Email Ettiquette: Yes, I judge Bad Grammar and Careless Typos

Now that I am involved in this National Blog For A Month - November deal-io, I'm afraid I have caught a few typos or errors in my posts, I am chalking them up to the "pressure" of having to get something up everyday, whether I've got the time for it or not. Usually, I am extremely fastidious about my emails and other electronic musings, i.e. I can't stand having an error in my facebook status update for fear of people thinking I am an idiot, etc. In turn, it is only natural that I would think that you are questionable if you choose to hit send or "publish" on your typo/error-ridden reply, email, letter. I can't help it, I just do! I am liable to assign you with qualities ranging from, the fairly innocuous, careless, to the decidedly nastier, idiotic. I apologize for this in advance.

...Of course, there is a caveat (as there often is with me). I will forgive you if the message or intent of the note is interesting, witty, obviously written in a rush or exceptionally insightful and I am always happy to be proved wrong when I judge too harshly. Always. I am a firm believer in humanity's ability to change and overcome and, lord knows, I've had days where I know that if that was my one chance to make an impression on someone.... well, let's just say they would run the other way the next time they saw me. So, unless you are truly unlikable, I will be open to loving you or something about you for any good reason you give me. And that is probably why, on the flipside, I am able to judge stupid mistakes so easily. I know that I will forgive you as quickly as I condemned you!

That whole bit above was all an extremely long, not terrible coherent preamble to what really got me thinking about this and that I wanted to share with you: Send: The Essential Guide To Email For Home and Office. I found this delightful article in an old New Yorker at the gym. *Quick! Click the link and give it a read.* It is important that we are all on the same page.* It is the Amy Vanderbilt-equivalent for email correspondence and looks to be chock-full of great, rational, seemingly obvious advice on what should and shouldn't be put in a email. A couple of my favorite things are 1.) Assume that anything you write in an email could be forwarded on to others - with your name attached. Yikes! And double-yikes for this whole blog thing! And 2.) Forget the assholes that don't like emoticons. I don't use them all the time, but I love that there is something that can be added to your typed text that can add a smile or a wink to indicate that you are joking. Sarcasm has a funny way of not always translating in short emails, so a quick ;-) can really save the day sometimes! If you have a minute, seriously check out the New Yorker peice, it is pretty short and really excellent.