Pneumonochrome

˙ʇɥƃıɹ ǝʇınb ʇ,usı ʇsnɾ ƃuıɥʇǝɯos ʇnq ‘ʇɐɥʍ ǝɹns ʇou ʎllɐǝɹ ɯ,ı  ˙ɟɟo ˙˙˙ʇlǝɟ ʇsnɾ ƃuıɥʇǝɯos puɐ ‘ƃuıuɹoɯ sıɥʇ dn ǝʞoʍ ı

10. Perhaps the most obvious reason an editor is essnetial to the writing process is spelling. Correct spelling can make or brake your message. Few things are more distracting to large portions of the literate populous than abundant spelling errors.

9. An editor can help ensure that your sentences are consistent. It can be very confusing when your own on-the-go editing produces a sentence that seems to have been stapled together like the Frankenstein monster can cause your readers to reread portions of your sentences in complete befuddlemetn.

8. Editors help to make sure you stay focused in your writing. Focus is important, especially in topical writing. Topical writing is any writing that is done to discuss one specific topic and communicate information about it to many people. Much of the writing on teh internet could be considered attempts at topical writing. Some of my favorite blogs are topical blogs, whether they are about the daily experiences of people working under appreciated jobs or the latest political trends, each post on the blog generally should have a specific topic. I read one the other day about Hillary Clinton’s health care plan that was a prime example of good focus in writing. The post wasn’t long, really, but was packed with good information about and analysis of Senator Clinton’s proposed changes to the health care system in the United States. It was clear from the author’s writing that he didn’t care for Senator Clinton at all, but his treatment of her health care plan was very even. He resisted the urge to discuss other aspects of her platform in that post, which would have diminished the focus of the article and obfuscated the points he intended to make, and it made all the difference in the world to the readability of hte post.

7. Editors can help you to avoid one of the unpardonable sins of writing: excessive use of cliché. Everyone under the sun, these days, seems to plug cliché into their writing like it’s going out of style.

5. Editors, while good at helping you correct errors in your writing, can also identify areas where your writing is incomplete, helping you to be a more thorough and reputable writer.

4. Editros can also help to make sure you write using a grammar that is appropriate for your audience and purpose. Just as a technical manual should avoid words like “duh” and “fussbudget”, writing for young children should not be comprised of words like “esoteric”, “skullduggery”, or “actionable”.

3. What a good thing Adam had. When he said a good thing, he knew nobody had said it before. For the rest of us, editors help to ensure we aren’t plagiarizing anyone else.

2. Editors can help spot punctuation errors that can be every bit as disracting as spelling errors can; and can help you find better sentence constructions in general.

1. Editors provide a much-needed second point-of-view. It will never make as much sense to anyone else as it does to you, and editors can help make sure you haven’t left out necessary antecedents.

Walking to catch the campus shuttle home  today, I passed a sign that said, in part,  “No Tipping.” Someone had stuck a small  magnetic-poetry-style word between the two  words printed there, The word was “cow.”  It made me chuckle to see “No cow tipping”  written up on the wall as I exited The  hospital. Cow tipping is particularly funny  to me because I spent a few years working  on a farm when I was younger.  I regularly woke up over 300 cows at 2:00 in the morning, but one thing I never did was tip one over.  You know why? Cows don’t sleep standing up.  Surprise!

Now, I’m not foolish enough to think that everyone who’s ever mentioned cow tipping really believes it can be done.  In fact, I’m sure that most people who have ever brought the subject up at least suspect that it sits right up there with jumping just before your run-away elevator hits the ground to prevent being hurt.  However: every once in a while someone will, in my presence, claim to have actually tipped cows.  Usually I’m in a pretty good mood, and I’ll just grin and call BS quietly in my head.  Every once-in-a-while, though, I just can’t resist the urge to tell people exactly how I know they’re full of crap.  Whether I say something or not, I get to laugh just a little to myself every time I catch someone making up a lie like that, especially because it’s such an absurd thing to lie about.

What are some of the myths you see perpetuated that you know, from your own personal experience, are myths?  I should mention that I consider this blog to be my space, and anyone whose comment makes it up here is seen here as a guest in my space.  I say that because I have no inhibitions at all regarding the editing and deleting of comments.  If you comment in response to the question I just asked, please keep in mind that one of the fastest ways to guarantee I’ll moderate your comment is to make a comment that calls a person’s spiritual beliefs, or faith, a myth, so please don’t do it.

Oh, and by the way, the majority of this post was hand-written on my tablet PC.  I’ve finally got the handwriting recognition trained up pretty well, and it’s nice to be able to just use the stylus to jot down thoughts from time to time.

So, my son was up before I left for school this morning.  Right before I left, I went into the bathroom to brush my teeth.  My son really loves brushing his teeth, and he ran into the bathroom and stood up on the little stool we have in there for him and grabbed his toothbrush.  I turned on the water for him and he wet his brush and started brushing, rewetting it a few times while I was brushing my own teeth.  When I finished and rinsed off my toothbrush, he did too.  When I set my toothbrush back in the holder, he did too, waiting until I did.  He then waited until I rinsed out my mouth, and tried to rinse out his (he puts his hand under the water and then rubs it on his lips), and when I spit the last of the toothpaste out, he climbed back up on his stool and spat in the sink as well.  It’s so amazingly cute to watch him mimicking his mother and I doing everyday things like this.  I really love it.

Today I realized how great school is for me right now, and just how much happier I am in Medical School than I was as an undergraduate.

So I decided to talk about it, say hello to podcast 3.