aliens

I would like to take a moment to reflect on how flippin’ cool my job is!

Now, some people, when I took a position as a copyeditor at a geophysical journal, expressed concern that such a highly creative and energetic person as myself would find fixing commas in dry scientific journals to be — well,a trifle dull. They said the same thing when I chose Geology as my major, by the way. “What are you going to do, Diana, write books about rocks?” Well, at least edit them.

But I digress. They thought I’d be bored by all the discussion of regional tectonics in the Himalayan fold-thrust belt of Nepal (get your minds out of the gutter, people!) or electron precipitation events triggered by lightning in hurricanes or the implications of long-range transport on the European ozone budget — and let’s not forget taht fascinating magnetoplasma sphere…

But I like it, and I like it even more when I am confronted with a paper like the one I am proofing now:

“Using multiple beams to distinguish radio frequency interference from search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) signals.”

Aliens.

I love this job.