New email: "Can you tell me how to edit in a PDF document?"

Reply I can't send: "That's the whole point, jackass; we don't want you altering the content of the article."

Reply I sent: "The textual content of a PDF file cannot be altered, but you may indicate corrections using the comment tool."

I am 100% positive that this guy won't know what that is or how to use it, and will need instructions (I don't actually have an instruction sheet or anything, because we assume our authors can use Acrobat). This is fucking ridiculous.

"Good news! I converted the PDF to a Word document! I will re-convert it back to a PDF before I submit it!"

It's cute when they think they're being helpful.

My plans for today involve talking to an old manager and officially expressing interest in roles based in California. After work, I'm on a mission for Cinderella shoes rather than an Elsa dress, because reasons.

Surgery went well (it was a secondary infundibular cyst making a large bump on my forehead) except for the part where I squeaked when they injected anesthetic. There seems to be a pain path directly from my forehead into my vocal cords.

(Infundibular is a fun word to say. All that it is, is a hair follicle gone rogue. Essentially it traps all the natural oil your average follicle produces and just grows. Ick.)

I'm not supposed to remove the bandage until tomorrow, and have to go back next week to get the stitches out. No prescriptions, no special instructions aside from not scrubbing at it hard. It's nice when "minor surgery" really is minor.

Stephs author is being crazy, of course, but I will say that it is frustrating to do anything other than the smallest editing in the pdf when your bibliographic program and figures are native to Word. It would be better if authors and editors could collaborate on the lossless version of the manuscript.

I'll tell another one. Some journals will not accept figures generated in Excel, because they are not high enough resolution. However, if you print out the Excel figure and then scan it back in at a (meaningless) high resolution, the figure is acceptable to the journal. When faced with the prospect of learning a new graphics program to finish a paper they long since stopped caring about, people fire up the printer and git er done.

Holy crap, he figured out how to do it! And helpfully emailed me to tell me "Ok...figured out how to do that...thx."

I should have said "Ask your daughter, dude."

It's cute when they think they're being helpful.

For values of cute that include screams.

Theo, I have one of those. Did you go to a dermatologist or your primary care doc? (My primary care doc says he can remove it, and I generally trust him, but I feel like a dermatologist would be better equipped to handle it.)

Mine is up past my hairline, so it's not visible, which is why I've been putting it off.

For values of cute that include screams.

Screams, sure, and also violently wishing that you could punch someone through the intertubes.

Totally makes sense, Rick. And I can see how if you're savvy, it would seem unfair that you can't just keep using track changes in Word or something! You'd think there'd be a way to require that to stay on or something.

Yeah, certain people here like to give me edits that aren't tracked and it makes me nuts. And I miss half of them, because fuck that noise, I don't trust that they are that valuable! Except, of course when they are. Just track changes, people! I need better version control.