I come across a lot of terrible writing through my job. One e-mail “letter” that I read recently has been bugging me a lot, not just because it’s so awful in terms of grammar and punctuation but because it’s just plain stupid and drives home the fact that, often, when you want something, you mostly need to be coherent and kind to the person you’re asking. I think about this in terms of this letter (we’ll get back to the letter in a minute) but it applies to all kinds of situations.