Grammar Moses: Where did I put that modifier?

I sometimes enjoy testing the limits of my car stereo after a long day of telling other people what to do.

In the morning, however, I need calm. Were it not for the obvious safety hazard, I might burn a soothing sandalwood and myrrh candle on the dashboard to accompany the dulcet voice of Mary Dixon delivering me the news on National Public Radio.

My peace was interrupted last week, however, when during a story an interviewee said, "Everyone is not computer-literate."

I'm sure if the big brains in our IT department had heard that, their peace would have been similarly interrupted.

To say "everyone is not computer-literate" is a poke in the eye with a sharp stick to anyone who studied computer science or anyone younger than, say, 13.

I assume what the interviewee meant to convey was "Not everyone is computer-literate."

See the difference?

I am evidence of not everyone being computer-literate. I can't even figure out how to find my wife's trove of family photos on the disk drive to which I downloaded them.

Here lies the importance of the order of words.

Here is another troublesome example: "I saw a brightly painted fire hydrant on the way to the Super Bowl."

Most fire hydrants I've encountered are decidedly stationary. So to see one making its way to the Super Bowl would be quite something, especially if it were painted in the red and gold of the Kansas City Chiefs.

A better way to write it would be: "While on the way to the Super Bowl, I saw a brightly painted fire hydrant."

Here's another: "The teacher served brownies to the kindergartners on flowered napkins."

What were the students doing on flowered napkins? Is this a new nap time tradition?

The goal is to modify the brownies, not the kindergartners.

A better way to write it: "The teacher served the kindergartners brownies on flowered napkins."

6 times?

Constant reader Stan Zegel sent me a rather jarring headline from a British newspaper: "Mother who gave birth to 'one in a million' identical twin sisters with Down syndrome reveals she was advised to abort them six times."

I'm likely not the first person to notice the propensity of UK headline writers to engage in hyperbole. It must be all of the competition on the newsstands there.

In this case, though, I'm guessing the shock value was wholly unintended.

I'll try to be uncharacteristically sensitive here: Anyone knows that when it comes to abortion, once is enough. By definition. You cannot abort the same pregnancy six times.

The better headline would have been: "Mother who gave birth to 'one in a million' identical twin sisters with Down syndrome reveals she was advised six times to abort them."

Write carefully!

• Jim Baumann is vice president/managing editor of the Daily Herald. Write him at jbaumann@dailyherald.com. Put Grammar Moses in the subject line. You also can friend or follow Jim at facebook.com/baumannjim.