Out on the carpet.

Ugh. Yesterday was a very Monday Monday. I agreed to do a big assignment without realizing that the deadline is this Friday, and it's the most boring book in the world and worked on it all weekend and most of the day Monday. All that on poor sleep Sunday night (another windy night, and large dog Tralfaz wanted multiple trips out in the bitter cold). But that wasn't the worst of it.

A client bawled me out for a poor job I did on another book. What hurt was that she was exceptionally nice about it, and that she was right. I had neglected the book. I'd overbooked, and it was the same week baby dog Izzy needed surgery and then keen attention during recovery. The thing was, her assignment wasn't difficult; it was painless. A pleasant enough mystery novel. Meanwhile I was doing a crazy cookbook for one client and a messed-up manuscript that looked like it had been dictated to Siri for another, and a flow of short fact-checking jobs from a third, and I took it all because I have to help come up with the $5,500 for the kid's surgery. But just as the best-behaved child gets the least attention, so too did the most pleasant editing job, and the errors that escaped me in my proofing were caught by others.

So I have taken up residence here. 

 

Which leads me to one of my favorite conundrums: Is it worse to be accused of something falsely or accurately? The first is frustrating, because it's unfair but it's hard to prove innocence; the second is embarrassing, and shame is painful. My first thought is that it's better to be accused falsely, because there's always the option of punching someone in the snoot. But really, for the sake of truth, it's better to be upbraided honestly. Wounded pride stings like hell, but the only way to get better is to be caught in the act of being worse. If I have to lose this client, those are just the breaks. 

Meanwhile, until my penance is over, Tralfaz will be in the bed while I'm in his house. Woof!