Blogging from #AtoZChallenge - Swam/swum and Santana

I had to include swam/swum in my grammar challenge because it's a rule I just recently learned - when I used it in my ms. I used to think it was just personal choice or maybe a Brittish vs US thing. Nope, there's an actual rule and it's not too hard to remember.

The past tense of swim is swam, but it's changed to swum when preceded by a helper verb.

Example: (from my MG sci-fi ms MIGHTY MIKE SAVES MARS)
Mike already knew he could handle small spaces since he’d swum into an underwater cave when a Jellybean turned him into a fish.

In this example "he'd" is the contraction of "he had" and had is a helper verb. And since I didn't do helper verbs for H, here's a link to a list of helper verb and a handy mnemonic to remember them (which coincidentally involves the word "swim"!)

Santana is a gorgeous arab gelding that also came from our favorite rescue. One of my boarder's bought him. He had actually been surrendered to the rescue as a donation, and his purchase price was a bit higher than normal. But he came with registration papers, was in beautiful condition and had been well trained.

Have you ever gotten a pet from a rescue or the Humane Society? My rescues include dogs and horses and some of them have been better than we ever expected. Partly cuz I'm just not into potty training puppies!