Stupid mistakes - a celebration

[Djmac1031]

It happens to me ALL the time.

No matter how many times I proofread, edit, proofread again, edit again, rinse and repeat...I STILL find stupid mistakes. Badly worded sentences, typos, misused words, even wrong character names.

I can hear some of you already: "Get an outside editor."

And I'm sure that helps many of you.

I simply don't have the patience to track someone down willing to read every damn thing I write LOL.

Anyway, instead of BITCHING about them, I figured maybe we could laugh at ourselves, point out our own glaring errors.

I'll point out one of my latest to start:

From my newest story, The Deal With Lara: "Mmm, you're already so hard for me already," she purred.

Double use of "already" makes what should be a sexy moment clunky lol.

I know we can edit and resubmit stories, and I have for REALLY tragic errors, but if I wanted to correct EVERY story I made a mistake like this with, I'd constantly be resubmitting every single story.

 

[NoTalentHack]

I have continuity errors in my most recent Cultural Exchanges chapter that conflict with a minor plot point of the first. I’m just kind of putting my hand next to my eyes and averting my gaze.

 

[BiscuitHammer]

I'm terrible at self-editing, because my brain knows what I MEANT to write, and skips over obvious typos and repeated words. Until I got an outside editor (the price being that I wrote him into the Alexaverse), my editing attempts were a tattered pageant of misery.

Some of the mistakes were simple, such as referring to Alexa as 'Alex', or vice-versa. Or misspelling Trilby as 'Tribly'. they're little things, but my readers have commented on it breaking their immersion and jerking them out of the moment. Hence, I have an editor.

My personal greatest mistake was getting painted into corners in my stories, especially the Alexaverse. Now I've learned to always leave myself wiggle room, to expand on ideas when I think up something I like. Given that the Alexavrse was originally meant to be six chapters, and now stands at thirty-eight, I'm best off avoiding corners.

 

[alohadave]

Even with an editor or proofreader, mistakes always slip through.

The people who complain about minor mistakes are best ignored.

 

[Djmac1031]

Even with an editor or proofreader, mistakes always slip through.

The people who complain about minor mistakes are best ignored.

I very rarely get complaints about minor mistakes.

Although I did have several readers (kindly) call out a mistake I'd made in using the wrong character name in the middle of a conversation.

Stupid little mistakes rarely pull me out of a story, especially now that I understand just how easily and often they can happen.

It's only if a story is riddled with them to the point of making it unreadable that I have a problem, especially when it's obvious the writer never proofread even once.

 

[Voboy]

I've made my share. The worst was, IIRC, a time when I had written a series of bullet-point notes to guide myself to the planned ending. I appended it to the end of the piece as I was writing, then forgot to delete it once I was done.

 

[SyleusSnow]

Some said it couldn't be done, but I had an error in a story for the 750-word challenge.

Now I proof listen to every story using text to speech. So now only 50% of the errors make it through

 

[MelissaBaby]

This fucking dog.

Mary and Alvin Chapter 29

Alvin and Bonita, working at the wharf:

Alvin stood on the deck of the Annie Mac, looking up at the rigging. Bonita sat on the top spur, her legs wrapped around the main mast.

Moosie sat at his feet and looked up as well. He gave out one sharp bark.

"Easy, bub," Alvin told him, "she's just fine."

Alvin and Bonita go home from the wharf:

Alvin's truck bounced into the driveway. He stopped and let Bonita hop out. Moosie had been sleeping under the table, and ran to her.

 

[onehitwanda]

I've made my share. The worst was, IIRC, a time when I had written a series of bullet-point notes to guide myself to the planned ending. I appended it to the end of the piece as I was writing, then forgot to delete it once I was done.

Been there, done that, drank the absinthe but still groan every time I remember. Sigh.

 

[panaflora]

This fucking dog.

Mary and Alvin Chapter 29

Alvin and Bonita, working at the wharf:



Alvin and Bonita go home from the wharf:

Obviously Moosie gets around.

 

[BobbyBrandt]

I don't make minor mistakes. I claim that they are purposeful traps to catch someone copying my work and posting it elsewhere.

