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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 is the purpose of the backup?
(a) It is used to repeat what you said so the person to whom you are speaking can understand.
(b) It is used to restart a conversation when you were too distracted to listen.
(c) It is used to erase what you said and rephrase.
(d) It is used to replay a sentence and discover what might have been missed.

2. The speaker uses a conversation between himself and which relative as an example of the low point?
(a) His father.
(b) His brother.
(c) His grandmother.
(d) His mother.

3. What sentence is NOT used as an example of when the reversible colon is appropriate?
(a) I've never felt loved by anyone outside of my family::my persistent depression.
(b) Sex::yes.
(c) I want a better life::my family.
(d) My eyes water when I speak about my family::I don't like to speak about my family.

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

5. What are some things the speaker might be doing when he imagines his family's versions of the should-haves?
(a) Taking a walk or a shower.
(b) Shopping or doing his taxes.
(c) Reading a book or making dinner.
(d) Having sex or driving.

Short Answer Questions

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

2. How may fights have the speaker's parent had in all of their marriage?

3. What were some things the speaker's father's doctor advised him against doing due to the emotional stress these things caused him?

4. How many heart attacks had the speaker's father suffered when he told his son the secret to his successful marriage?

5. What did the speaker call his brother and say after finding out he was in intensive care?

Short Essay Questions

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

2. What does the severed web symbolize? What does the speaker call this?

3. 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?

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

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

6. What are the should-have brackets?

7. What is something the speaker and his brother do not discuss? How do you know?

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

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

10. What did the speaker's brother learn after first experiencing chest pains and ultimately ending up in intensive care?

(see the answer keys)

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