Hypin' The Hyphen

Little-known fact: when you have a two-part phrase that describes something, the two parts need to be connected with a hyphen. The hyphen shows that they're working together.

Otherwise it seems like each one applies individually, which may or may not be the case. For example, if your friend runs her own bakery, you could say she's a small-business owner. But if you call her a small business owner she could get mad, and punch you with her tiny fists.

It really shouldn't come up too often. And there are exceptions, this being English and all (the most commonly encountered example being the -ly ending -- no hyphen, then) but overall just remember that if you need both adjectives, you probably need to draw that little line between them.

And now I'd like to close with the following little known fact: