Sub-editors: how can I avoid killing them?

Yeah, they basically made his shit sentence slightly less shit by not having a bad double-entendre add to the confusion

that is not the kind of thing I would take into my weekend, nor is "Like Zorro."

"he scraped a Desmond" would be up there though

I think the final sentence is ungainly. Maybe it's just my weary state, but as soon as it gets to the "and watch" it loses me.

Yes, it should lose over a glass of rosé.

It strips me of all confidence in writing for the magazine.

Hands up who actually believes this.

" his dick jumped around and rattled on her teeth" <--- rattled? How hard is this guy's cock?

Hard as a sword. Like Zorro's.

It sounds like it's demonically possessed and ejaculates for minutes at a time, so I guess all bets are off

" his dick jumped around and rattled on her teeth" <--- rattled? How hard is this guy's cock?

-- Raw Patrick, Thursday, 24 July 2008 14:13 (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

Internet hardman

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/jul/11/pressandpublishing

I missed this one. What an arse.

damn, grimly fiendish went in

That Zorro passage "won" the "Bad Sex In Fiction" award - up against some stiff (oo-er) competition.

The First Casualty by Ben Elton

He felt the thick, luxuriant bush of soft wet hair between her legs and in a moment he was buried inside it.

"Ooh-la-la!" she breathed as he smelt the clean aroma of her short bobbed hair and the rain-sodden grass around it. "Oooh-la-jolly well-la!"

And so they made love together in the pouring rain, with Nurse Murray emitting a stream of girlish exclamations which seemed to indicate that she was enjoying herself. "Gosh", "Golly" and, as things moved towards a conclusion, even "Tally ho!"

http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/mediamonkey/2008/07/indefinite_article_definite_an.html

'Coren says the email is "ancient" and is puzzled as to why it was surfaced now. "Looking at it - and you have to admit, it's a corker - it occurs to me it can only have been leaked by one of four Times staff. God, they must hate me."'

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b348/linda-u/S-mad-u-crew.jpg

guardian would be way more interesting if they let cam'ron guest copy edit for a week

"He felt the thick, luxuriant bush of soft wet hair between her legs and in a moment he was buried inside it." <--- this guy must be three inches tall or something. And he doesn't even climb into the pussy. Just the hair.

http://www.asiantribune.com/files/images/Death%20to%20America.jpg

Totally depends on how thick and luxuriant said bush is. Could be like Karadzic's beard down there. (xpost)

Yeah, there's something incredibly ungainly about that sentence anyway - if I'd been subbing it the indefinite article would have been the least of my concerns (and before I read on I assumed that they took it out because to most people reading it would *only* mean a blowjob, and have barely any connotations of food at all).

xposts

"Totally depends on how thick and luxuriant said bush is." No matter how hirstute you still gotta be the size of Ant Man to be buried inside it.

Glad to see that despite the letter the subs still didn't bother to change it back for the online version though.

Chaps,

ok well im super drunk right now after playing bass in an awesome metal show and i have a hot chick waiting for me in my bed so ill say this:

I will now explain why your error is even more shit than it looks. You see, i was making a joke. I do that sometimes. I have set up the street as "sexually-charged". I have described the shenanigans across the road at G.A.Y.. I have used the word 'gaily' as a gentle nudge. And "looking for a nosh" has a secondary meaning of looking for a blowjob. Not specifically gay, for this is soho, and there are plenty of girls there who take money for noshing boys. "looking for nosh" does not have that ambiguity. the joke is gone.

fuck times and its nu style of subbing whatever he wants whenever he wants (sans admin log)

hey.. if i was a dude in his 30's, in a dead end job that never got laid, and had barely any irl friends i would love anonymously subbing restuarant reviews too...

basically: this is the only thing dude has control of in his life.

even when he gets drunk he spends his time subbing reviews. kinda sad.
fine.

you can say 350 restaurant reviews were good today but one of them that was actually totally cool, brought the lols and was a solid article got subbed for no reason was enough for me to say "fuck this shit"

tom millar obviously loves the "this is the thread where i say"
style of pussy ass bullshit posts that make ilx terrible. just see idiot thread board for that bullshit. its basically the same 4 ilxors talking about their bullshit lives that no one asked about plus tom telling us how wasted he is.

its like an episode of sex in the city with tom and ned adding in there 2 cents once in a while. wow what bunch of lols.

im not one to make a big post about leaving but fuck this shit. for reals. im leaving for gershy who is a real bro and "GOD FORBID!!!!" bumped threads that already existed....

this paper is now just a bunch of rich college kids and dumb fat bitches (lets get real.... even the actual rock stars that post here are academic morons.) that wanna talk about the politics of messenger bags and facebook profiles. obviously tom wanted this. you can tell by his "dudes im totally wasted!" posts all over the dumb ass molify lingbert thread. so hay! you got what you wanted, tom!

i hope your life of never getting laid by anyone and being stuck in a dead end job is finally giving you what you wanted in life. everyone hates you btw. but hey as long as you rule who gives a fuck right?

