While living in London, I worked for an irate Scotsman named Stuart Murray. He kept a bottle of whiskey in his desk drawer and, quite rightly, often accused me of being a terrible secretary. For example, I once took a message from someone at "The Golden Fax," assuming it was an office supply store and not realizing there was a financial firm named "Goldman Sachs." But I digress.
Stuart Murray used to dictate his letters in a heavy, drunken Scottish accent. I often assumed words I didn't understand were just Scottish or British slang, so I spelled them phoenitically. Quite predictably, I was wrong most of the time. While reading the letters I had typed, Stuart Murray would peer over his reading glasses, stare through me for a moment or two, then slur, "Raaaachel. I have a handy feature on my computer that you apparently don't have on yours. All my misspelled words are underlined with a red squiggly line. I see we'll have to install that feature on your computer. Hmmm...."
I think Stuart Murray should pay a visit to the Star Tribune copy editing desk. They must not have the handy red squiggly line feature either.
The worst part is that I took a screen shot, assuming they would correct the problem immediately. As of this posting, however, it still reads "istory."
1 comment:
That's too funny Raaaachel! I can totally imagine that scotsman and his dissatisfaction with your secretarial skills (remember, I've been a legal secretary and an executive assistant so I'm familiar with that brand of dissatisfaction, also in my case, deserved). I can also imagine an English accent saying "istory" and being rather out of place in a midwestern newspaper. Keep up the good blog. i look forward to your musings every day!
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