One of the worst days of my life

Hey, I saw a minor typo in a recent Roger Ebert review. It can happy to THE best of all of us.

 

A suburban Philadelphia paper (I worked at a neighboring sister paper at the time) once ran an A1, above-the-fold refer to a story about an outbreak on a cruise with a photo of the ship docking and the bold words VIRUS-LADEN CRUISE SHIT.

The paper first realized the mistake when it received a phone call from one of the local middle schools. One of the kids spotted it in the library.

I still have a copy. It's suitable for framing.

 

It can happen as well

 

My first shop did this. It was humiliating.

 

I've had some typos. Noting too embarrassing, more a "how the fuck did I miss that?" A place I freelanced for spelled my name wrong in the byline, but I missed a guy's name in the story.

I write for mostly online outlets now, and there is a small comfort in knowing if I make a stupid typo or butcher a name, its not too hard to fix.

 

Years ago we had the state beauty pageant here (the winner went on to the Miss America pageant), with full front-page coverage.
Except for the winner's boobs. Our photographer captured her in the giddy throes of celebration, right about the time one of her nipples popped out of her dress. It was a tight Friday night deadline, and somehow the picture not only made it onto the front page, but onto the press and a few papers before anyone caught it.
I heard the news editor that night did a sprint back to the pressroom that would've left Usain Bolt in the dust.

 

I once wrote a hockey story describing shits on goal... Don't fret it...

 

One of the best days of the readers' lives

 

provably and demonstrably so.

 

My best friend in the day was the night news editor, which meant that, among other things, she was responsible for checking the last made-over negatives before the final edition went to press. They had one of those cutesie spring shots, with an old lady on a swing enjoying the day. Except that, underneath her billowing dress, this lady had on no panties, which you couldn't tell from the negative. Full spread doesn't do justice to that scene. My pal was saved by a web break -- is that phrase operative these days? -- very early in the run.

 

For similar reasons, I believe, my old SE had a "no hurdles pictures" policy from track meets. VERY easy to get in trouble, especially back in the days of negatives.

 

I cringed the day the Braves signed 1B Robert Fick.

Enough said. (Caught before it appeared in print, thank God)