Did you feel the earth shake? I opened my mailbox this evening and nearly dropped my mail in the street: My new issue of Southern Living had arrived...and it was perfect-bound.

For years, Rex has cited Southern Living's saddle stitching as an anomaly in the magazine industry. It makes more sense for large magazines to perfect-bind -- meaning the edge of the magazine is flat like a book binding -- than to saddle-stitch, using staples down the middle.

But for years, though Southern Living regularly runs well over 100 pages, they've continued to saddle-stitch. The conventional wisdom has said, It's not broken, so they're not fixing it. Through slumps in the magazine industry, Southern Living held steady on ads and subscriptions, so why mess with a formula that was working?

According to an article in Media Week last fall, SL has finally felt the economic effects that hit other magazines far more frequently. The redesign in my mailbox today is aimed at a younger demographic than their average reader [over 50 now], hoping to attract new advertisers and subscribers.

From the looks of it, they're aiming at the Seven Sisters magazines [the ones you think of when you think "women's magazine" -- Better Homes & Gardens, Family Circle, Good Housekeeping, McCall's, Ladies Home Journal, Redbook and Woman's Day]] and perhaps a little at O, Real Simple and Martha Stewart Living. They've expanded a section on healthy living into a regular feature. And the interior design -- well you'd easily think you're flipping through Family Circle unless you looked at the folio.

I don't say that as a negative; I think the new design is a nice, fresh look and it fits the content well. I can't wait to hear about the reaction from Southern Living readers, though. SL's design has been so stable for so long that although many of these changes are subtle in and of themselves, the very fact of a change may hit some readers in the face. They've even changed their font for body copy.

But me, well, I'm all about change. I say, good job, and congratulations for taking the leap! For more, get Rex's take. Like me, he's now curious to see how the market will react:

Why did Time Inc. allow Southern Living to stick with saddle stitching for so long? ...here’s my semi-educated guess: Time Inc. has been afraid to anger the tens of thousands of readers who have vast collections of past issues of the magazine displayed on bookcases. ... Again, that’s a theory. Surely, the Southern Living folks went beyond the typical reader research to isolate collectors of the magazine to gauge what their response will be. They did, surely? If not, this should be a very interesting experiment in what happens when one ignores the obvious.

"Have your photo's enlarged for just $1.99!"

Those were the flashing red words on a huge drug-store marquee when I drove by last week. And as I type this in Word, it doesn't understand the problem.

The problem is: That sentence -- the word "photos" -- does not need an apostrophe.

Apostrophes serve several purposes, the two most common are to show possession and contraction. (As a refresher, a contraction is a shortened form of a word or group of words where the missing letters are replaced by an apostrophe. Example: we+will=we'll, should+not=shouldn't.)

The word "photos" as it should be above is simply plural, not possessive. And it's certainly not a contraction.

Example: We'll take John's car to the meeting.
Example: Don't let Julia's daughter leave before giving her a hug.

Other not-so-common uses of the apostrophe
An apostrophe is used when one or more letters or numbers have been left out of a word.

Example: I am part of the graduating class of '90.
Example: Top o' the mornin' to you!

Another rule, one that looks funny and is hard to remember because it does: When a word calls for two apostrophes, simply eliminate the second one.

Example: Patrick is learning the do's and don'ts of driving in Nashville traffic.

Which brings up the final common use of apostrophes: Use an apostrophe when creating the plural form of a letter, number, sign or word discussed as a word, not as its form of speech.

Example: He knows the do's, now he just needs to work on the don'ts.
Example: Please remove all B's and 9's from this page.

If you're just bustin' at the seams to learn more, Grammar Girl takes the apostrophe discussion a step further in a recent post. Enjoy! We sure do.

At Hammock, we work with several great photographers around the country who never cease to amaze us with their creativity and ability to tell stories with their work. One of our favorite photographers to work with in the Bay area is Eric Millette (ericmillettephotography.com) who posted this stunning photo (large view) of himself on the Hammock T-shirt map. After seeing it, we immediately had to track him down to find out more about it. We were so impressed with it, indeed, we've decided to donate one computer to the OLPC Foundation in his name.

Here's a Q&A e-mail exchange Rex Hammock had with with Eric about his Hammock T-shirt photo.