explanation and clarification
Alec, as always, is right on the button; there is something "fishy" about the previous post. In his comment on the post, he raises the issue of inverted commas/quotation marks, and their overuse in our annual newsletter.
Well, it's a long story, but one well worth the telling, because it contains lessons for us all....
This time last year (roughly) I made a resolution (of the New Years variety) to write more romantic fiction. To this end I purchased and installed on my laptop a copy of "Mills & Boon's Romantic Digital Assistant v2.04" - a piece of software that Mills & Boon produce (and sell for £21.99) to help aspiring authors meet the exacting publication standards set by M&B for their romantic novels. The program runs in the background on your computer, and amongst other things, helps the novice author keep track of the numbers of clinches, kisses and swoons (and other seduction-related data). For historical romances it also provides a series of acceptable defaults for bodice-ripping parameters (e.g. number of buttons ripped off, and percentage of heaving bosom exposed).
It also helps with matters of writing style. It ensures for example, that, in the interests of keeping the reader engaged, the text doesn't include too much boring description, but is firmly based in dialogue - for example -
"Oh Roger I've never felt this way before", Helena gasped.
"I know" groaned Roger;
"I know you know my darling", whimpered Helena;
"I know you know I know" heaved Roger....... and so on.
Pretty steamy stuff, eh? And of course in the heat of the moment it is very easy for an inexperienced author to lose track of all those inverted commas, or even to miss them out altogether! I'm sure you can see where I'm heading here. I lost track of, and even missed out, some inverted commas. And because I had (stupid smug man that I am) altered the program's default inverted comma setting, excess punctuation built up in the keyboard buffer, and the even the computer's main I/O bus.
Early versions of Windows used to include a facility for releasing the pressure of excess, unused punctuation (rather like the spit valve on a tuba), but of course the latest versions don't (Microsoft cost cutting again!). So I had this problem - my laptop was slowing down because it was clogged up with inverted commas, but their was no way to drain-off the excess - what was I to do?
And then it came, a blinding flash of inspiration!!! Write an excessively long and tedious annual newsletter to send out with the christmas cards - that'll help, especially if I litter it liberally with words and phrases enclosed in "utterly pointless quotation marks" - and I'm delighted to be able to report there is hardly any extraneous punctuation left clogging up my computer.
And that would have been that, if I had not also fiddled with the "Reality" settings on the program. The default setting for your average romantic novel is 17.5% - 100% provides pin-sharp realism (e.g. Big Brother), 0% leads to utter fantasy (e.g. a New Labour election manifesto). Before I wrote the newsletter I had mistakenly set the "Reality level" to minus 14%....
So take note before you make those New Years Resolutions, the "law of unintended consequences" is hard at work in the Universe, and set to undermine our very best intentions.
