Because I have nothing better to do.

So maybe I'm just cranky because I awoke to the sound of chainsaws this morning. That's never a happy noise, especially when it's followed closely by the loud thump of my former neighbor's formerly gorgeous oak trees falling to the ground.

Wretched builders, ruining our neighborhood.

On the other hand, it's entirely possible (read: likely) that I'm just frittering time so I don't have to tackle the effing volunteer project that's been cluttering my effing desk for effing months, provoking me to routinely shake my fist at the sky with a vow to never volunteer for anything ever again.

Oh, please excuse me for just a moment while I take this call.

Hey, Jen. What? The preschool room mother gave birth over the weekend and can no longer fulfill her duties? Of course I'll step in!

I'm sorry. Where were we? Right, right: the reason for this post.

Maybe I'm sharing my grievances with the blogosphere because, like my own personal heroine, Lynne Truss, I'm routinely gobsmacked by the typos and grammatical errors and journalistic blunders I read. And I'm wondering: just when in the utter bloody hell are people going to start writing right?

PROPERLY! I meant to say "writing properly." You see: it's contagious, poor writing.

Allow me to present Exhibit A, a photograph I snapped yesterday of a seemingly innocuous strip of dedication bricks in a local park.

You may want to enlarge the picture to determine why I was sorely tempted to pry one particular block from the ground and run it to a nearby engraver for a quick fix, so egregious and absurd was the error.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: people, please don't underestimate the power of proofraeding.

Exhibit B in today's What Were They Thinking? rant is the following news item, virtually clipped and saved from the front page of cnn.com this morning.

27 suspended for Clooney file peek
http://www.cnn.com/2007/SHOWBIZ/10/10/clooney.records/index.html

I worry that I might spontaneously combust if I don't itemize my gripes against the fine editors at cnn.com today.

First: That this is considered newsworthy boggles my weary mind. Against the backdrop of really important stuff happening in the world, this was, as of eleven o'clock this morning, the second most viewed article on cnn.com.

Wait, wait... yes, it's now leading the pack. And somewhere in the world, minding his own business and enjoying a well-earned life of leisure, Walter Cronkite just felt an icy chill run down his spine.

Second: If I'd submitted this pablum, rife with errant punctuation and poor sentence structure, to my Journalism 312 professor at Mr. Cronkite's and my alma mater, it would have been rebuked, scorned and held up to my classmates as a bloodcurdling example of What Not to Do.

I am nearly overcome with the urge to print this page and take a bold red pen to it. You scoff, but my grandmother would be immeasurably proud.

Third: The world has so generously provided us with a dizzying array of stellar photographs of its two-time Sexiest Man Alive.

Yet this... THIS was the best you could do, cnn.com editor?

Please help me, because I do so want to understand. Did he trip your grandmother once? Run over your dog? I'm listening.

Oh, please excuse me for just a moment while I take this call.

Hello, darling. Giggle.

Ahem.

Fourth, and finally: I'm a firm believer in the right to privacy. But c'mon, y'all: IT'S GEORGE CLOONEY. I'd have taken a little peek, too. And at more than just his medical records, if you know what I'm saying.

I'm pretty sure you do.

Yes, I'm happily married. Very! But I am, after all, a human being. A human being who runs afoul of Strunk and White on occasion, but who joyfully celebrates National Punctuation Day. Who enjoys a dish of celebrity gossip here and there, but also craves real news from real journalists.

I'm a human being who hugs trees and adores pavers, including those with typos. And I really do want to make the world a better place, even if I'm much too disorganized and disheveled to handle a garden-variety volunteer project.

So back to my effing desk I go.