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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What did the narrator's father realize after his first fight with his wife?
(a) She will always win.
(b) It's never, ever worth it.
(c) He loved a good fight.
(d) Only fight if you can win.

2. What example does the speaker use of the should have brackets when his father asks him if he hears static in the phone?
(a) {I'm hanging up the phone}.
(b) {I'm no longer listening}.
(c) {I'm crying into the phone}.
(d) {I cannot hear anything}.

3. What does the speaker call the severed web symbol?
(a) A Barely Tolerable Subsitute.
(b) An Inadequately Worded Idiom.
(c) A Scarcely Salvageable Sentence.
(d) A Hardly Acceptable Replacement.

4. What does the severed web mean, approximately?
(a) I see you.
(b) I love you.
(c) I need you.
(d) I loathe you.

5. What were some things the speaker's father's doctor advised him against doing due to the emotional stress these things caused him?
(a) Running or arguing with his wife.
(b) Watching Orioles games or thinking of the current administration.
(c) Cooking dinner or cleaning the house.
(d) Driving during rush hour or answering the phone.

Short Answer Questions

1. What symbol represents "the low point" in the speaker's familial communication?

2. What does the narrator's father attribute to his successful marriage?

3. What do the should have brackets denote?

4. Why does the speaker think he has become a yes man?

5. What does the original use of a lowpoint then to create?

Short Essay Questions

1. Why did the speaker's father's doctor advise against pulling weeds? What other things did he advice against?

2. Describe the snowflake and when it might be used.

3. Describe the conversation the speaker relays between mother and father to show use of the corroboration mark.

4. What does the speaker's father confess to him about his marriage after his 19th heart attack?

5. Describe the phone call between the speaker and his brother after he ended up in intensive care.

6. What are the should-have brackets?

7. What are the final words that remain unspoken, as shown by the use of the should-have brackets, between father and son in the final conversation of the story?

8. What does the speaker realize about himself after his father discusses how his brother was already a yes man?

9. What are low points? What conversation between the speaker and his mother does he use to exemplify their use?

10. What is one example the speaker gives of the use of a reversible colon?

(see the answer keys)

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