I have to polish up my cover letter and submit applications for two different jobs at my campus, both of which would be essentially the same stuff I'm doing now, but for much more money and in divisions where I would never, ever again have contact with Rage Nurse or Vengeance Doc. Why is this onerous? Why am I not all over this? I don't understand me.

Change is hard, even when it's good for you.

Ah, msbelle. I hope you can work something out, because that does Not sound like good times.

Oh my god. The author who put a hard return at the end of every line e-mailed back and said -- I swear to you -- "I don't know what a paragraph return is. Please advise."

I don't even know how to explain what the fuck a paragraph return is. It's A PARAGRAPH RETURN!

Can you just ask him to make it more obvious where the paragraph breaks are in his manuscript?

Oh my god. The author who put a hard return at the end of every line e-mailed back and said -- I swear to you -- "I don't know what a paragraph return is. Please advise."

Wow. That's...wow.

I'd keep things as simple as possible and say "hit the enter key twice". And if he asks what the enter key is, punch him in the face.

Can you just ask him to make it more obvious where the paragraph breaks are in his manuscript?

Oh my god. The author who put a hard return at the end of every line e-mailed back and said -- I swear to you -- "I don't know what a paragraph return is. Please advise."

Wow. That's...wow.

I'd keep things as simple as possible and say "hit the enter key twice". And if he asks what the enter key is, punch him in the face.

That's what we finally decided on -- to ask the author to put extra returns in to separate the paragraphs. And then we'll run find/replace to take out single returns.

We're all just sitting here laughing in utter bogglement because none of us can figure out how to explain what a hard return is without going into a 3-page dissertation. ("Well, you know how when you're typing and the words appear on the screen and proceed toward the right side of the screen?")

It's the Enter key. I can see not knowing a different name for that, if that's not your business.

It's the Enter key. I can see not knowing a different name for that, if that's not your business.

But "hard return" is the term for hitting that key at the end of a line where you want a break to appear. Do people call it "hard enter"? (That's a serious question.) I don't know what else to call it.

I have made a haircut appointment and called to follow up on my tire repair. And dealt a little with crazy renter situation.

I have been dealing with crappy stuff all week, and I'd love to be done with it.