Funny typos (that you may or may not have caught)

I just had one for a story I was working on. I typed the word "overpass" and left off the "P."

I still giggle every time I think of one years ago where I typed "Titus" and left off the "U."

Luckily I caught each about a minute after I finished the paragraph. Everyone has their eighth-grade moments.

 

My career-worst typo, TV division:

The former mayor was mugged outside a restaurant. My chyron for the story said “Former Man Mugged Outside Restaurant.” I can only assume that because I type the word “man” so many times a day it was just thoughtless muscle memory.

It aired that way. The only person who noticed it was my director, who caught it live as it aired.

My director was transgender. It was the first time she had worked with me.

 

I’ve probably shared this here before, but I worked as a copy editor in a city where the female mayor’s last name was Genis. Spellcheck kept wanting to change it to Penis so I thought I fixed it so that didn’t come up as an option.

I came to work for my next night shift and everyone in the newsroom looked at me with a smirk — an article appeared with a quote from Mayor Sandy Penis.

I was horrified then scared when I was called into the editor’s office with him and the publisher. The door was closed and I starting apologizing and explaining and the publisher stopped me and said she’s not a penis but a c*nt.

 

I was writing a basketball story. I meant to type shot. The i is right next to the o. Oops.

I didn't catch it and neither did anyone else, until a friend texted me "ooh, spicy!"

 

When I worked at a Gannett paper, there was a deal to have the larger paper in the area cover our pro teams. They would send us an unedited version first, then an edited version much later (typically after our deadline).

One night, big Gannett paper’s writer had the local NBA team out-shitting its opponent. I caught it, fixed it and notified our SE, who told the Big paper SE.

Frequently, the Powers That Be would complain when I would put AP copy instead of Big Gannett Paper copy. I would always fall back on the out-shit example and point out that that AP would send its story two hours before Big Gannett Paper’s unedited version and four hours after the edited version.

 

Better to always type PUBLIC in all caps and figure the copy desk will catch it and lower-case it, than risk the other...

 

Our TV writer's last name was Jicha. Spellcheck insisted it should be Jihad.

 

Or run a spellcheck for "pubic."

Ask the local athletics association, which had the other in huge type over a boys swimming photo in the official program a few years ago. Accurate, but still embarrassing.

 

A paper I used to work at made Jay Leno’s headlines with “the right to bare arms.”

Also had barbecued “children” as an entree in the senior menu instead of chicken.

 

The paper I used to work for (before I got there) had several Mighty Dicks or Mighty Fucks.

 

At one stop, the weekend reporter turned in a story - don't recall if it was a news obit or a regular obit, but I digress - with the ending line "Arraignments are being handled by Smith and Jones Funeral Chapel."

Arrangemenets. Since the reporter usually made at least one bad typo in every story, we'd always read his stuff closely. I remember turning to the photog on duty and saying, "If there's gonna be arraignments at this funeral, I'm going to fill out a photo request form."