That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

 

[BiscuitHammer]

I don't make minor mistakes. I claim that they are purposeful traps to catch someone copying my work and posting it elsewhere.

That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

I've been known to intentionally leave large continuity errors (no, for real!) in some of my stories to see if my dedicated readers are paying attention. There's often a prize for the first person to spot it, usually getting written as a character into my story.

This most often involves getting boffed by Freja and Jeanie, but that isn't exactly difficult. You have to be clinically dead or an identifiably different species before they won't tag-team you...

 

[yowser]

I don't make minor mistakes. I claim that they are purposeful traps to catch someone copying my work and posting it elsewhere.

That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

After acquiring what I considered an inadequate grade on a written assignment for a high school English class, I explained to the instructor that Navajo weavers always left one 'mistake' in their blankets, a minor flaw, since only God could produce perfect works. I explained that I was only following their example.

I received a decidedly withering look back. "That would be a fine rationale Jon, if there was only one error in your works..."

 

[Djmac1031]

In my story Caring For Carrie, a father is left taking care of his daughter after an accident leaves her arms and legs in casts.

So as he performed certain actions, I of course wanted to convey a sense of caution needed so as not to aggravate her injuries.

In the editing process, however, I found I was overdoing it, especially in the use of the word "carefully."

I edited that story several times at least, weeding out over used words, yet still wound up with this monstrosity:

"Again I carefully lifted her off the bedpan and removed it carefully,"

 

[RetroFan]

The funniest one for me was when I wrote a fat fetish story, where the male narrator had lusted over an overweight woman for years. When they finally have sex for the first time, the guy thinks it was 'worth the weight' rather than 'worth the wait'.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Even with an editor or proofreader, mistakes always slip through.

The people who complain about minor mistakes are best ignored.

Yep. I rarely get through a commercially-published novel without spotting at least one small error, and having been on the editor's side of things, I don't fault them for that.

We used to have a cassette recording of J.R.R. Tolkien reading "Lord of the Rings", and there was a bit where he described Boromir as "son of Boromir". If the greats can do it, with their own work, the rest of us are allowed a few mistakes.

 

[ElectricBlue]

This fucking dog.

Mary and Alvin Chapter 29

Alvin and Bonita, working at the wharf:



Alvin and Bonita go home from the wharf:

Moosie can drive home faster, obviously. What's the issue?

 

[ElectricBlue]

I edited that story several times at least, weeding out over used words, yet still wound up with this monstrosity:

"Again I carefully lifted her off the bedpan and removed it carefully,"

‍

More care during edit?

 

[Trionyx]

I received a decidedly withering look back. "That would be a fine rationale Jon, if there was only one error in your works..."

Clearly not a good English teacher or at least not one who used correct English. When stating something contrary to fact, the subjunctive case should be used. “…if there were…”

 

[Initiate_me]

I don't make minor mistakes. I claim that they are purposeful traps to catch someone copying my work and posting it elsewhere.

That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

Mine are psycho-metaphysical reminders to the reader of the fundamental unknowability of reality and existence.

 

[HordHolm]

Even with an editor or proofreader, mistakes always slip through.

The people who complain about minor mistakes are best ignored.

This. I edit quite a lot of academic work - peer-review submissions, project proposals and the odd monograph or book and I always try to focus on every detail, but I know (and fortunately so do the academics who employ me) that in 100,000+ words there will always a few errors no matter how hard I try.

 

[Kumquatqueen]

Clearly not a good English teacher or at least not one who used correct English. When stating something contrary to fact, the subjunctive case should be used. “…if there were…”

I was always taught the subjunctive was a mood not a case, but I believe some other languages treat it as a case.

 

[lovecraft68]

My worst-that got through-was a story where I write "She grabbed her cock and gave it a squeeze"

This was not a trans story, this was a milf story, and when I ended up seeing this all I could think of was the reader saying "Holy shit, she has a cock? When did that happen?"
There's also a chance many glossed over it and didn't see it because people have a tendency to read faster during sex scenes.