Back in those long ago days of the 1980s I had reached a stage in my career where I enjoyed the services of a secretary.  It also so happens that she was the only person in the office who had a computer on her desk (it was a Wang).  My desk was equipped with a Dictaphone, a nifty device into which I would speak my thoughts, hand a tape to the secretary, and in a hour or two, I would have those words composed and formatted into proper business correspondence.  Well, truth be told, I’d usually have to edit two or three times to get it right–turns out what you say is not necessarily how you would write it.

And sometimes how you say it is just flat out wrong.  I have words in my vocabulary that I know and understand, but have never actually heard in conversation.  So, one day my secretary comes to me and says “boss, that word you keep using–‘as-certain’–is pronounced as-ser-tain.”  Then she laughed.  And told the rest of the staff, who laughed as well.

So, I learned humility and developed some tolerance and compassion when I see stuff this:

But I still laugh.