I am participating in the 31 Days of Free Writes October challenge. This is meant to be a free write, which means: no editing, no over-thinking, no worrying about perfect grammar or punctuation.
Today’s prompt: Overcome
I mistyped a word at work today (you know, the place with the pristine editing standards?) and did not realize until several hours later when I saw the final version (which an editor had, thankfully, corrected).
I was summarizing a really interesting piece about how vendors have to overcome their reluctance to engage a client in some difficult questions when something goes wrong — that it’s more the tendency to fall all over themselves creating some new process to fix the problem or prevent it in the future.
The problem with that overreaction is … it doesn’t address the root cause and ultimately DOESN’T help the client because the problem will inevitably arise again if it isn’t fixed.
Throughout the article, the author talked about measuring things — and he used the word “gage” (his spelling — this is important) SIXTEEN TIMES.
Therefore, I typed it that way when summarizing the article.
The problem? He was convinced he was right.
But he wasn’t.
And I, trying to be quick and efficient, turned off the part of my brain that would in any other situation have sent out a red alert that he meant “gauge.”
There’s currently an ad campaign on CNN that shows a picture of an apple. The WORDS of the ad say “banana banana banana” — point being that no matter what people call it, the apple is still an apple (and CNN’s point is about fake news but I’ll leave that for a different day).
Such a parallel for those times in life when we are so overcome by the repetition of the wrong thing that it starts to sound right.
Wife of one, Mom of two, Friend of many. My pronouns are she/her/hers.
I have trouble overlooking typos in books when I read them, but so far I have overcome the temptation to contact the author just to tell them about their typos! Thanks for sharing! FMF #7.
Oh I do too. I truly despise typos in books, especially if I have spent $25+ on a hardcover. Proofreading isn’t the priority it used to be, unfortunately. I have accepted that (mostly) on social media – everyone is in a hurry there. But I still place a high high value on accuracy — it shows the writer cares.
Great post, Paula. I’ve pretty well given up on mainstream media; the Christian Science Monitor is one of the few outlets I still trust.
Too many people trying to hard to convince me that they’re right, when they can’t even get facts – facts I DO know – straight. Yuck.
I totally hear you on that, Andrew. Since I work from home, in the afternoons I can choose to have the news on the whole time if I want to (my morning work requires too much concentration). I think it is messing with my mental health. Thanks for stopping by.
Oh Paula, I have been in your shoes before too. I think it’s why I’m overly cautious about errors.
It’s a blessing and a curse for sure! 🙂