UPDATE (5:45 am, local time): BLAM! BLAM BLAM BLAM! Die, you zombie project! Die! BLAM BLAM BLAM BLAM. BLAM. BLAM BLAM. There, I think it’s dead. Off to bed. ORIGINAL POST: True story: the paraphrased correspondence between one freelancer and his so-called editor (as patiently translated, or at least paraphrased, by his collaborator): (A few months ago.) Editor: This passage, about the chess game. We like it, but… can someone really win a chess game in five moves? Freelancer: Yup. Apparently you can win in just two moves. I Googled it. I’m a pro, okay? Here’s a link. Editor: (Without …
Tag: freelance
Teacher Competence & Textbook Design
The interesting thing about textbook publishers in Korea is that they need to consider the competence of the people who will be using their books. As anyone who lives in Korea can guess, thisis most crucial for the TEFL industry; despite the fact that there are hundreds of thousands of native English speakers teaching English in Korea, there are also hundreds of thousands of non-native speakers teaching English. And since the method for selecting people for teaching jobs doesn’t seem to prioritize skill or ability in the subject they’ll be teaching — at least not when it’s English — and …
When ATMs Attack, or, How Things are Going in Depok/Jakarta
I’ll be going back to Jakarta tomorrow because a certain ATM has decided to swallow my Samsung Card (a credit card) and not spit it out again. Put the card in the machine, watch it crash, watching Windows reboot (with the Diebold brand name proudly displayed, of course!)… quite a sad sight. The first time it happened was a week ago, and I thought it was a freak accident. Turns out, no, not at all. Samsung Cards crash BNC ATM machines in Jakarta, it seems. Or at least, at the mall I was at. Other than that, things are going …
Grrr.
Note to all proofreaders: One sometimes must just say no. One such time is when all the begging, money offers, and other wiles are, you are fully aware, not going to incline you to once again drop all your bloody weekend plans at the last minute, without any warning, and fix typos and gunk that you’ve already marked as needing revision three times before. Because if you politely point out that the time constraints are just impossible, then what you’ll get is a promise that the thing will be sent to you Friday afternoon, and not Friday night. And no, …
Photo ID?
I was just getting my papers together to send off for my Criminal Record Check and I came across a ton of expired old ID cards. My student/faculty cards from undergrad and grad school (I was issued a student card and then, as a TA, soon after got a faculty card at Concordia); my old S.I.N. card (Social Insurance Number, for you non-Canadians); my Quebec Health Insurance card; and a few more odd cards. Not among them was my long-ago destroyed learner’s license, which even after it expired was useful for ID for a while, and as soon as it …