The Great Typo Hunt Part 2

We can argue over the logic, but the U.S. lacks an overarching authority or consensus on generic possessives.* So the Mother's Day argument makes sense in isolation, but the government yanked the apostrophe out of Veterans Day. Let's not get started with Presidents' Day ... Presidents Day? President's Day? So the Mother's Day argument makes sense in isolation, but the government yanked the apostrophe out of Veterans Day. Let's not get started with Presidents' Day ... Presidents Day? President's Day?

I have a confession to make. I don't care whether you go with Kid's or Kids', Presidents or President's. There isn't some apostrophe G.o.d reclining upon an ancient, pitted throne, clutching one single answer to the conundrum. What's more essential is that you make a decision and stick with it stick with it. Consistency is the key, and unfortunately also the area in which so much signage fails. Some days later, in Charleston, we'd see a store announcing "Phillip's Shoes" on its awning, while "Phillips Shoes" adorned the building itself. You can't even make up your mind about the name of your store? Isn't that kind of an important decision? The Filene's Bas.e.m.e.nt problems we'd be investigating further after brunch were another telling example of apostrophe confusion. "Mens' boxed ties" was an easy one to make, arising from someone knowing a basic grammatical rule (plural apostrophes go after the s) s) that happened to be broken in this particular case (since that happened to be broken in this particular case (since men men is already a plural noun, there's no need to distinguish between the singular and plural. It's is already a plural noun, there's no need to distinguish between the singular and plural. It's man's man's and and men's) men's). But then another sign had decided to skip the apostrophe altogether, resulting in the MENS MENS department. department.

Your teachers were right about the apostrophe always standing in for a missing letter or letters. A millennium ago, instead of using an apostrophe and an s s for possessives, English used a genitive case that added the suffix for possessives, English used a genitive case that added the suffixes to the possessing noun (e.g., Benjamines beard, kides night). Within a couple hundred years, that practice fell into disfavor as English became the preserve of the lower cla.s.ses, after English-speakers got stomped on by French-speaking Normans from across the narrow sea. But we'll hold off on the edu-tastic voyage through history. Suffice it to say that in the case of possessives, the apostrophe stands for that lost to the possessing noun (e.g., Benjamines beard, kides night). Within a couple hundred years, that practice fell into disfavor as English became the preserve of the lower cla.s.ses, after English-speakers got stomped on by French-speaking Normans from across the narrow sea. But we'll hold off on the edu-tastic voyage through history. Suffice it to say that in the case of possessives, the apostrophe stands for that lost e e, from a grammatical convention that no longer exists.

Further maligning the logic of apostrophes is the fact that the possessive nouns often sound sound the same as the plural noun. Spoken language came on the scene long, long before the written symbols that corresponded to it; the oral form of language often guides the written. In the case of possessive apostrophes and plurals, in so many cases verbally indistinguishable, the written distinction becomes increasingly confused for a growing segment of the population. the same as the plural noun. Spoken language came on the scene long, long before the written symbols that corresponded to it; the oral form of language often guides the written. In the case of possessive apostrophes and plurals, in so many cases verbally indistinguishable, the written distinction becomes increasingly confused for a growing segment of the population.

We enjoyed an incredibly good meal, I treated, and we departed, but not before Benjamin made one last change. Thanks to his inquiry, we now knew that a single coloring contest took place. I handed him the elixir and got my camera ready, and we rolled out according to plan, Benjamin leading our procession and pausing, as Jenny and I pa.s.sed slowly between him and any probing eyes. He struck with a quick splash of the elixir and took Jenny's arm, leaving me to flash a picture and scurry out the double doors after them.

We triumphant three strode out into the parking lot, cool as cantaloupes. My first successful venture with my new typo-hunting ally Benjamin. I felt suave and in control, action-movie cool, except that I couldn't figure out how to walk in slow motion.

