I operate a spell checker the way most people sing a Pearl Jam song- by blindly stabbing at each word. Half the time my spell checker has no clue what I’m even trying to type- I might as well be playing pictionary with the thing. I have never, for example, spelled “separate” correctly enough for the word to even appear in the list of suggestions- my computer usually responds with “scepter” and other random guesses. In fact, my spell checker can’t even ballpark essential terms, like the current month, due to my inaccuracies. I once told a search firm I couldn’t begin work “until the start of spring” after struggling with “February” like it was a ten-in-one remote: ” Feburar.. Febwarie? ..Febu- screw it, I’ll just wait six weeks“. I’m 30 years old and managing my career like Punxsutawney Phil because an animated paper clip can’t sense that I spell “February” with an extra ‘R‘. Some one owes me a refund.

The worst effect of bad spelling- when you send coworkers and friends a completely nonsensical email after the computer suggested an off-topic word that happens to share a similar spelling. Do you realize how many times I’ve accidentally quit my job because I can’t remember where the ‘e‘ in “quiet” goes? Why can’t my computer –which remembers directions to every Pizza Hut on the planet– recall that I botch “quiet” every time and start suggesting some thing else? Why- because my computer –despite knowing all recorded facts– does not ‘get me’. In four years of partnership, we have built zero synergy- half the time we can’t even locate a decent synonym after he’s rejected all my attempts on a word. Last year, a client of mine read that his website had “a pretty damn good chance of working” after we bungled “guarantee” for hours. I once proposed a quarterly review on “hump day” after my spell checker and I struggled with “Wednesday” like we were installing a furnace. I’ve been in school since the Reagan administration and I have to use nicknames and abbreviations in order to discuss certain weekdays. I may –single-handedly– explain the trade gap with China.

I’d love to blame school for my terrible spelling, but, in truth, they tried every thing short of acupuncture. In grade school, I was sent to ’special classes’ for spelling where my teacher –baffled by a total lack of progress– began experimenting with obscure, sensory techniques. An article suggested, in her words, that movements completed with under-used muscles tend to be memorized with no effort, so, for an entire year, I had to write my spelling assignments on sand paper with my left ring finger. She called the approach “tactile learning” and I stuck with it because –having just seen “Karate Kid”– I was convinced, when I confronted her after weeks of no improvement, she would reveal that I was actually learning a deadly karate move the whole time. There are two lessons that you always learn the hard way: your “secret move” is not functional karate, and ‘twelfth‘ has an ‘F‘ in it.

17/10/2006
RSS 2.0 / trackback