Sunday, April 24, 2011

Titles for dummies

"How to Open Schlage A-Series Locks": At the risk of sounding like I have an idiot bias, who doesn't know that you insert the key and turn it. That pretty much was the content of the article.

Friday, April 22, 2011

One for the ages

A fellow Demand copy editor sent an article back to the writer for a rewrite. The writer then bitched on a Demand forum about not understanding what the copy editor wanted.

The copy editor posted her reaction on a Facebook group that some 120+ of us have formed:

"Hmmm...unless by 'not sure' he meant that he has no idea what I was saying, which since I was saying that I had no idea what he was saying, would be ironic."

Thursday, April 21, 2011

My article copy editing day begins

First up is a "How-to" article: Under "Things You'll Need" are "Potectuive gloves" and "Googles."

ETA: Excedrin.

Friday, April 15, 2011

Sneaking in?

This photo is my LOL of the day. It's the image used in an article titled "Fixing a Squeaky Stair." The question is, Why does she not want to make a sound?

Neither left nor right

Thanks to one of the few writers who acknowledges that not everyone is right-handed: "Hold the trigger end of the drill in your dominant hand and place your other hand under the front of the drill."

Pulling no punches

One of my fellow article copy editors included the following note in a rewrite request to a wordy writer:

"If you're going to use that many words, make sure each one has a job to do."

Bravo.

Thursday, April 7, 2011

Where gun opponents fear to tread

I just copy edited an article titled, "The Best Way to Clean a Muzzleloader Shotgun."

Couldn't wait to finish it.