Spellcheck can't go it alone

I've been keeping a small list for the past month or so. You see, spellcheck is a pretty easy way to make sure nothing is too egregiously misspelled. If you've got extra letters or the blatantly wrong letter somewhere, spellcheck has got your back. But there are some errors spellcheck just can't catch — when a typo creates a different, but still real, word. They're usually phonetically similar words — if you were to follow the story along, reading it aloud in your head, you might not notice them until it was too late.

Here's my list of typos that created completely new words that spellcheck wouldn't have caught. Sadly, I didn't write down the context for some of them. (Disclaimer: All of these were caught and changed well before their respective stories went to print.)

1) "a serious of events." Serious = series.

2) "being conscience of the event." Conscience = conscious.

3) "the teachers' onion." It is such a large and important onion, multiple teachers have to be a part of it. But we were pretty sure they meant "the teachers' union."

4) "a message on a marquis."  This one sent me to the dictionary just to be sure, but "marquis" is a title of nobility. Context from the story led me to substitute it for "marquee," a sign.  A marquis could have a message if he wanted to, but there aren't many of those in Wisconsin.

And my personal favorite...

5) "going to asses the situation." Now that is a situation I don't want to be in; I'd rather assess it beforehand.

So after you run spellcheck, make sure to check the individual words of the story.  I am being completely series when I say let's not make assess of ourselves.

-Benton