Work grump

[scarlettina]

I'm an editor, not a journalist, damn it. I know it. My resume reflects it. And yet, somehow, I spent the last two days redoing a writer's research and rewriting an article.

And then, after two days of reading more research than I can wrap my brain around (and, quite frankly, being bored out of my mind by it all), I'm told the final product is good—quite fine, in fact—but my research methods need work and here are all the nitpicky details of what I did wrong and what was wrong with my sources.

Now, I know this is an opportunity to learn, and I'm trying to see it that way. But for just a moment I need to kvetch and get it out of my system because the frustration could swallow me whole.

I'm reminded of an incident that occurred when I was in elementary school. My dad spent two hours, maybe more, trying to help me do my New Math homework. I was frustrated to tears. He was frustrated to silence. I later learned that after I went to bed, he typed a 6-page single-spaced letter to the principle about New Math that basically asked, "What the hell difference does it make how she does the math as long as she gets the correct answer?"

I kinda feel like that right now.

::grumble::

Comments

[skidspoppe.livejournal.com]

I used to work with a writer who turned in some really crappy copy and when the publisher questioned him on it, his response was "That's okay, Skids'll fix it."

As for you methods...fuck 'em (I know, not the most literate of responses, but they don't deserve that much thought)

[scarlettina.livejournal.com]

Well, after sleeping on the whole thing, I've decided that I'm just going to move on. I did the best that I could, and the boss was happy with the final product. I'll keep his mail so that, if I need to do something like this again—a major overhaul on a someone else's piece on a subject about which I don't know very much at all—I'll have it as a reference. In the meanwhile, I'm not going to look at it for a while. I'm still feeling like I was bashed for doing the work in the best way I knew how.

[kathlaw.livejournal.com]

Ye gods. My sympathies.