Are they going to smack you on the nose with a rolled-up newspaper and say "Bad author! Bad!"?

Don't lie. You really do wish that were a part of your job description, right?

Oh my god, yes. But not about deadlines. We don't really care a whole lot when authors miss deadlines, unless it's by 2 weeks or something, because we deliberately build in time for them to miss the stated deadline. We expect it.

But for other ridiculous petty stuff, like arguing with us about fucking GRAMMAR, then yes, we have all desperately wished we could reach through the internets and whack the author on the nose.

Apparently it started snowing here right after I got to work and has been snowing steadily ever since.

I had no idea.

I just got a pretty nifty editrix/dominatrix visual with a snappy cat-of-nine-tails.

That was damned satisfying. I need a cigarette.

I just got a pretty nifty editrix/dominatrix visual with a snappy cat-of-nine-tails.

If I didn't actively avoid interacting with strangers, and if I didn't fear getting arrested for prostitution, I could make a really sweet living as a grammar dominatrix.

Part of me would be so happy to be a pedant dominatrix. *So* happy.

The rest of me runs screaming from the required reality.

The rest of me runs screaming from the required reality.

That right there is why I continue to toil as a vanilla editor. I suppose it would be possible to screen potential clients for any Ick factors, but when it comes to getting all yardstick-to-the-ass, pretty much anyone who isn't my boyfriend already has too high of an Ick factor.

I am right now on the other end of Typo's rant: caught between a difficult author (not that you are, Typo, but this guy can't follow instructions) and the layout team who keeps screwing up. The author is understandably annoyed that it's taking so long, I'm annoyed that he keeps sending me unusable files and that the layout guys keep screwing up, and the layout guys are annoyed that I'm not satisfied yet.

I'm annoyed that he keeps sending me unusable files

We had an author once who sent in his manuscript as a Word file -- with a hard return typed at the end of every line. We asked the author to re-do it without the hard returns, and he replied with "What is a hard return?"

So, okay, we explained it as a paragraph return. He replied with "I don't know what that is." We finally said, "When you typed your paper and came to the end of a line, you pressed the Return key to start a new line. Please do not do that."

He replied with, "I cannot make the changes you request because I do not understand what you are asking."

I still believe we were being punked, but OTOH, putting a hard return at the end of every line is a LOT of effort to go to just to piss off the people who are publishing you.

How can Shir's parents be my sister?

There's a term in Hebrew called Marit Ayin/Marris Ayin. It literally translates as "the appearance of the eye" and - refraining from a permitted action because Jews might see you and think you're really doing some other (forbidden) action - something you won't do/do if only for the sake of appearance.

Ha! I know this one. It's summed up by the joke "Why don't Church of Christ members have sex standing up? "Because someone might think they're dancing."

At my last job, so many people sent me files with hard returns that I wrote a macro strip them out. One reason you can't make them understand is that they don't have formatting marks on, the way god intended.

People in Rochester act like that about the first snowstorm of the year. Every year. And all of the sudden they are unable to drive. Or use caution in any way.

When those people move south, they spend winters loudly complaining about how Southerners can't drive in snow.

This Christmas I bought two laptops and two routers to bring back home for my family. Because they are who they are, both laptops needed to be fired up and fully configured before they got to their owners. Both routers had to be wiped, reinstalled with a new OS, and configured in place to extend their network both over the wire and wirelessly.

Why did my father keep checking up on my progress with his laptop before I even got there? Why did he keep chasing me down to see if the full-house coverage wireless network was up once I arrived?

Does this not look like a favour to anyone else? Doesn't he know that normal people turn on their laptops themselves?