Copy Edits In Progress

First off, the notes and corrections aren’t bad at all. In fact the majority of the marks are instructions for the printing/typesetting process. There are actually many pages where there are no marks at all.

Most of the work I have to do is in answering and address several questions and issues both the copy editor and my editor have come up with. These are mainly written on yellow post-it notes stuck throughout the manuscript. I’ve taken the route of going through the entire manuscript and taking care of the easy ones first. Then I go through again and again dealing progressively with the more involved issues. This way, the real big things (nothing is really THAT big) can stew in my mind while I deal with everything else.

So I’d guess I’d say, so far, so good.

One thing, though…I’ve learned that I don’t know the difference between past and passed. Well, that’s not exactly right. I mean I DO know the difference, just don’t ask me what it is right now…I’m tired. But apparently my fingers don’t know the difference. Because when they’re typing away on my keyboard they confused these two word more often than anything else. I’d reprimand them if I thought it would do any good, but they’d probably say, “I was only following orders from the brain.” Then the brain would have some lame excuse like there “must be some faulty wiring in the spinal cord region.” And the spinal cord would blame the nerve cells, who wouldn’t blame anyone but would threaten to all get “pinched” at the same moment if I came down on them.

So I’ve resigned myself to the fact that this is a problem I’ll have to live with. I’m sure someday I’ll get passed…past…passed…past…around it.