June 10, 2005

Another letter to SI!

The latest Sports Illustrated printed the following sentence in a blurb regarding the National Spelling Bee.

"One word the competitors were not asked to spell: ecstaticness, which is what Anurag (Kashyup, the champion) ... was feeling."

My copy editor side went red, and this letter was sent to S.I.

Dearest SI,

For The Record (June 13, 2005, pg. 26), the main reason that 'ecstaticness' wasn't a spelling word is because it apparently only exists in sportswriters imagination.vocabulary; the kids at the Bee would understand that the word is e-c-s-t-a-s-y. See also a player's "aggressiveness" (a-g-g-r-e-s-s-i-o-n) and a team's cohesiveness (c-o-h-e-s-i-o-n).

In all seriousness, if you're looking for a copy editor, I'd love to help out in any way I can, especially cutting down un"ness"essary suffixes. My phone number is 317-475-0395, or just respond to this email address.

Please consider the top paragraph as a submission to Letters, and the lower a job request/plea. I love your magazine and would love to work for it and find ways to make it even better than it is.

Sincerely,
Michael O'Neill

It won't be printed, but it'd be really funny if it did. :-D

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