Why use a modifier to set straight a not-quite-right noun when the right noun is available?

Dangling punch lines to forgotten stories remain in the language like the smile of the Cheshire cat.

After eating, an epicure gives a thin smile of satisfaction; a gastronome, burping into his napkin, praises the food in a magazine; a gourmet, repressing his burp, criticizes the food in the same magazine; a gourmand belches happily and tells everybody where he ate; a glutton empraces the white porcelain alter, or more plainly, he barfs.

If you re-read your work, you can find on re-reading a great deal of repetition can be avoided by re-reading and editing.

A dependent clause is like a dependent child: incapable of standing on its own but able to cause a lot of trouble.

The first ladyship is the only federal office in which the holder can neither be fired nor impeached.

Sir Alec Douglas-Home, when he was British Foreign Secretary, said he received the following telegram from an irate citizen: "To hell with you. Offensive letter follows."