!!!!!!!!!

Woe is me again. As a repeated offender of the overuse of the exclamation mark, I am suitably put in my place by the Benevolent Dictator for Life I am indeed chastened. I just can't help it! It's a dreadful habit I have, almost akin to addiction to that lovely exclamation mark. I use it perpetually, even when I know I shouldn't, and even as I type this, my fingers are twitching to shove it on to the end of every sentence....... !  Argh! Couldn't help myself! It even sits at the end of every sentence in every sermon I've ever preached.


After today, things are going to be different, because I'm embarking on a Twelve Step Programme to cure my addiction. Others can join me.



1. We admitted we were powerless over exclamation marks—that our lives had become
unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to
sanity and stop us being obsessed by a line with a dot at the bottom.
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives and our grammatical errors over to the care of God as we understood Him.
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves, and our overuse of exclamation marks.
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature
of our wrongs and promised that full stops will do us from now on.
6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character especially as far as exclamation marks are concerned at least.
7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings, including our use of these dreadful things
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed by using exclamation marks, and became willing to make
amends to them all.
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, especially the Benevolent Dictator, except when to do so would injure them or others.
10. Continued to take personal inventory and, when we misused exclamation mark, promptly
admitted it.
11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with
God, as we understood Him, praying only for strength to use more periods
and the power to carry that out.
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to
carry this message to other exclamation mark users, and to practice these principles in all our
affairs.