Filene's Bas.e.m.e.nt awaited across the parking lot, and there all my illusions of urbanity shattered. We seemed underdressed for the store. Our T-s.h.i.+rts and jeans stood out against the garb of customers and employees alike. The man who approached us noticed it, judging by the downward turn of his mouth, but Benjamin snapped, "Your boxed ties, please?" I realized the object of my objection occurred in a word that, bad punctuation aside, was also completely unnecessary. It's not as if there were a separate station for women's women's boxed ties. boxed ties.

The well-dressed employee escorted us down an aisle to a fixture that looked familiar. Benjamin gave our thanks with a sharp nod, letting the man know that his a.s.sistance was no longer required. Benjamin's whole manner seemed to suggest that he was often, in fact, over overdressed for such a store, but that this was merely his Sunday off and no one had better question it. For the first time it occurred to me what an a.s.set it was to have a retail employee on my side. He'd seen all the customer types often enough that he could mask himself with any att.i.tude to match the moment, and so much of the typo-finding realm would overlap with his familiar turf. Benjamin was striding into the echoing ivory halls of typo-hunting with gusto. I took it as a promising omen for this leg of the trip.

"Precis.e.m.e.nt," Jenny declared, channeling Hercule Poirot as she gestured toward the offending sign. She and Benjamin cuddled together, delighted at how they'd sleuthed the cause of one of my earliest finds. Not merely the same error, but the same sign. These errors had been run off en ma.s.se. I twisted around to check for another problem, sighted it, and this time snapped better photos of what I'd failed to adequately record a few hundred miles north. Jenny declared, channeling Hercule Poirot as she gestured toward the offending sign. She and Benjamin cuddled together, delighted at how they'd sleuthed the cause of one of my earliest finds. Not merely the same error, but the same sign. These errors had been run off en ma.s.se. I twisted around to check for another problem, sighted it, and this time snapped better photos of what I'd failed to adequately record a few hundred miles north. MENS' BOXED TIES MENS' BOXED TIES. And above us, MENS CONTEMPORARY MENS CONTEMPORARY.

Adding to my sense of deja vu, Benjamin said, "Since men men is already plural, the is already plural, the s s can only declare that it's possessive; therefore an apostrophe is strikingly absent." can only declare that it's possessive; therefore an apostrophe is strikingly absent."

Declare? Therefore? Strikingly? I wondered how much longer he'd be wearing his snootier-than-thou persona, as much as I'd appreciated it. "See, dude," he said, and I sighed with relief that I wouldn't have to poke him in the coconut after all, "there's no use trying to correct this apostrophe here, and it wouldn't have helped to confront anyone in Boston either." I wondered how much longer he'd be wearing his snootier-than-thou persona, as much as I'd appreciated it. "See, dude," he said, and I sighed with relief that I wouldn't have to poke him in the coconut after all, "there's no use trying to correct this apostrophe here, and it wouldn't have helped to confront anyone in Boston either."

I stood shocked. They had casually removed the dark stain of cowardice from my first day's hunt and washed it clean so that, in hindsight, my deeds shone pure, giving off an aura of discretion discretion. Jenny drove the point home: "We'd have to call their corporate office. See, the employees could even get in trouble for taking signs down or fixing a mistake if their district manager failed to understand. Their merch people are supposed to put up the signs they're told to, no questions asked."

Though Benjamin and I resolved to call the Filene's Bas.e.m.e.nt corporate headquarters at the close of the trip, we never got the chance to do so, thanks to the interference of certain dire events. As it turns out, our efforts would not have been that productive in the long run anyway-as of this writing, the chain has been sold to a liquidator and has filed for bankruptcy, another victim of hard economic times. What was truly important about that day's adventures was that I had gained a valuable ally in the fight for better spelling and grammar.

TYPO T TRIP T TALLY.

