Hailey's Novel Diary – 12/12/17

It might be a few generations before computers are ready to replace a human proofreader.

I typed the word “snigger”. Apparently, I have never done that before. At least not on this version of Word.

“I'd never do that,” he sniggered.

Makes sense to me. Spell check wanted me to change “snigger” to a much worse word with a very different meaning.

I generally ignore any and all spell check programs. That might be dangerous. No one types every wrod properly every time. But typos should reveal themselves during the editing stage. And if I mix up homophones, spell check will never notice. “He new he wanted to where his Christmas Satan hat too make his skin Les pail.” None of those words are spelled incorrectly. There is not a single squiggly red line.

So Microsoft developed their own grammar check. It is terrible. Just for fun, I ran a grammar check on the book. It wants me to change “is this a miniseries?” to “is these a miniseries?” I don't want to change that. Some differences are a matter of opinion, but this one is just wrong. It also wants me to change “is this a different battle?” to “is these a different battle?” Come on. That's just illiterate. Maybe you can argue that since “miniseries” ends in S, grammar check thinks it is plural, but “battle” is singular. Even so, it thinks “is these a ...” is correct. Is these a? Be these a? No blue lines.

Most of the spelling “errors” are proper nouns that Microsoft has never heard about. I had to add “Angeles” to the dictionary because it kept underlining Los Angeles. I would never expect them to know every city in the world, but is Los Angeles an obscure little village?

Sometimes, the spelling suggestions are just crazy. It wants me to change “campout” to “cam pout”. Compound words can be a matter of opinion, but then why not suggest “camp out”?

One of the flight attendants quietly approached Alicia during the pre-flight safety video.

The top spelling corrections are “per-flight”, “ore-flight” and “pee-flight”. Pee-flight? What kind of book does Microsoft think I'm writing? And what is an ore-flight? This is not a book about miners.

“Are you trying to sniff out if I'm a lesbo?”

Lesbo is slang, so I can understand it not being in the dictionary, but the options are “boules”, “bootless” and “boneless”. Who accidentally types “lesbo” when trying to type “boules”? That's some serious, and seriously Freudian, dyslexia. But “boneless” is appropriate.

“She doesn't do walk-ons.”

The top corrections are “walk-nos”, “walk-ins” and “walk-obs”. I have never even heard of walk-nos or walk-obs.

When Tyler lotioned Cheryl's back in turn, she felt goose bumps running up her neck.

Spell check suggests “motioned” or “lotion ed”. I can see people typing “lotion” when they meant “motion”, but “lotion ed”? “When Tyler lotion ed Cheryl's back in turn, she felt goose bumps running up her neck”? That is simply wrong in any universe.

They saw DVDs of the Maddie O'Laine movies, but that was like watching someone else.

The corrections are “DVD” and “DVD s”. I realize that people don't seem to understand apostrophes anymore and will type “DVD's” when they want it to be plural, even though that is possessive, but spell check is supposed to know more than some teenager on Facebook. “They saw DVD...” and “They saw DVD s...” are as wrong as wrong can be.

Her first date was with a young sommelier, played by a struggling actor and graduate student at USC.

The top corrections are “isomerism”, “somewhere” and “slimmer”. Sommelier is a French word, so maybe it should be changed to freedom server, but isomerism is the arrangement of atoms. I can assure you that her date was most certainly not with a young isomerism.

They all went to Gracias Madre, a popular Mexican restaurant in West Hollywood.

“Cadre”, “Madge” and “Padre”. Gracias Cadre might be a good name for a restaurant, but it definitely changes things. The interesting part is that padre is in the dictionary, but not madre. Maybe Microsoft thinks madres should stay in the kitchen, but not have any acknowledgment in their efforts.

Cheryl nursed her niçoise salad and sat silently during most of the conversation.

“Nisei” and “noise”. Spell check knows Nisei but not niçoise. It hates the French but not the Japanese. I guess that is a step in the right direction. But what is a Nisei salad? Maybe I don't want to know. Now, maybe “Cheryl nursed her noisy salad and sat silently during most of the conversation” works, but that is not what I want to say.

She was Anita Lickalott, a young coed at BJU.

“Allotropic”, “Littoral”, “Glottal”. I can see it not knowing Lickalott. Obviously, that is a joke name. Allotropy is another chemistry term, but this book is not about anthropomorphic chemistry characters. Anita Glottal fits, although that would be far more esoteric than I intended. Anita Littoral has nothing to do with it, unless the implication is that she is always wet. But again, Lickalott is better. The scene in question is not supposed to be subtle.

If you ever write an educational cartoon about chemistry, feel free to use Anita Allotropic.