"#2 – okay, fine, change it."
This was in reference to the following note I wrote:
"I still hate that these prepositions aren’t capitalized in the abbreviations"
I threw my arms up in the air and said, “YES!”. You see, I’m a technical writing intern at a company that works in abbreviations the same way plumbers work in toilets: we’re constantly up to our elbows in . . . them. (I should warn you now that this post is about punctuation).
Well, all our acronyms are fully capitalized, except two. Two of our acronyms, RoTR (Record of temporary Revisions) and RoR (Record of Revisions) drop the preposition—this despite the fact that the LOEP (List of Effective Pages), the TOC (Table of Contents), and numerous other abbreviations either ignore the preposition or capitalize it. Generally I’m not a stickler for house styles like this, particularly when everyone is consistent with it (“It’s more important to be consistent than correct”), but I’ve been spending all day fixing grammar and punctuation, and I could never get this one systemic rock-in-my-shoe out from under my arches.
Well, this morning when I got her note I thought I had been all alone in the office. I arrive around 6:00 AM and most people don’t arrive until 8:00 or later. Unfortunately some Johny-come-early snuck in without me noticing and gave me a really, weird look.
I thought I could say something like “Go Mariners,” and that would make me look like a delinquent-sports-watching employee, but also a less-socially-awkward employee, and that was a tempting tradeoff, but since the Mariners generally suck I didn’t think he would buy it. I considered saying “Excuse me” and sitting down, but instead I just made eye contact with him for an awkward second or two, and said nothing and sat down.
So, to get to my point: sorry, technical writers. I know I just increased the ridiculous angles on the caricature that is “Editor” and “Writer,” but, it was worth it.
And I’d do it again.
1 comment:
hahaha. the last drawing is the best.
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