I am not a grammar goddess, as is quite obvious from my blog, but I do my best to adhere to the few rules that rattle around in my head. I have a number of books on the subject on the bookshelf within closest reach of my chair, which also contains other useful reference texts such as as my obese, but beloved, dictionary, and thesaurus. The oldest of them, the first book on grammar I voluntarily bought, is still the one I check the most frequently: The Elements of Style, by Strunk and White. That slim volume contains a world of sense, and is written in such precise and clean…