Why don’t people start their letters with Dear So-and-So anymore? Every letter or e-mail I receive is all “Hey Austin,” (punctuation tip: it’s “Hey, Austin”) or just “Austin,”. Forget that! I use Dear as salutation in personal and business correspondence and I refuse to kowtow to the forces of awkwardness.
What do you think? Am I just being my future crotchety older self again?
Yes, dear.
(Ooh, I hate to point it out – and I’m sure CMOS will back me here – but “Hey Austin,” [one comma] is grammatically correct and stylistically preferable.)
Not only did your wife demonstrate why I don’t use “Dear” when emailing you, but she also confirmed what I suspected about your punctuation complaint. My MSN and email habits shall not be broken!
Shazam! You always need a comma after Hey. Even “Hey Jude” is wrong, and I don’t call the Beatles ‘wrong’ lightly. Although I couldn’t find any websites on it in the thirty seconds I looked.
Prove it.