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And Ars made a complicated gesture with the fancy pen he drew from his pocket. The world turned inside out and then went black . . .
When I came to, I found myself buried beneath a mound of papers. Each was heavily marked in the red pencil all writers know and "love". And then I saw the name written on each one.
"See me."
"Clean out your desk by five o'clock. Come back when you learn to spell."
"Your tenses stink. Don't bring me something like this again. Ever."
"Are you trying to make me laugh? You do realize that this is obituary column you're writing. No more slapstick. Stick to the style guide or get out."
My whole body tensed with fear . . . I'd saved this interview for last because I dreaded it so much. Jerri White.
Unlike the rest of the heroes, I'd met Ms. White before, and I had been praying she didn't remember me . . .
A scream cut through the air "COPY!" where my leader article? How come I don't have the corrections from yesterday on my desk? Am I the only one working here?
The world came into focus as I clawed my way out of the pile of discarded articles, each slashed into oblivion with Jerri's red pen.
That pen was still with her too. Standing over two meters tall, it scraped the ceiling of the office. The very source of her power . . .
It seemed like its baleful gaze was upon me again as I emerged . . . and almost as frightening that of Ms. White as she smirked at my discomfort.
Jerri White: Is Ars disposing of his trash here again? I don't know how many times I've told him . . . . YOU!
You're that intern I had back in '92 from Poynter. You owe me a copy of Fontlab. I never did manage to make those discs usable after you panicked and ruined 'em.
LR: Errr . . . sorry!
LR: . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
JW: Cat got your tongue? Man, I've been wanting to do that to someone all day. The fact that it's you is just a nice little bonus.
So let me guess. You want to know how the Purple Team got its name, and someone gave you the idea that I was responsible.
Wrong. I have no idea how we ended up as the Purple Team.
Next question, lets see, I don't seem very "heroic?" Not even a real question. But I'll take a shot at it.
I am a hero, pal.
The biggest and least appreciated hero you'll ever meet. I protect our mother tongue, the lady English, from the barbarian hordes that try to besmirch her every hour of every day.
All this for doodley-squat. I know, maybe you have the idea that I'm raking in the big bucks after talking to Ars. Wrong. I make ten cents a word when I'm writing copy. Less when I edit. The only reason I do this job is pure love. Well, that and using my red pen on goons like you.
So what is it that I do, specifically?
I write copy. I make sure it is free of spelling errors and grammar gaffes. I give production to Ars, and as much as he might hate to admit it, give him direction in how it should be used. I work with The Coordinator to make sure that it appears correctly on the page. I love every single letter that goes to print. They are my babies. Every single one of them are my darling children.
When someone abuses my children, even if its far, far away on another site, I get upset. That's when I let my red pen do the talking for me.
A lot of people ask me how I do copy. I guess that should be a "superhero secret" but I'll give it to you for free. First, learn English. Second, write up your text in a text editor. Not a word processor. A text editor. When you're done copy and paste your work into Write in OpenOffice.org or MS Word and run a spell check.
For our readers:
Open Office.org is the free and open source office
and productivity suite. Available for Mac, Linux and Windows XP/Vista.
News flash! Hold the presses! These spell checkers aren't reliable. If you stop there, I'll be coming to visit you real soon. No, what you do then is give your copy to someone else to check. When it comes back, make your corrections.
Now give it to someone who really doesn't like you or that you owe money to. You should be able to find plenty of people to fit the bill, Ryan. I didn't like you the first time I saw you, and you haven't grown on me since. Once they're done with it, and you make corrections, then you can check it over at least once more yourself. If it is clean at that point, you can pat yourself on the back . . . maybe you have a good document. For now.
You need to keep checking back as you add content, and you should be doing that regularly.
Speaking of editing content . . . the content of my office would smell a lot better without you in it.
LR: . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
JW: Yes, you're going to be moving on again. There are these kooks over at Saint Petersburg College that want a word with you. Crazy summer silly season material.
Jerri hums "They're coming to take me away Ha-ha" and rolls her eyes . . .
JW: Yeah, they claim they're the real Purple Team and they made everything . . .
Jerri makes an expansive motion with her arms . . .
JW: . . . created it from whole cloth, like we create a web site. Have fun.
And with that she hit me with her red pen, and the next thing I knew I was in Clearwater, Florida . . .
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