Total found: 16 Total corrected: 9 * Maybe that's for the best. In 1890, President Benjamin Harrison formed the U.S. Board on Geographic Names, to regulate the names for the astonis.h.i.+ng number of cities, towns, and natural features that America had come to encompa.s.s. They decided that the less punctuation, the better, particularly in place names containing a possessive. So they went and blasted the apostrophe out of Pike's Peak, making it Pikes Peak, and so on. The policy remains to this day, with only a few exceptions being granted by federal largesse (and, here and there, rebellious communities such as the Fells Point neighborhood in Baltimore-its residents insist on Maybe that's for the best. In 1890, President Benjamin Harrison formed the U.S. Board on Geographic Names, to regulate the names for the astonis.h.i.+ng number of cities, towns, and natural features that America had come to encompa.s.s. They decided that the less punctuation, the better, particularly in place names containing a possessive. So they went and blasted the apostrophe out of Pike's Peak, making it Pikes Peak, and so on. The policy remains to this day, with only a few exceptions being granted by federal largesse (and, here and there, rebellious communities such as the Fells Point neighborhood in Baltimore-its residents insist on Fell's) Fell's).

5 Maladies

March 1112, 2008 (Kill Devil Hills, NC, to Myrtle Beach, SC)In which our Heroes suffer numerous Trials against their spirits, plans, and digestive abilities in their inexorable Quest across desolate beaches, cold woodlands, and ferryless harbors.

Another burst of cold wind blew across the beach in Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina. I recognized that the sand wasn't flying in our eyes, but that was about the sum of our blessings. The afternoon had yielded a fairly lousy hunt-not from hesitancy on our part, but because we didn't know where to go. As Benjamin tromped over to a far sign, the sole bit of text on the beach, I examined the magazine I'd picked up at the only place open for business this early in the season. The cover promised suggestions for outdoor "activites". Benjamin returned shaking his head. "Some notice about which parts of the beach are unsafe for swimming due to sewage." Disturbing, but grammatically clean.

Our nose for fertile typo ground was proving to be stuffy indeed. We had entertained thoughts of a thriving boardwalk along the beach. Instead we found ourselves plodding along frigid white sands, gazing in both directions down an empty sh.o.r.e.

Benjamin pointed out that we'd found a couple of fascinating historical typos earlier that day at the Wright Brothers National Memorial. The fathers of modern aviation had tried their hand at a newspaper, and one front page showed why their talents lay skyward instead-they'd spelled the name of their own paper wrong! Another exhibit specifically called attention to a typo. A telegram about their initial flight success had misreported the duration as a mere fifty-seven seconds rather than the full fifty-nine (not to mention calling Orville "Orevelle"). While Benjamin found this intriguing, to me it meant the League had arrived a hundred years too late on the scene of a devastating offense.

"Sorry, man," I said. "I suck."

"It can't be helped. Nothing's open," he said as we wandered by the gray waters of the Atlantic.

Yet the typos were out there, somewhere. The town slumbered in seeming peace, but knowing what I knew, I could find no such respite. I had chosen to come here on the hunt, and I had gotten it wrong. A mere three typos had been found, and none corrected. Benjamin, a numbers guy at base, would be crushed once he realized we'd dropped under the fifty percent mark of mistakes corrected versus found. We headed to a campground, where a new problem would elicit his regret with mightier force.

It was a decent enough clearing in the woods, but it appeared deserted. We selected one of the little sites facing a pond, and then found no one to take our payment at the office, which stood as abandoned as the rest of the grounds. During the off-season, campers were on the honor system to drop an envelope with the proper amount into a slot. We didn't have cash, but we had to go grab some hot dogs to make over a fire anyway, so we could hit an ATM while we were out. First, though, Benjamin wanted to set the tent up. He was excited about the tent. He'd nabbed it for half off a price that he already considered low (and rejoiced when I went in for half of that). As he leaned into the trunk, where he'd stuffed the tent that very morning at his parents' house in Virginia Beach, he discoursed at length on all its marvelous features, such as how quick and easy it was to erect, and how well it held up against an insane wind during a trial setup. This last bit cheered me, since the wind here still kicked up an occasional rough gust. The dying sun spilled fantastic colors into the sky and the pond. I stood smiling in its glow until I realized that Benjamin was caroming between the tent he'd unrolled and the trunk.

"Something wrong?"

He didn't answer, muttering to himself as he shook the empty tent bag like Heracles throttling the Cretan Bull, but with a more distracted air. I looked over at the unrolled tent, which waited to be unfolded, hoisted onto poles, and staked into the-wait a minute. Where were the tent poles?

