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You’re not going to believe this. Frankly, I’m not sure that I do.
I’ve just found a plea for help written under my bathroom basin.
Seriously.
It’s even dated.
I had dropped an earring and, when I bent to pick it up, caught a glimpse of thick black letters. I thought at first that it was simply builder’s scribble as these things usually are.
Then I realised what it actually said and took a closer look.
Help!
Holy Moly!
Now, given that it is dated 2007, I’m guessing that it’s too late to spring to the rescue at this stage.
I’m also not quite sure where North Carolina is located in relation to San Antonio.
I can however imagine an employee at a building supplies shop or a plumber absolutely cracking up as they wrote this on the basin. You know, “Hey dude, let’s see if this fools anyone!”
Hardeharhar etc…
Nevertheless the responsible side of me is screaming, “Tell someone! Call the police! DO something!”
Yeah. I find that side of me annoying too.
So I’m telling all of you.
Advice please.
In the meantime, I think I’ve just got an idea for a book…
ttfn
S.
Well, here it is. My first blog rant – and on apostrophes.
According to a Colgate toothpaste commercial I saw on tv a few minutes ago:
“One in four Australian’s have tooth decay.”
Really? One in four Australian’s what … precisely?
Who signed off on this ad and do they still have a job?
What’s with the possessive apostrophe? And why was it accompanied by footage of a number of people in white lab coats?
Was the idea to give the impression that this mob was uber-intelligent and should therefore be taken seriously?
It didn’t work. Mostly because one doesn’t have to be a superbrain to know when an apostrophe is appropriate and when it is simply visual clutter.
In this case, it was somewhat like the zit that pops up in the dead centre of your nose an hour before a very important first date. That is, not terribly attractive and totally unnecessary.
It’s not that hard to use apostrophes. Really.
I’m serious.
I’ve set it out in very simple terms on my website; four pages in short words and really big type, starting with this one: Apostrophes 101
It’s not something that (supposedly) highly-intelligent people dressed in white coats should get wrong – especially if they want me to buy their stuff. Makes you wonder if their chemical formulae are written out properly and what the resultant toothpaste will actually do!
Good grief.
Time for some deep breathing before other people in white coats show up methinks…
ttfn
S.
I am back, bleary-eyed and listless, from the Emerald City. Those who don’t reside in Oz may know it better as Sydney.
It is a phenomenon in its own right and one to which I shall dedicate no further words… because I didn’t see much of it really.
What I did see quite a bit of was the Olympics. They are — apparently — mandatory viewing in all public areas. Well, the swimming, certainly. It’s a cultural expectation that all Australians be exposed to as much pool-side vision as possible once every four years.
Now, while I am no sports fan (being inherently non-competitive and fatally co-operative in my nature) I must confess to like watching the swimming. Probably because it doesn’t involve a ball. And it’s over really quickly.
I can safely report that all airport lounges and gates (as well as hotel dining rooms and restaurants) have a box in the corner for the diversion of this nation of armchair sportsmen.
No, really.
What caught my attention, however, was not the record-breaking performances of the home side, but the appalling quality of the subtitles going live to air for the edification of the deaf.
In order to allow our aurally challenged countrymen to also experience immersion in the Olympic spirit, sports commentaries, interviews and chit chat amongst various sporting types (with broad shoulders, gleaming smiles and carefully tousled hair styles) is being transcribed into subtitles for their viewing pleasure.
This is obviously being done by someone completely unfamiliar with the Australian accent. The resultant sub-titular gibberish is now a serious medal contender in the Chinglish replacement stakes.
The transcribers should be slated as replacements for targets in the firearm events.
Honestly, if a scribe is unable to understand the vernacular that they are listening to (and which is the native idiom of the intended reading public) then they are unqualified for the job at hand and should be given the flick.
What is the point of transcribing hours of conversation – to be displayed two lines at a time – if the resulting text means absolutely nothing at all? Isn’t this just adding insult to injury? I feel that it displays a complete lack of respect for the intended audience and reeks of grudging compliance with someone else’s rules.
Was there a requirement that the official broadcaster also provide sub-titles for deaf viewers? (My lack of interest in the Olympics is the cause of my ignorance here.) If so, who was the bright spark who thought that having any arrangement of letters appearing at a constant rate qualifies as providing comprehensive sub-titles? Why are separate syllables appearing as different words in a nonsensical string?
The great Aussie diphthong appears to completely confound the scribes: towels at one stage were referred to as toe rails. I don’t know why. And I don’t think it is a case of voice recognition software run wild either. The wording doesn’t change to reflect context and there is no inherent sense in much of what appears.
While it did all provide me with much involuntary hilarity and quite a few belly laughs, I wonder what our deaf sports fans are making of it all? Is it a case of roads to Hell and good intentions, or simply an exercise in condescension?
How does this audience feel when they realise that the network executives don’t actually care about the quality of the product they are airing purely for their benefit? Would they rather get nothing than this dog’s breakfast of errors?
