My editing pet peeve - what's yours?

I'm really starting to love the shit out of this thread.

Especially when I know it's going to be referred to on another, lesser Web site.

 

he takes 'em for a walk every now and then, i hear.

 

Totally unsolid.

 

I'm allowed to see them on my off days.

 

Visitation rights?

 

I'd suggest that the cultivation of too many peeves is antithetical to good editing. If you're watering and feeding too many of them, you're probably making needless changes to copy that would be better-served by a more substantial edit.

I've worked for editors who had the "victory against vs. victory over" hangup, and so, yeah, I changed it. But my God: The dictionary on my desk has 20 prepositional definitions for "over," 10 more that are adverbial, four that are adjectival and a handful that take in nouns and verbs. Those who are so doctrinaire as to believe that "victory over" is nonsensical ought to be prepared to lodge similar objections to chats "over dinner" and towns "over the county line." Better yet, they ought to just remove the broomstick from their ass and acknowledge that there are plenty of legitimate ways to express the thought.

An editor's goals should be accuracy, clarity, logic and conciseness. Style -- especially style that establishes meaningful distinctions -- is great, too. Made-up style that furthers none of those aims is a distraction and a waste of time.

 

Well, nothing's on paper, but spup is pretty cooperative.

 

Yeah, that'll last for about another nine months.

 

As long as you are not sitting below the food, referring to a chat "over" dinner is fine.

 

count yourself lucky. remember what annie wilkes did to paul sheldon's ankles? yeah, that's what mrs. petty did to my balls about five years ago.

lucky. lucky, for damned sure.

 

When I've created style manuals, I've aimed for establishing a style that establishes meaningful distinctions or provides a set of consistent standards.

More to the point: I wanted to have a logical reason for every entry I created and every rule I instituted.

 

Damn. Good point.