"I can't believe this. I can't believe it!" Benjamin shouted. He turned to me. His voice became perfectly calm, though the wildness of his eyes betrayed the tempest within. "This simply cannot be. I'm not the kind of person who does does this. This is a rookie mistake. How could I have ..." this. This is a rookie mistake. How could I have ..."

He'd left the tent poles wrapped up in the tent's protective outer coat, the rain fly, back at his parents' house. The wind had turned so furious the day he'd done the test setup that he couldn't roll the fly up with the tent without the thing blowing away, so he'd spun the fly around the poles and then rolled up the heavier tent. He'd stashed the two bundles side by side in his closet, but the pole/fly bundle fell back into the dark recesses, and Benjamin had forgotten all about it this morning when he'd reached in and grabbed the tent.

I recognized in his apologies a note of my own glistening self-flagellation from the beach and resolved that tomorrow, by the light of a new day, we'd learn from our mistakes and charge forward, not allowing a defeatist att.i.tude to get in our way. I did wonder, though, as I stared up at the moon that had risen during the search for the poles, where we would be lodging here in rural North Carolina with no notice. Then I remembered that my GPS had uses beyond simple navigation. I had it search for nearby hotels as we came back out onto the main road, now in full darkness. Six or seven places came up.

"Which of these sounds cheap to you?" I said.

"Uh." Benjamin scrolled through the list. "Probably anything with 'Econo' in its name."

The bolder future that I'd envisioned came true, in perverse fas.h.i.+on, the next morning after we set off from the Williamston Econo Lodge. We'd checked off lessons learned, with nary a glance at our mistakes in the rearview, but then everything else began to fall apart. Callie's troubles began that morning with a faint protest that would get worse over the coming days. I'd realized before I even began the trip, when I'd taken her to the shop for a full inspection and a mani/pedi, that I'd be putting some serious miles on her and that she was entering her elder years by automotive reckoning. Even so, Callie's grumbling took a backseat to the rebellion of another modern technological wonder.

During the first days of this journey, probably somewhere in New Jersey, as I listened to the tinny female voice squawking orders from my dash, I'd decided that my GPS needed a name, and that the only proper name would be Authority. I was being somewhat ironic at the time, but as the days went on, I slipped into placing more and more trust in the inerrancy of her dicta. O folly! How soon I forgot the motto of my parents' generation: Question Authority Question Authority. Thus, Authority caught me off guard when she announced that the trip from Williamston to Beaufort would be nearly an hour shorter than the Google Maps route I'd looked at before nodding off to bed. Benjamin, too, thought the eastward heading strange. We looked ahead in the GPS route and saw that Authority had steered us toward a ferry. Oh, all right, so that solved it. Except that the ferry, like everything else along the North Carolina coast, wasn't running in early March. Our road ended at a chain blocking access to the dock, with a sign that said CLOSED FOR SEASON CLOSED FOR SEASON.

Benjamin shut Authority off and yanked my road atlas from the pile of stuff suffocating the backseats. "A chance to redeem myself," he announced, taking over the navigational duties. The trip to Beaufort would take an additional hour, thanks to the necessary backtracking.

We could at least take comfort in the fact that each of our trials carried with it a crucial lesson. For example, very few typos exist on beaches. And: Tents need something to hold them up. And above all, I now knew not to place blind trust in Authority again; I would always compare her routes against the maps. Though she'd mislead us a little here and there, never again would she send us so far astray. We paused for lunch along the way, making a shopping trip for supplies and eating peanut b.u.t.ter sandwiches in a grocery parking lot before heading onward. Beaufort was a little coastal town with a big heart and an exceptional Maritime Museum, wherein Benjamin sc.r.a.ped an errant apostrophe off the wall with his thumbnail.

Another spartan day for finds, but at least this time we went three for three, knocking us back over the fifty-percent correction mark. In retrospect, that day was also notable for our first run-in with an enemy whose name is Legion: CARS WILL BE TOWED AT OWNERS EXPENSE CARS WILL BE TOWED AT OWNERS EXPENSE.

