Husband had a phone interview at 1. It's either going well, or it went badly and he won't call to tell me, or he called someone else to talk it over.

Ahhh! My 3pm meeting isn't happening! That is amazing. Maybe I will take a nap.

One meeting down, one rescheduled, and about an hour until the next one. Lunch was delicious. I'm starting to feel hopeful about the rest of the day.

Interview~ma to Mr. Dana. And call her darn it!

Nap, Jesse, nap!

Called husband, no answer. So he's still on the phone with them, or with someone else.

And another round of layoffs at my company. Nothing that directly affects me, but yikes.

Oh my god, this is the week of the GIANT asshole authors from hell. Our journal style is that titles -- even of editorials -- have to be scientific and informative and contain key points of the article. (I know other journals allow leeway for editorials to have wacky or funny titles, but we don't. It is what it is.)

So I have an author with an editorial about diagnosing dementia, and he titled it "To Dement or Not to Dement: That Is the Question." First of all, we don't use "dement" as a verb. Second, I told the author what our style is, and asked him to provide an alternate title.

He replied, "I must say that I really like the title as it was written and I am reluctant to change it, as this is the whole reason I wrote this article." [ED: Seriously? The WHOLE reason??? That's a shitty reason to write an article, you ASS.]

I replied very politely and reiterated what our journal style is, and said unfortunately, the title does not meet our style, and asked him to please provide another title.

He didn't reply to me; he emailed the editor-in-chief of the journal (way above even the people I have direct contact with) AND COPIED ME so I knew he was being a dick about it, and said (including the emoticon, so professional): "Sorry to bother you with this rather silly point. The copyright department want to change the title of the editorial ("To dement or not to dement, that is the question"). I fear that this would make the piece rather pedestrian in nature, dragging it back to the mean. However, I don’t want a big todo over this and I’m happy to do whatever you say. :-)"

Oh HELL NO, son. HELL NO. What IS it with these fucking authors this week? Just follow our style and everything will be fine, YOU DICK. (And where did you get the idea we're the "copyright department"? Your credibility is at absolute zero now, you shitbag.)

I honestly expect the EIC will say we should just leave the title as is so the author doesn't get his delicate fee-fees hurt any more. But I forwarded the email to my coordinator because I told her I wanted her to be in the loop. I did not include any personal assessment of the author's parentage or general shitbaggery, because I didn't want THAT to get forwarded to anyone else.

Alla y'all in academic publishing, on the author side: NEVER DO THIS SHIT. We hate you when you pull this diva shit. HAAAAAAATE.

The copyright department

I wonder if he meant "copywriter". Which wouldn't be right either, I guess.

It's just SO fucking petty. And I am equally petty in that I want the EIC to tell him to fuck himself and change the title.

I need Advil and chocolate.

Interview went well, he said. Now I have to research Oklahoma City to decide if we would be willing to live there, provided he gets another interview.

That's insane, Teppy.

Dana, I hope your DH's interview went well.

I have eaten a piece of chocolate and taken ibuprofen. Now I need to see if I can smite this author long-distance.