Betweem (for Between)

Betwixt and between. Begin the beguine. You take the high road and I'll take the low road. Celts have always been partial to peripatetic paradoxes. In addition to beautiful churches and castles. Weem (from the Scottish-Gaelic word uaimh, meaning "cave") is a village near the town of Aberfeldy in the county of Perthshire, Scotland. It claims a 16th-century castle where Bonnie Prince Charlie once slept on his way to the Battle of Culloden in 1746. It has a medieval church that houses funerary monuments of the Menzies family. Plus, there's a pub and hotel there. So if you ever find yourself between a rock and a hard place, you might want to stop for a bit to gather your wits in Weem. We got seven hits on Betweem (for between) in the OhioLINK database today.

(Old Parish Church of Weem, from Wikimedia Commons.)

Carol Reid

Accompaning (for Accompanying)

You've all heard the expression Two's company, Y's a crowd? Well, perhaps that's not exactly how it goes, although that is essentially what's going on with our typo of the day, which is crowding out the letter Y. Today's typo was found 33 times in the OhioLINK database. The night that Peter Pan flew in through the nursery window in search of his shadow, and invited the Darling children to accompany him to Neverland, he might have been hoping for Wendy, and not John and Michael too. But as things turned out, the three pajamaed neophytes made for fine company. And the celebrated Maude Adams made a fine Peter Pan when the James Barrie play opened on Broadway in 1905. "Maudie" Adams made her stage debut in her mother's theatrical company at the tender age of nine months and was a seasoned actress by the time Barrie tapped her for the part of Peter Pan. Many other women have played the unchanging boy throughout the years (in fact, the role was the exclusive domain of grown-up gamines until the early 1980s), but Maude Adams remains the one who "never grew up" in our collective imagination.

(Maude Adams as Peter Pan, from Wikimedia Commons.)

Carol Reid

Coperat* (for Cooperat*)

Back in my day, cops were called "pigs," but this pic of a ratty-looking little anarchist causes me to wonder if there might be cop rats (with tiny rubber bullets and wee cans of pepper spray) out there as well. Banksy is a graffiti artist believed to be from South Gloucestershire, England, and to have been born in 1974, but his real identity has long been unknown. His style is similar to that of Blek le Rat (Xavier Prou), known as the "godfather of stencil graffiti art." Regarding Blek, Banksy says: "Every time I think I've painted something slightly original, I find out that Blek Le Rat has done it as well, only twenty years earlier." We found out that there were 18 cases of Coperat* in OhioLINK today, but we're not going to cop an attitude and rat out the perpetrators. We would suggest, however, that you take a stand against bibliographic anarchy by cooperating to stamp out this typo.

(Banksy Anarchist Rat, from Wikimedia Commons.)

Carol Reid

Interpet* (for Interpret*)

Pets can bring couples together in the best of times, but they can also come between them. In the wonderful "Thin Man" movies starring William Powell and Myrna Loy, the dog Asta seems like an indispensable accessory to their love: indeed, when Nick and Nora Charles eventually have a baby, it's a bit of a cipher compared to the pooch. While pets can occasionally wear out their welcome or be the cause of a marital split, it's just as likely that weary lovers will decide to stay together simply because they can't bear to share custody of the canine. (This scenario is amusingly depicted in the 1960s novelty song "I'll Take the Dog" by Jean Shepard and Ray Pillow.) Interpet* is a "high probability" typo, according to the Ballard list, with 94 hits in OhioLINK.

(Cropped screenshot of Asta from the trailer for Another Thin Man, 1939, from Wikimedia Commons.)

Carol Reid

Comunity, Comunities (for Community, Communities)

The roses red upon my neighbor's vine
Are owned by him, but they are also mine.
His was the cost, and his the labor, too,
But mine as well as his the joy,
Their loveliness to view...

(Poem by Abraham Gruber, which I found hand-copied into a notebook of my grandfather's from the 1920s.)

It's spring planting time and community gardens are terrific places to do just that. My own community has nearly fifty of these verdant little havens of flowers, herbs, and vegetables, popping up in vacant lots and city parks, each uniquely charming and abuzz with the birds and the bees. Comunity (for community) had sprung up 22 times in OhioLINK at last visit, and Comunities seven. Join with your neighbors and promptly weed these typos from your catalogs.

(Photo taken by participant/team Corn Fed Chicks as part of the Commons:Wikis Take Manhattan project on October 4, 2008.)

Carol Reid

Pulbic* (for Public*)

The closest I could come to a decent pun on today's typo was the mathematical term pullback. You can look it up if you like, but suffice it for me to quote directly from Wikipedia: "The notion of Pullback in mathematics refers to two different, but related processes: precomposition and fiber-product." Its "dual" (which I suppose means its opposite) is either pushout or pushforward, depending on which "notion" you're referring to. It all puts me in mind, a little, of the Doctor Dolittle character the pushmi-pullyu, a cross between a gazelle and a unicorn with two heads facing in opposite directions. (This helpfully allowed the pushmi-pullyu to eat and talk at the same time without violating etiquette: "Our people have always been very polite," says one.) There were 24 cases of Pulbic* in OhioLINK this morning. Put your heads together and push (or pull) this typo out of your own OPACs.

(Portrait of Hugh Lofting, the author of Dr. Dolittle, courtesy of Wikimedia.)

Carol Reid

Lvoe* (for Love*)

There are a lot of ways to spell love, according to Alvy Singer in the movie Annie Hall ("I lurve you, I loave you, I luff you...") and a lot of ways to sell it too. I am especially fond of the phrase "pitching woo." It sort of sounds like what it is ("Woo hoo, I'll pitch, you catch!") or perhaps, a bit more ominously: "Let me pitch you this idea, sweetheart, and if you like it, there might be a bridge in Brooklyn I could sell you." The typo Lvoe* casts its spell eight times in OhioLINK, which makes it one of relatively low probability. (But often, just when you least expect it, look out below!) Lovers sometimes look (or feel) as if they're all elbows, but even with a couple of wings thrown into the mix, no mere physical impediment, it seems, can get in the way of true love.

(Cupid and Psyche, 1817, from Wikimedia Commons. As usual, click the pic for a closer look.)

Carol Reid