As I wrote my day's blog entry, I reflected on my continuing struggle to find the places in most dire need of our typo-hunting services. I needed more text-rich locales than I'd been able to find yet. Still, at least Benjamin was on board with my mission, we'd be picking up the tent poles tomorrow, and we could once again claim to have corrected a (slim) majority of our discovered nemeses. We went out to dinner thinking our troubles had mostly concluded, powerless to resist the grotesque "thickburgers" that Hardee's had been bombarding us with through highway advertis.e.m.e.nts for some time now. Alas, the worst was yet to be digested. For Benjamin, it turned out to be utterly indigestible. By morning he lay p.r.o.ne across his bed and skipped our second Econo Lodge's continental breakfast. He retched to try to force the fast food out of his tract, but to no avail.

I realized then that my poor friend wasn't used to consuming the mounds of terribly unhealthy food that an epic road trip requires. The Hardee's tera-burger had been his grim initiation into the lifestyle. This seemed the culmination of our woes of the last few days, as if an acc.u.mulated sludgeball of ill luck were what was actually troubling Benjamin's guts. If we could propel it from his system, I thought, we'd see an immediate change in our fortunes.

On the harrowing drive to Myrtle Beach, I thrice feared for Callie's interior, but the burger remained lodged in place. Each Hardee's billboard we pa.s.sed made Benjamin's nausea swell, and there were many, but when we cranked up the latest alb.u.m by his favorite jeans-clad bard, Springsteen, some eldritch Magic helped quell his troubled stomach's pains. We managed to arrive without the forcible ejection of any internal organs.

Once inside the city limits, we drove past lurid signs promising simulacra of whatever one desired. Dinosaur putt-putt! Medieval banquets (serfs and wenches included)! A rock-and-roll theme park! I hadn't visited this particular honky-tonk since my dad led a family expedition here many years ago. Time had not moved on here; apparently the place was still catering to my prep.u.b.escent self. Our first stop in Myrtle Beach was the FedEx office, where missing tent parts had arrived ahead of us. We put them to use right away at a KOA campsite in a modest wood not far from the beach. After Benjamin and I erected the tent, which proved at least as easy as he'd told me two nights prior, he crawled inside it to die. It was late afternoon at that point. I had to get the day's typo hunting done soon, and it looked like I'd be doing my rounds without a companion. I told him I'd be back in a little while. The pedestrian exit led me past a fundamentalist church and into the touristy main commercial district, separated from the beach by a bulwark of outsized chain hotels.

On my own again so soon! How vital was a partner in correction-how forlorn felt I without one. Benjamin's absence hobbled the League's gait. I visited a couple of souvenir and T-s.h.i.+rt shops and made rote fixes to a few typos here and there, but my orthographic heart was listless. Then I came upon the biggest typo I'd seen to date, on a giant marquee outside the "Pacific Superstore."

Suddenly vigor crested over me. I had to show Benjamin that I could do this alone. I strode into the store. The place was a cavernous repository of beach gear and trinkets, perhaps imported wholly from the other coast, as the name of the store implied. I saw one shopper present. I hung around for a moment until a short lady approached me. "Can I help you?"

"Hi there," I said. I gave her the heartiest grin that I could manufacture. Which may not have been all that convincing, I admit; I've always been a more adept scowler. I knew I'd have to work on my salesmans.h.i.+p, though, in this and future typo-related endeavors. "I noticed that your sign out there in front has two t ts in SWEATTS SWEATTS, and I was wondering if there was a reason for it."

She gave me a puzzled look and accompanied me outside, where she looked up at the sign. She was unmoved. "Oh yes, but I thought that sweats.h.i.+rts sweats.h.i.+rts did have two did have two t ts when shortened ..."

"Well," I stammered, "no. I actually have a strange request for you-can you take one of the t ts out? I'd really appreciate it. You see, I-"

"I'm sorry, you'll have to ask the manager," said the lady, indicating a long-haired guy perched on a ladder while talking on a cell phone and making adjustments to surfboards on display along the wall.