And worst of all. Dumbest, deafest, shittest of all, you have removed the unstressed 'a' so that the stress that should have fallen on "nosh" is lost, and my piece ends on an unstressed syllable. When you're winding up a piece of prose, metre is crucial. Can't you hear? Can't you hear that it is wrong? It's not fucking rocket science. It's fucking pre-GCSE scansion. I have written 350 restaurant reviews for The Times and i have never ended on an unstressed syllable. Fuck. fuck, fuck, fuck.

Right,
Sorry to go on. Anger, real steaming fucking anger can make a man verbose.
All the best
Giles

Like Zorro.

I can't believe you ended the review on an unstressed syllable. That's not like you at all.

Adam Bovary, London,

"I can't think of a nicer place to sit this spring over a glass of rosé and watch the boys and girls in the street outside smiling gaily to each other, and wondering where to go for a nosh."

I mean this is Operation Ore fuel, really, this sentence.

Actually if you read that whole review it's appallingly overcooked! I would have cut about half of it.

And smile when you’re looking for my reservation in the book. Smile like you hope it’s there. Don’t frown and dither as if you’re hoping I’ll die before you find it, saving you the trouble of seating me.

Smile when you offer me a drink. So your dad died last year. Deal with it when you get home.

Smile when my girlfriend complains that the carpaccio is raw or the gazpacho is cold. Smile and say the right thing.

That's not even the full sentence.

H3nry Harr1s is too good for the quality not to keep on rising until he has the simmer he wants, and I can’t think of a nicer place to sit this spring over a glass of rosé and watch the boys and girls in the street outside smiling gaily to each other and wondering where to go for nosh.

59 words (or 60 with his indefinite article) apparently constitute a little jingle that the reader takes with him into the weekend.

He does have a point of sorts with the "smile" business, but unfortunately coming from him it sounds less like "put the customer first" and more like "applaud me for breathing, touch the hem of my garment" and other sixth form prefect mores.

But he definitively spoils it by outing his girlfriend as too dumb to know that carpaccio is raw and gazpacho cold...

this paper is now just a bunch of rich college kids and dumb fat bitches (lets get real.... even the actual rock stars that post here are academic morons.) that wanna talk about the politics of messenger bags and facebook profiles.

Jog my memory, was this about ILX or the Times

ask chaki?

... and another e-mail from a colleague telling me about this :)

But he definitively spoils it by outing his girlfriend as too dumb to know that carpaccio is raw and gazpacho cold...

Nono I think he's saying he - or rather his journalistic persona - knows his girlfriend's stoopid, but is suggesting that it's not the waiter/waitress's job to point that out: it's their job to smile and say the right thing.

nb. said girlfriend (or at least, his current belle) sits next to a friend of mine. she has now seen this thread.

Waiter: Sir, are we ready to order?

Brian: Whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on a second. You have no idea what I'm talking about, do you?

Tina: Sure I do! Opera's bitchin'! Okay. I guess I'll have the es-car-got and a glass of chab-liss.

Brian: Same here. Es-car-got and the chab-liss.

I doubt that ex-Giles Coren employee Gordon Ramsay would "smile and say the right thing."

correction: Gordon Ramsay, Giles Coren's ex-employer. I don't want him getting any more high falutin' ideas.

Oh man the Brando one is amazing.

Fan Tan by Marlon Brando and Donald Cammell (William Heinemann)

In a moment Annie was on his side, Madame Lai was like a plant growing over him, and her little fist (holding the biggest black pearl) was up his asshole planting the pearl in the most appreciated place.

"Oh, Lord," he cried out. "I'm a-comin'!"

she has now seen this thread

awesome. she can tell him my offer of a shift still stands, assuming he can demonstrate the vaguest knowledge of how production desks work.

which i really, really, really fucking doubt.

but he won't leave any articles end with an unstressed syllable.

'awesome. she can tell him my offer of a shift still stands, assuming he can demonstrate the vaguest knowledge of how production desks work.'

Future T2 cover article right there, guaranteed.

Yeah that is solid gold actually. I doubt he has enough of a sense of humour to actually do it but you never know.

he will probably have enough of a sense of humour to do it before some idiot ruins his genius joke by taking out an a.

heheh, i've just been mulling that over: would he do it? glad to see i'm not the only one.

(ken: that's brilliant, btw.)

Quote from my mum, having read the piece:

"Oooo, Giles Coren, get back in your box AND keep you hair on! What a hilarious rant, I hope that it made him feel better. Jewish smewish or what?"

She seems to have turned into Larry Grayson :-)

And what's the best way to raise this issue with them without resorting to screaming, violence or explaining things in a style not unlike Father Ted explaining perspective to Dougal?
Now we know.

http://twitter.com/gilescoren

hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha

"Dumbest, deafest, shittest of all..."

Probably one of the ugliest things I've ever read.

people are still sending me this :)

(also: that twitter thing is fucking genius.)