The blue rectangle tells you that the word was replace by an
AutoCorrect entry. Hover the mouse over the rectangle to get an
AutoCorrect Options button, which will let you undo the change, stop
correcting that word if it's typed again, or open the options dialog.

Just for fun, type the word "unusual" into the Help search box and
press Enter. You should get a link to the topic "I see something
unusual in my document". That topic covers almost all the nonprinting
characters, underlines, and other squiggles Word can show. The
AutoCorrect box is listed under "Smart tags and other buttons".

--
Regards,
Jay Freedman
Microsoft Word MVP FAQ: http://word.mvps.org
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the
newsgroup so all may benefit.

On Tue, 11 Apr 2006 19:48:10 -0700, "Al Gillis"
wrote:

Wow, Suzanne... This was a cool reference! It explains a lot of little
thinkgs I've wondered about!

So here's one more mystery symbol that browsing around the WordMVP pages
didn't clear up. Using Word 2002 and 2003 a little blue rectangle (blue on
my screen, anyway) will appear from time to time under some characters -
first character in a word. What in the Wide, Wide World of Sports is that
trying to tell me?

Thanks, too, for your excellent help almost every day!

Al


"Suzanne S. Barnhill" wrote in message
...
See http://word.mvps.org/FAQs/Formatting/NonPrintChars.htm

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
Word MVP FAQ site: http://word.mvps.org
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup
so
all may benefit.

"Tom Brown" wrote in message
...
We have been using MS Word for years on another computer and we just got
a
new machine. So, I loaded Office 2003 and the first time I opened an
existing document, I see formatting symbols that I have never seen
before.

Specifically, I see the Paragraph symbol at the end of each paragraph and
the CR (carriage return, enter, whatever you call it ) symbol at the end
of
all the other lines.

I am using the Normal view and can't find any way to get rid of those
formatting symbols. If I go to the Reading Layout, it looks normal.

TIA,

Tom