"h.e.l.lo," I said to the manager when he came over. I gained some more momentum, sensing that this was an essential trial of my mission. Its outcome would predict the success or failure of the many confrontations to come. "I couldn't help but notice that your sign out front has two t ts in SWEATTS SWEATTS. Could I ask you to, uh, fix it?"

"Does it?" he said. Now it was our turn to promenade in front of the Superstore. He headed for the door. "Who would have done that?"

Certainly I had a suspect in mind, but since TEAL's mission focused on amending the error and not on finger-wagging, I shrugged, following behind him. "I'm actually traveling around the country correcting typos, and it'd be great if you could fix this one. Would you be able to do that?"

Strangely, my story did not faze him in the slightest. The guy was but the first of many supervisors, middle managers, and wage slaves who would take the tale of the League at face value with no visible reaction. Probably half of them didn't believe me, or didn't care.

"No, they don't care," Benjamin would explain some few hundred miles down the road when the topic of responses came up during our westward journey. "When you're a service manager, things break into two categories: typical and atypical." I had become atypical, and atypical was bad.

The manager peered up at the sign, squinting in the sun. "Yes, that's not right. Don't worry, I will make sure that it's fixed." Evidently he thought this would be enough of a response, as he started for the door.

"Oh, I'm sorry," I pressed, "but could you fix it now so I can take a picture of it? I'd really appreciate it. I'm keeping a blog, and I can write this in."

He hesitated, then glanced back into the echoing interior of the store, still nearly devoid of customers. "All right, I will do this for you, but you must hold the ladder."

I nodded, sensing a solemnity to the moment. "Sure."

He returned with a ladder a moment later. For some reason it was a different ladder from the one he'd been using to adjust the surfboards. Perhaps it was reserved for handling requests from meddling pa.s.sersby. He set it up beneath the sign, and I held the legs while he climbed up. Keep it steady, I thought, wouldn't want to have this crucial encounter end in a sprained ankle. As I stared up at a rear end in board shorts, I realized the greater import behind my ostensibly simple duty. To come to this juncture, to hold that ladder, was why I had dreamed up the Typo Eradication Advancement League in the first place-so that I could aid in endeavors such as these, pointing the way for the managers of the nation to correct problems in their own territories. With my hands firmly grasping the ladder of attentiveness and care, who knew how high my countrymen could ascend? Perhaps to the very heavens of perfect spelling and grammar, where seraphim cry hosannas to the correctly deployed apostrophe and cherubim strike down subject-verb disagreements with their burning blades!

Above me, the manager popped at out, then moved the rest of the letters closer together. "There, do you feel better?"

"Sure do," I said, taking the question at face value. "I can count this as a success story."

"Just don't include me in the picture, eh?"

I stood marveling at the small but visible improvement in the world that my ladder-holding had brought about. I won't say that it was a rush rush, because we're not talking about Xtreme s...o...b..arding here, just a small and early step on the brambled road to righteousness. But I did feel a palpable lifting of the spirit, a realization that the landscape around me was more malleable than it seemed. All I had to do was ask. Though, as this episode had demonstrated, sometimes asking more than once would be necessary. Persistence was my most potent weapon against the black hordes of error. For the first time in my life I could see the panoply of possibilities opened up by merely engaging people. Imagine what else could be accomplished!

I returned to the campsite to share the happy news with my TEAL colleague. My tale of success lent him needed vitality. He struggled into a sitting position. "Let's go for a walk," he wheezed.

"Are you ... sure that's a good idea?"

Benjamin grinned bravely. "Here's the thing, Deck. I need to puke, but I can't physically get it out. So let's walk, and that'll agitate my insides, and eventually-"

"Okay, I get it," I said. "You need a hand up?"

He waved his hand dismissively and heaved himself upward on shaking arms. He took a couple of tottering steps over to Callie and grabbed a water bottle from the backseat. Then we made our ponderous way out of the KOA camp and into the commercial district. Benjamin still grimaced like a hurting cowboy, but he persevered, taking liberal swigs from his water, which, he explained, was another facet of his vomit-inducing strategy.

