An author writes ...
 
"By the time we were finished, it had gotten dark." 
 
"We were both drinking coffee. Melanie had ordered a soft-boiled egg and toast."
 
"I nodded. Henry and I had finished our beer. She was still on her second glass of wine."
 
... so I know he knows how to do it. And then he writes, as the opening line of a chapter, two-thirds of the way through an almost-error-free novel ...
 
"I had worked a few years back on a drive-by shooting."
 
Were he trying to slip an error past my scrutiny, so he could write and say, "nyah, nyah", he would have been less obvious about it. So why did he do it?
 
Initially, he was defensive about his misuse of the verb form but it now seems he may have taken it less as criticism, something to deny and defend against, and more as useful suggestion, even enlightenment.
 
I suppose the answer to the question, "Why did he do it?", is that old habits do indeed die hard.
 
.brad.mon.29dec08.


      

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