Are you up for Dewy Decimals meets Diagnosis: Buzzworditis.

The new weatherperson on our NBC TV affiliate here in Boston set the table for today with "It looks like we're in store for sunshine...."

No doubt you pounced on the misused like and substituted as if, recalling that like is not an introducer of clauses. But did you find and fix that other thing? If not, penitently peruse this reissue of an item from CW, 12/99-1/00, p. 36: "A national business publication noted ...that 'Consumers who are cranking up their air conditioning may think electric companies are in store for a bonanza.'"

"Beware in store. Webster's New World College Dictionary (4th ed. 1999) says 'In store -- set aside for, or awaiting one in, the future; in reserve or prospect.' So even if a windfall did lie ahead for the electric companies, the writer presented the fact badly. Re-read the definition and you will doubtless agree that the sentence should say, 'Consumers who are cranking [air cons] may think a bonanza is in store for electric companies."'

* Make that revised forecast read "Looks as if sunshine's in store for us...." From Vox Populi Communications, Ottawa, Ontario, courtesy of owner/driver Christopher McKillop, came this notification dated June 15: "A great one for your column: I recently received a newsletter from CODE, a Canadian organization that supports literacy programs in developing countries. In an article on CODE'S work in Tanzania, the very first sentence set the stage with the author's thoughts on his own school library. There, readers (many of whom are teachers and librarians) were treated to.... 'Books catalogued according to the dewy decimal system.' I can only guess that they were catalogued early in the morning, before the sun had a chance to dry them off."

Audio-based spelling will hole your boat every time; the American librarian and founder of the decimal system of classification (in 1876) was New Yorker Melvil Dewey (1851-1931), so spelled. CW thanks CM, whose domain name includes the curiosity cyberus. One wonders about a possible descent from mythology's baddest junkyard dog, Cerberus, the triple-header who kept the riffraff away from Hades' portal.

* Kathleen Much, who does her editing in the shadow of fair Stanford and possesses laser vision when the subject is solecisms, filed twin indictments on June 15: "What a difference an 'r' makes! New York Times 12 June 2001, p. A29. "'[In Iran] a woman was stoned to death for staring in lewd films.' It wasn't watching, it was participating that earned her the death penalty." Starring.

Later, just after supper, KM returned to rat-out Reuters: "'RAYFHEON CO. said it had been jointly awarded a U.S. Marine Corp. contract...to develop a new combined military command center. Raytheon said [it and other companies] will develop [the system] for the Marine Corp.'

"No, this isn't the Marine Corporation. It's the Marine Corps.(!) You'd think Reuters would know the difference." Roger that, Kathleen. How important is major-league proofreading? Each of these cites proceeds from a one-letter error that distracted and derailed the reader.

* Further word to this e-dress arrived from step-daughter Pamela, who computes for a Boston financial shop: "From a memo I received 6/27: 'Four subsections are included; previously critical events which are not critical in nature, default critical and action message processing, criticalization of informational messages, and finally processing of non-EMS (tandem.ems event 512) generated messages.'

"Now I ask you, what the heck is criticalization???"

I fear I'd have to post that question to the whole memo, but that's my problem. Your problem is that no on-site lexicon -- from the Shorter Oxford English on down -- gives houseroom to this six-syllable teratoid, albeit most show nouns criticality and criticalness. Diagnosis: acute buzzworditis. Query the author; watch him squirm.

* Controller v. comptroller. Paul R. Martin's Wall Street Journal Stylebook says the former "is generally the proper term for financial officers of businesses and for other positions such as air-traffic controller. Comptroller is generally the accurate term for government financial officers: the comptroller of the currency, the state comptroller."

Alden Wood, APR, lecturer on editorial procedures at Simmons College, Boston, Mass., writes and lectures on language usage. He is a retired insurance industry vice president of advertising and public relations. His e-dress is [e-mail]