We walked between two giant hotels and onto the cool sand of the beach. The sun sank into a brilliant slumber over the ocean. Mere days ago we'd hung our heads on another beach, one state north, but our mission itself had made progress far beyond geographic measure. I knew now that I could muster the courage to handle whatever orthographic challenge came my way. Perhaps all our recent tribulations had served to lead us to this consecrated moment. I turned to comment on the splendor of the sunset, and saw Benjamin jumping up and down on the sand. Between jumps, he gulped down more water. Something would s.h.i.+ft in his internal tracts soon enough. The League, purged of its ill humours, could then commence its true work.

TYPO T TRIP T TALLY.

Total found: 25 Total corrected: 14

6 Beneath the Surface

March 1516, 2008 (Atlanta, GA)Wherein our oblivious yet infinitely amiable Heroes invite contests for which they are ill-equipped, and an unforeseen conversation riddled with deep and ominous subtext precedes a mental maelstrom & literal hailstorm. Soaked through with insight and precipitation, our Chief Arbiter of Grammatical Justice recognizes that, like sewer-dwelling, nunchaku-wielding amphibians, more lurks 'neath the roads our Heroes tread.

In 1861, Georgia and six other slaveholding states seceded from the Union, protesting the election of Abraham Lincoln, that infernal Northerner who plotted against the expansion of their chattel-based business. Georgia, the railroad hub of the South, ferried supplies to all corners of the newly hatched Confederacy, until the Union sh.e.l.led the heart of Atlanta. When the war ended, Atlantans rebuilt their city center, creating a vibrant business district around their new train station. Over the next hundred years the city grew over that district, with bridges and viaducts turning the former street level into subterranea. In 1968 the funeral procession of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. clattered directly overhead; the following year, the "city beneath the city" was reopened as Underground Atlanta, a retail and entertainment destination. Its charming old architecture helped the district to flourish as the Bourbon Street of Atlanta, but eventually subway construction and crime shut down Underground Atlanta. The cookfires of vagrants ravaged the old historical sites. In 1989 a revamped, mall-like Underground Atlanta reopened. Three years later, following the acquittal of the L.A. policemen who had beaten Rodney King, rioters smashed up the place. In 1996, Underground Atlanta opened its doors for a third third time, now in time for the Atlanta Olympics. In 2008 two white boys wandered into Underground Atlanta, looking for typos. time, now in time for the Atlanta Olympics. In 2008 two white boys wandered into Underground Atlanta, looking for typos.

We gazed down the little thoroughfare. Having come from the MARTA, Atlanta's ma.s.s transit, I felt that, strangely, we'd reentered the station we'd just left. With the pipes running along the ceiling, this place looked more like the subway than the subway did. A row of clothing stores, interspersed with dollar stores, ran along the wall, and the walkway was broken up with mid-mall kiosks peddling hats, sports jerseys, and your instant photo plastered on mugs or s.h.i.+rts. Light filtered through windows that ran below the ceiling. Perhaps owing to the threatening clouds outside, the lighting in here felt gloomy. Consumers moved along in no hurry, giving the impression that no one came here to find what they needed, but because there wasn't anywhere to be be. Whatever its past glory, Underground Atlanta stood before us as testament to capitalism's slipperiest slope, junk for people willing to buy junk because it's there.

A whiteboard affixed to a metal railing contained some spelling issues. I pointed the sign out to Benjamin, who spotted the bright pink PREGNACY TEST PREGNACY TEST immediately, but needed a second to see, in yellow block letters outlined with a black marker, the transposed vowels of immediately, but needed a second to see, in yellow block letters outlined with a black marker, the transposed vowels of SOUVINER SOUVINER (it's a tricky word, one we'd see botched again before we reached the Pacific). My Typo Correction Kit, a plastic shopping bag holding the tools of my amending trade, bulged heavy in my coat, though I found myself ill-equipped for our entry into this particular den of errata-I lacked dry-erase markers. Still, I felt the fervor of the mission coursing through my veins. It had carried me through sundry trials thus far, including road-acquired ailments: one of my eyes, at present, was welded half shut thanks to an unknown irritant. (it's a tricky word, one we'd see botched again before we reached the Pacific). My Typo Correction Kit, a plastic shopping bag holding the tools of my amending trade, bulged heavy in my coat, though I found myself ill-equipped for our entry into this particular den of errata-I lacked dry-erase markers. Still, I felt the fervor of the mission coursing through my veins. It had carried me through sundry trials thus far, including road-acquired ailments: one of my eyes, at present, was welded half shut thanks to an unknown irritant.

