A PSA for regular twc readers
A reader over at Jerry Pournelle’s Chaos Manor in Review points out something I frequently gnash my teeth over here at twc. In reference to a posting of a long ago article Dr. Pournelle wrote for a now-defunct publication, the reader points out:
Your new [as in “newly-posted”–ed.] report begins, “In the 1980’s, I was [and] editor and columnist for SURVIVE Magazine.” The built-in Microsoft checker has no problem with that, even though VERB COORDINATOR NOUN makes no sense.
As I age, something happens ever more frequently. As my mind gets several words ahead, I unwittingly type a similar, but incorrect word, in place of the intended one. Spell checkers let those fall right through the cracks.
“As I age…” I experience much the same phenomenon. In addition to my already excreble typing “skills” (I type by the “biblical method”–“seek and ye shall find”) that result in all kindsa typos, I too frequently get ahead of myself or get lost in a train of thought waiting for my typing to catch up with my thoughts. Sure, a bare 35-40 wpm is pretty bad to begin with, but I tend to think at, oh, I dunno, about 300-500 wpm, so… *heh* (Yeh, I don’t talk nearly as fast as I think the words, either, although I’m sometimes accused of talking too fast for my listeners. Makes for some interesting conversations as I sometimes skip ahead several steps in an argument/conversation or wait for the conversation to roll around to where I already am… although folks don’t always bother to consult their script. *LOL*).
So it goes.
Words jump the queue. Whole thoughts are dropped or skipped. There are never enough words or sentences or paragraphs to fully express any given idea. Tough. The “holes and gaps, lacks and losses, absences, insipidies and the like” that plague my blogging along with queue-jumping words (or parts of words, sometimes!) are just what they are, and likely to stay that way. As Pournelle says of his blog, “It’s a daybook” and not all that intensively edited at that.
So, I’ll just continue slogging along at my herky-jerky pace and hope y’all read between the lines (or paragraphs, sometimes ;-)) and use those queue-jumping words, when possible, to aid the process.
I hear you. Although my typing moves a bit faster than yours apparently does (been clocked at 100+ wpm on a good day) the problem of typos actually doesn’t always get much better. In some ways, it’s worse, because by the time I realize I’ve made one I’m 19 words down the line and have to go back to grab the offender, by which time the train of thought is two stations on down the line and I’ve no hope of catching it again. Same problem, different day. So don’t worry – we’re all in this together, and at least sometimes the “typos that get by” add humor and insight.
One hint though: if you’re as prone to the “ones spellcheck doesn’t get” as I am, avoid use of the word “public” at all costs. Of all the unintended-but-not-technically-misspelled words that can cause problems, that’s among the worst (and most entertaining, if it’s not you making the error). Seen it in quite a few legal documents, and it always raises an eyebrow.
Yeh, I’d like to blame old fingers, etc., but I’ve always been a rather indifferent keyboardist. makes for some fun command line sessions.
What’s wrong with using the word “pubic”? Are neo-victorian bowdlerizers gonna jump me in the dark and beat me with their purses? *heh*