Saturday, May 26, 2007

The Importance of a good proofreader

Recently my husband was given an award by the International Association for Aquatic Animal Medicine. It was supposed to be a surprise, but he told them he was too busy to go to their dinner (which was a shocker, since normally free food takes priority over just about everything), so when they told him he "had to be there" he was pretty sure something was up. Of course, I knew about it, but neither of us wanted to spoil the surprise for the other, so we each pretended to believe the original cover story, which was that he was presenting the award to a colleague.

More interesting, however is the story behind this plaque. The first iteration had the award given for Marine Mammal Conversation. Now, those critters might be smart, but so far, nobody's been able to do a whole lot of chit-chat with them. So, they sent it back and pointed out it was for Marine Mammal Conservation. They fixed that, but then my husband, after receiving this corrected version, pointed out that the man after whom the award was named was spelled Keyes, not Keys -- a fact driven home decades ago when my husband met the man who pointed out the spelling and pronunciation by way of introduction.


So, Dan -- because I know you're checking to see when this gets posted -- Here it is. And congrats again.


1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Bad Spellers of the World Untie! We'll have cron chips and salsa, but if you spill anything, you'll have to go home and do some lanurdy...