The thread on the construction dictionary (and terminology) made me chuckle. Do any of you have any favorite typos?
A couple of the ones that have showed up on some of our projects are:
Revolting doors (instead of revolving ones)
Vitreous bowels (instead of bowls)
and on the title sheet of the drawings at an engineering firm that I worked for many, many years ago …
Department of Pubic Works (instead of Public)
A drawing note referring to a “well-hung unit heater” and wording in the Notice to Bidders saying, “the work may commence once the Contractor has been executed.” I think that last one was a premonition of difficulties ahead.
Some of my favorites (yes, these really appeared on a set of Drawings):
Laundry Shoot
Butt-faced Glass (presumably after it got drunk)
CUM (instead of CMU)
And, of course, the typicals:
. . . and too many others to recall at the moment.
Electrical engineer designating lighting fixture types as FAA, FAB, FAC and so on…
Very funny stuff, it is always enjoyable to read a funny post esp. when it relates to our industry, maybe Colin could start a humor thread, as it relates to the industry, without the major vulgarity. I for one still find it useful to tell a humorous joke on a job site or email a colleague or an adversary during battle. Humor is still the best medicine.
My vocabulary has be corrupted by:
“incandecent” for “incandescent”
“condominimum” for “condominium”
“dullbozer” for “bulldozer” (by my son at age 4)
I have to be careful because I spent a couple of years with a large shipping organization (US Navy) living with boatswain’s mates who a have a “colorful” language all their own.
My favorite typo occured when a friend tried to be helpful by typing a specification for my college class in specification writing. I had to smile when I saw “can’t strip” in the roofing section.
I like the spec typist’s idea of being helpful by carefully searching a spec section one of my colleagues wrote to change every occurrence of “sex bolt” to “set bolt.”
I’ve enjoyed reading all these contributions. Its wonderful to finish the day smiling.
I’m sure we could probably fill a large notebook with all the spec typos.
The other thing we have to remember, at least in my experience, (as someone who spent a year and a half as an english major)is that many Architects cannot spell to begin with.
My favorite typo today has to be the one about executing the Contractor!!
Architectural terms and what they really mean (published several places … not my work)
ARCHITECTURE TERMS
(and what they really mean)
Sense of Entry: The front door is big and far away.
Human Scale: less than 400 feet tall.
Skewed Grid: The design looked too boring with a regular grid.
Pedestrian-Oriented: Doesnt have enough parking.
Contextual: Is surrounded by a lot of other buildings the architect couldnt
tear down.
Theoretical: Nobody in their right mind would ever consider building the crazy thing.
Signature Building: You cant afford it.
Less Is More: The designer ran out of ideas.
Classically Proportioned: Traced out of a book of Greek architecture.
Postmodern: Traced out of a book of Roman architecture.
International Style: No country will take responsibility for it.
Deconstructivist: The backhoe ran into it during construction - and they liked it.
Seismically Designed High Rise: In an earthquake, the structure will not collapse, but will drop all of its glass and stone panels into the street
turning pedestrians into a stew-like mush of pureed flesh.
Jury: Firing squad.
Design Review Board: Failed architecture majors.
Architecture Student: Egotistical masochist with no money.
SHORTFORM GENERAL CONDITIONS OF THE CONTRACT
Article 1
The work we want did is clearly indicated on the attached plans and specifications. The Architect, who has had plenty of college, has spent a
lot of time drawing up these plans and specifications, but nobody can think
of everything. Once your bid is submitted to the Owner-that’s it brother! From then on, anything wanted by the Architect, the Owner, or any of his
friends, or anybody else except the Contractor, shall be considered as shown, specified, intended, or implied, and shall be provided by the
Contractor without any expense to anyone except the Contractor.
Article 2
If the work is done without extra expense to the Contractor, then the work will be taken down and done over again until the extra expense to the
Contractor is satisfactory to the Architect.
Article 3
The contract drawings are intended to be correct. If drawn wrong, it should be discovered by the Contractor, corrected, and done right at his own
expense. It won’t cut no ice with the Owner or the Architect if the Contractor points out the mistakes which the Architect has drawn on the
plans.
Article 4
The Contractor is not supposed to make fun of the Architect, his plans, or specifications. If he does, then the same consequence shall apply as stated in Article 3 above.
Article 5
Any Contractor walking around the job site with a smile on his face will be subject to a review of his bid.
Article 6
If the Contractor doesn’t find all the Architect’s mistakes prior to making
his bid on this job, or if he doesn’t have enough sense to know that the Architect is going to think up a bunch of new stuff that has to be done
before the job can be deemed complete, then the Contractor shall provide any such items without extra expense to the Owner or Architect.
Article 7
Any evidence of satisfaction on the part of the Contractor shall be considered as just cause for withholding final payment.
I got into this business in 1979 as an estimator for a wall and ceiling contractor. I remember some gag definitions which circulated then, one was Engineer’s Estimate defined as the cost of construction in Heaven.
Just to show that it’s not just our field which mangles the language, this is currently on the Washington Post website’s front page:
“Al Qaeda Group Claims Turkey Role”
Project Manger (Manager - spell check–what a novel idea!!)
But manger is a perfect example of why spell check does not help you - its a perfectly fine word. You can make yourself look totally incompetent relying on spell check systems.
The humor from the errors is great. Here are a few I have come across in my years of working with architects and engineers:
On the drawings prepared for the expansion of existing men’s and women’s locker rooms at a wastewater treatment plant were a baptismal font and the piping to and from the font.
And my all-time classic from an engineer: “The Contractor, his employees, his sub-contractors, sub-sub-contractors, etc. and their employees, and all suppliers and their employees shall abide by al Federal, State, and local laws, rules, regulations and codes with which the Contractor agrees with.”
The humor from the errors is great. A few of the classics I have encountered in my years of working with architects and engineers to prepare documents for my employer:
The drawings for the expansion of the men’s and women’s locker rooms at a wastewater treatment plant included a baptismal font and plumbing to and from the font.
My all-time classic from an engineer: "The Contractor and his employees, his sub-contractors, sub-sub-contractors, etc and their employees, and his suppliers and their employees shall abide by all Federal, State and local laws, rules, regulations and codes with which the Contractor agrees with.
Not a typo, but frequently I find that the short cut to note an undetailed condition as ‘similar to’ would be better labeled ‘different from’ since by the time it evolves its not really similar to anything else.
Taking Mr. Peques seriously-- then after “different from” wouldn’t one have to list every detail in the drawings? . . . But there is a genuine typo in the above message: “its” without an apostrophe, like his, her and their or theirs, is a possessive adjective and requires no apostrophe. But Mr. Peques intended “it’s,” the contraction of “it is.” Usually this error is reversed though: people write “it’s” when they intend the possessive adjective and generally never fail to include the apostrophe when the contraction is intended. In my opinion, this is the most common error consistently made in current English usage. I even saw it recently in a CNN caption.
I’m giving a presentation to architects and was wondering if any of you would object to me using some of these favorite typos. Do you think I need to give the sources? (or maybe the authors don’t want to be known)
I have seen the “trash shoot” similar to laundry shoot listed earlier in posting no. 8. i wonder if it was intentional.
anyway if anyone wants credit, i will certainly oblige