This provides an object lesson to all writers. Remember your audience, realise the limitations and provide written work of a consistent quality which actually gets the message across.
A message which does not communicate is no message at all.
Time to sleep.
S.
Well, the website is UP and looks pretty darned good – even if I do say so myself!
Have a look and tell me what you think. (Drum roll, please.)
Ta da!
I have spent the better part of the last week wrestling with it while enduring the related experiential learning and on-the-job training. I think I may have sworn quite a bit too.
As a direct result of this adventure within the labyrinth of website building, I intend to spend tomorrow pickling apples.
I’m sure you understand.
Besides, it will help me to reacquaint myself with the room I refer to as my kitchen … I hope.
I seem to remember having one, I just can’t remember the way to get there or what colour it is painted. This must change. Soon.
I get my best ideas while cooking.
My intention is to start posting regularly now that the website situation is fairly stable. And a few things have caught my eye over the last week.
There has been quite a bit of chatter here in the wonderful land of Oz about high school students being able to graduate while functionally illiterate; and someone in the UK is suggesting that spelling variants should be accepted for the sake of keeping the peace. <insert horrified gasp here>
No doubt I’ll find something to say about both those things and others.
In the meantime, here’s a sneak preview of my next “Perils of spellcheck” page to be published.
One of my editing colleagues was booking accommodation on-line recently and came across an hotel that offered panoramic views of the horizon for their guests’ “atheistic pleasure.”
We think they may have meant asthetic pleasure, but Heaven only knows!
ttfn
S.
I read an article this morning about classes in penmanship being run for senior students of high schools in New South Wales.
Keyboard Kids lose the art of handwriting
.
Apparently these teenagers are so accustomed to keyboarding, texting and so on that their handwriting is illegible – and they now need it for their senior exams! Oh dear.
What fascinated me about this piece was that it discussed the links between handwriting and other aspects of a person’s development; socially and intellectually. I’ll deal with one of those issues in this post.
It was pointed out that “Handwriting is an important expression of a student’s personality.” I’m sure we have all known a person who insists on dotting their lower case letter “i”s with a circle, or a smiley face or a love heart. Perhaps we even ARE those people.
We have seen our grandparent’s beautiful cursive writing, wondered over the copper-plate script of earlier generations (while trying to decipher it) and tried to get our own writing good enough to be allowed to use a pen in class. I know that I take particular delight in watching my 3 year old nephew biting on his tongue while he is trying to drive a crayon on paper.
Mind you, I also chuckle watching his 69 year old grandfather biting on his tongue while trying to drive a car – but I digress.
There is something about having total control over a writing implement that says you’ve officially made it to the status of individual. You are your own person when your handwriting is clearly recognisable as yours. When you can address an envelope, leave off the return address and know that the recipient will identify you as the sender before they even open it… well, that has a kind of magic to it.
It’s like writing “Hello, old friend” in invisible ink.
I know that there was a time in my life when my penmanship skills disappeared completely and it devastated me. I had carefully schooled myself out of the university scrawl I had acquired during my Masters degree and regained something that was really quite nice. I could even do the same left-handed!
Then my hands stopped doing what I was telling them to do and I could write no more. There were no elephant stamps for me for quite some time. Even now, each time I pick up a pen, there is a dread moment of suspense before I learn if I can write that day.
But what of the young adults who have never learned the power of a handwritten word?
Those kids who send love notes by text message instead of a chit of paper tucked furtively into a book somewhere?
Who hear from their grandparents frequently by telephone, instead of wonderful, seasonal, multi-page letters that tell all the news and require concentration and dedication to write?
In my view, no word-processed document can convey deep sentiment. It’s an impersonal and almost bland method of sending a message when compared with a hand-written note.
Of course, that’s just my opinion. Still, it would be interesting to know what our young teens would think if they were suddenly deprived of access to all keyboards and had to communicate handraulically instead. Would they even bother?
Till next time,
S.
You know, the written word used to be a sacred thing.
It was honoured, revered and respected. There was a magic inherent in the entire process of one person recording some thing on some medium and then another person being able to recover that message or ‘thing’ at another time and another place. The ability to take arbitrary symbols and use them to communicate was literally awesome.
Magic.
We seem to have lost that sense of wonder. Today, language is being assailed on all fronts. Grammar is neglected, spelling rests on the writer’s whim and punctuation is ignored. As a result, meaning is obscured, language tortured and true communication endangered.
Why do we make it so hard for ourselves? We have the tools to make our meaning clear. They’ve been developed over millennia, through many great civilisations and remain free to use by all!
This is not to say that there is no room for innovation; a language that refuses to change and adapt will soon be abandoned. However, there exists a foundation which has stood firm for many generations.
In this blog I will be talking about what I see happening in the written (and sometimes spoken) word. Some of it will be reflections on the beast and – no doubt – some of it will take the form of rants against verbal vandalism. There will probably be quite a bit of the latter actually …
See you soon.
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