The store that the sign advertised lived yet another level down, as if sent to a sub-subterranean time-out corner. Our soles squeaked down the staircase, bringing us into what turned out to be a dingy purveyor of everything from party favors (balloons and streamers) to random household items (clothespins, kitchen utensils, baby bibs). The clientele seemed mostly Latino and black. A woman reached out at us from an ill-defined enclosure at the front, a greeting that made me take a surprised step backward. She wanted our backpacks.

I replied that actually I'd come down to mention that there was an error on one of the store's dry-erase signs up the stairs.

She stared at me.

I could tell by her sour expression that I'd gotten this typo correction off to a rough start, effectively saying, I don't trust you to take my bags or my money, much like you can't be trusted to spell, woman! I don't trust you to take my bags or my money, much like you can't be trusted to spell, woman!

"Oh, my cousin did those," she said. We waited like a couple of dolts for her to continue, then realized that she'd said all she had to say.

"Uh, so ..." Benjamin stumbled. Was the cousin going to fix it? Was it an idiot cousin who always made a mess of whatever she touched? Had that been a buck-pa.s.sing maneuver so subtle we'd completely missed it?

I decided it was best to ignore the response completely, treat it as a non sequitur, and begin again. "It's just there are a couple of words misspelled."

"Oh, that's okay," she said.

No, it wasn't. I didn't think I would be able to convince her of that, though. Of course, my customary line at this point in the conversation would have normally been that I could fix it no sweat Sally, but without the right kind of tool-a plague upon the permanence of mine markers!-I couldn't do anything without marring the sign. Benjamin looked toward me expectantly. "It'd be an easy fix, and if you've got a dry-erase marker ..."

"Nope. My cousin did those signs. At home."

The one gap in their bountiful inventory! "Uh, if I I came back with a dry-erase marker ..." came back with a dry-erase marker ..."

Ha, now she was the one thrown off.

"Right," Benjamin added.

"Right," I said. "So we'll grab a dry-erase marker somewhere, and then we'll come back."

"Oh ... kay?" she said as we spun toward the red rubber stairs.

Now we sought not only typos but a shop that might sell a dry-erase marker or two. We pa.s.sed by groaning kiosks of purses and wallets, hats for every occasion (even pay-by-the-letter designer hats-I considered a TEAL hat, but they didn't have them in teal), and a.s.sortments of items labeled "gifts" since you wouldn't need need any of those things yourself. We saw s.h.i.+rts and shoes and women's accessories (no glitter was spared) and art and more clothes, but in spite of the wide, wild a.s.sortment of everything you never knew you desired, we couldn't find the one thing we wanted to buy. any of those things yourself. We saw s.h.i.+rts and shoes and women's accessories (no glitter was spared) and art and more clothes, but in spite of the wide, wild a.s.sortment of everything you never knew you desired, we couldn't find the one thing we wanted to buy.

We halted at a mid-mall clothing stand that featured dozens of locally designed Barack Obama T-s.h.i.+rts. We might not have noticed the mistake therein had it not been for our unwavering support of Obama, who was currently squaring off against Senator Clinton in a drawn-out Democratic presidential primary. As we perused the homemade wares, a typo on one s.h.i.+rt knocked us out of shopping mode and back into typo-correction territory.

Speaking of territory. Typo correcting can be awkward enough, but this one offered an altogether new brand of discomfort. I read it aloud: "He's black, and Im proud." We looked at each other, and then took another look at our surroundings. Not that we'd been oblivious of the absolute lack of other white people until this moment; it simply hadn't been a relevant factor in the equation until now.