h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I don't know if I mentioned this already (and reading the previous entries in my journal is clearly far too much work), but I'm doing a distance learning course in proofreading. Anyroad, I just got my first assignment (of 4) back and I got 4.8 out of 5, which seems pretty good. Typically for me, I'm disappointed at my 4.4/5 mark on "Spots and corrects editor errors" (I probably missed a couple of spelling mistakes; I'll have to have a look), but bearing in mind 4 is "good" and 5 is "excellent", I shouldn't feel too down.

Better yet, my tutor has put a note to the effect that there's a high demand for readers of maths and physics books, which kind of suits and MSc mathematician. If t'site'll just accept my application to be a subed I'll even have some experience to add to my CV.

I'm feeling quite positive about this.

Oh, and for some added practice, I've got the contract from my day job. I won't give too much away, but their head office is in Bidford-on-Avon, which is rendered "BIFORD ON AVON" at the top of the document.

My father did a lot of proofreading during his career (He was head of the composition department at the Colonial Press in Massachusetts). I did some proofreading myself.

Colonial press, eh? Did they not get the memo about leaving the empire?

Hi, Thursday. How's the campaign?

Fine thanks - 43 members, 2000 posts on the thread

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Good line!

They didn't get started until the mid-1930s, so they were too late to get the memo.

Who picked that name then? Seems odd considering America's insularity at the time.

Must start Unit 2 of my proofreading. Tomorrow.

*waves to Thursday*

*waves back*

There were a lot of abandoned textile mills during the 1930's (the depression, plus a lot of mills moving to the Southern States, where labor was cheaper). The Colonial Press occupied one of those buildings, and I'm guessing that it might have had the word
"Colonial" in its name. The people in the town would have an easier time figuring out where the Colonial Press was, because it was in the building where the Colonial Mills were. But I'm just guessing...

My grandmother worked in one of the textile mills during World War II. It was called Myron Mills.

I find that there are a lot of establishments and businesses in the east that use "colonial" in their name. This is probably just to make it look like the place has been around since colonial times, although in some cases the business may have actually been around that long.

Fair enough, I guess I'm just being ignorant. You'd think with all our history we'd be inundated with "Tudor Press", "Plantagenet Properties" and "Danegeld Mobile Phones", but we're not.

Surely you must have a lot of institutions wit6h "Victoria" in the names. Or "Albert." Or "Victoria & Albert." Plus, you've got Stonehenge, which goes way back. In Stratford on Avon, you have a theater named after Shakespeare (which, come to think of it, is also true of a town in the Berkshires in Western Massachusetts ).

Do you have any streets in London or elsewhere named after famous persons? How about airports or parks?

Okay, "Victoria" I'll grant you, but that'll all be genuinely Victorian. I guess parks sometimes get named after people, but we're only just catching on with airports. Liverpool has John Lennon Airport, but mostly they're just named after the place they're near (or, in the case of my local Durham Tees Valley Airport, two places, one of which isn't particularly nearby).

What we do do is have swathes of the country associated with famous residents by the local tourist board. Thus part of North Yorkshire is James Herriot Country and part is Captain Cook Country, the Lake District is Beatrix Potter Country. Nottinghamshire and South Yorkshire are both using Robin Hood and having a fight about which one he lived in.