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Issue 3 > It's not that hard to press F7.

It's not that hard to press F7.

Brian Wise with 'don't look dumb, get it right'.

The most beautiful, eloquent presentation in the world, and you mispelled your client's name. Or worse, confused 'your', 'you're', 'yore', and 'you all are'. One simple tip? Use that F7 key.

I'd love to say that when I go meandering through the personal ads in my local weekly rag's electronic version, I look at humor, sense of adventure, personality, and the values. I'd also like to meet Stephen King in person some day and ask him, writer-to-writer, man-to-man, what-the-hell screwed him up when he was a kid. And while I'm dreaming, I'd like a pony. A demon pony. Named 'Sprinkles'.

Shockingly, I tend to look at the surface to decide whether or not I'm interested in someone or something. When I pick up a book I've never read (and there are many, many books I've never read), I flip to pages one hundred, two hundred, and three hundred; never the front two chapters.

I read those pages, and if I like them, then I buy the book. If I don't, it gets shelved somewhere awkward, preferably where an employee can fume silently about its placement. (To be entertained by the sheer frustration on the face of an easily infuriated librarian or dedicated bookstore employee, slip an Amy Tan into the Maxine Hong Kingstons.)

The same really does go for the people I choose to do business with. You may have the most fantastic sell in the business—the most brilliant concept alive, the most creative team in the universe—but you misspelled 'hot dog' by typing it 'hot dpg'.

So, when I look at personal ads on the internet, I also tend to look at how often the writer uses proper English, good grammar or stock phrases like 'LOL', 'ROFL' or my personal favorite 'but whatevah'. I tend to snag on misspelled words, poor grammar, punctuation errors and the like. The occasional misspelling can be overlooked.

The same is true in any business proposal I get. A mechanic cringes when the gear shift moves from first to third and grinds. I cringe when I hear a native English speaker write with the grace and skill of a well-trained chimpanzee on hard hallucinogenic drugs.

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