When you have a long value in one cell and the cell(s) to the right has no value, Excel displays the text overlapping the blank cells. You can set the cell format to Wrap Text to keep the text within the cell so you can see all of the text, but the row height changes to accommodate the extra text. What if you want the text to look as though it is "cut off" when it reaches the adjacent blank cells(s)? Here's a trick I found. Add a new column betwen the column containing the values and the column you don't want text to overlap into. In the first cell of the new column type a single quote followed by a space (' ). Copy that cell down to all rows. Set the new column width to one (setting it to zero or hiding it doesn't work and the text will again overlap the next column).

re: ""What if you want the text to look as though it is "cut off" Could you give me an example of why I would want to that?

There may be times when the data that overlaps across blank cells might be interpreted (like in a printed listing not showing gridlines) as data that occurs in the second column and you really need to show that that second column really is blank on certain rows. Maybe you're only interested in seeing the first part of the first column and don't need to see/show the entire value. You can still "see" in the "formula bar" at the top the entire value in the first column, but it won't be running across the other cell next to it causing possible confusion.