Humor Me

In my case, it is after I hit Publish. Either way, until this blog becomes a paying venture, you will just have to overlook mistakes. I am a better editor when there is a financial reward. I am kind of like Pavlov's dogs in that respect. 

 

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Thesis Students and other Dilemmas

Somehow, I wound up with eight Masters thesis advisees this semester, more than anyone else in the department. Knowing I was instituting a new program in Journalism this semester, I encouraged all of them to start their writing over the summer. I met with three of them consistently and they worked diligently easing the semester for all concerned. At the last minute, another student popped up from the clear blue. I had been her adviser of record over three years ago, but she disappeared. Now I have nine students. Each student has to write a minimum of forty pages, not a big deal for a thesis, but think about trying to do this in Hungarian if you are not a native speaker. Most of them are so fluent, I forget English is not their mother tongue and wave off their concerns about filling forty pages. The worst of it is that they are required to have twenty-five books and four journal articles cited in their work. Considering the resources here, it is as possible as transversing the Appalachian trail without leaving Europe. Amazon.com becomes their best friend because they spend an inordinate amount of money on books, many that look great with the description, but are left wanting once they arrive. The solution I have found for them is Questia online at www.questia.com, an Internet library. They can either use the free library or join for one month, get their research done, note the information they need for the Works Cited pages and voila, they have saved a ton of money. Anyhow, reading, editing, suggesting, commenting on chunks of students' work while still carrying on with the regular reading, editing, suggesting, commenting on students' work in the semester classes, can seriously cause brain strain. After poring over one student's thesis, I sent it back and she replied that she also went over it and found a number of spelling errors. My response was "Gosh if you found typos in the first 20 pages, I should be fired for not finding them first. Distance is a great thing for improving your perspective from you own work." Her response was what makes this worth the effort. "I don’t think you should be fired! J It is not you task to correct every little bit of mistake. The depth of the comments that you make is exceptional, in any case." On to the next thesis with a smile rather than a frown.

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Last Edits

I was up by 7:00 am and finished the editing of the chapter. What tough work it is going over and over the thing, cutting words, replacing words, hoping you will cut pages in the process. By 1:30 pm our time, I sent it off to the editor. I still have the full book to work on, but my eyes cannot take any more computer today.

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Oversleeping

I set two alarms on my phone to get up at 2:45 and 3:00 am. We slept through both of them. We had arranged for a taxi to arrive at 3:10, but missed it when Ron woke at 4:00 am in a panic. We jumped into clothes and ran out and very luckily hailed a taxi on the street. We did not have time to take the bus, so the taxi took us to the airport. He was fast and not as expensive as it would have been had there been traffic. We went from Edinburgh to Amsterdam, then on to Budapest. As soon as we got home, I started editing my chapter. I fell asleep doing it.

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Pins and Needles

There were a pile of student papers to read, correct, grade, okay, not really a pile since they turn them in via e-mail. Maybe a mailbox full. Instead, I worked on my reviews. Though I am known for getting student papers back within a couple of days, these were mostly freshmen paper and they are not familiar with my work habits yet, so I had some leeway. I just sent in my reviews for Frommers: hotel, restaurant, museum. Only the first two were requested, but I am anal retentive at times. I thought the third would be an opportunity to say, "Hey, I am an overachiever." The deadline was May 7th, but I thought sending them in today would show my seriousness about deadlines. It should be of importance to an editor. The guidelines for writing the reviews was 35 pages long and I pored over them again and again. They have strict requirements for the formating, which took as much time as the rest. The fonts and sizes are different for various parts of one review and there are codes that need to be implanted here and there. It took me two days to write the 250 word review, having edited it again and again. I made mention of this when I sent them in to give him the idea that I do take this seriously, but at the same time will take direction for editing and rewriting. I also mentioned that the hotel was quite adamant about not being helpful, but after charming three people, I got my way. This was to show my tenacity, hopefully. The guide emphasized using humor, so I tried to instill some in my note as well as with the reviews. As soon as I hit the 'Send' button propelling them into cyberspace, I had misgivings about what I wrote, how I wrote it, life in general, my purpose on earth, and the beat goes on.

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