Imagine my horror years ago when, while reading a story I had written up the day before, I saw the word Vermin instead of the name Vernon, which I had intended to write. 

The mistake, made while working for another Wyoming newspaper, was the result of a typographical error that spellcheck, in its computerized wisdom, made far worse instead of actually correcting. 

Unfortunately, the error got past proofreaders as well, but that didn’t change the fact that I was the one who clicked the wrong button while spellchecking the document the day before.

When I saw it in print on the next day, I would have far preferred that the original error had showed up instead of the misapplied spellcheck substitution. At least no one would have assumed that the mistake had been a deliberate insult, as someone did in this case. 

That’s when I decided that spellcheck, although it provides a valuable service, is somehow calculated to embarrass the unwary and get them into trouble. Anyone who mindlessly clicks on the “accept” button often will find that the substituted word is not only wrong, but also is insulting, stupid, ridiculous, crass, suggestive or vulgar. In other words, it’s REALLY wrong, rather than just misspelled. 

That’s also when I decided to add words to my spellcheck library whenever I noticed that suggested alternatives would be particularly undesirable, to avoid having those spellcheck disasters show up in my stories by accident. 

That was illustrated especially well one day when I spellchecked a story I’d written about a state government issue. The story included the names of two Wyoming legislators: former Sen. John Schiffer of Sheridan and former Rep. Floyd Esquibel of Cheyenne. Spellcheck’s suggested replacement for Schiffer was “Stiffer;” for Esquibel, it was “Squirrel.” I couldn’t click “Add” quickly enough. 

A few months later, I saw a story on The Associated Press wire that quoted both Sen. Stiffer and Rep. Squirrel. I knew exactly what had happened.

“They did it!” I exclaimed, grateful that I hadn’t fallen victim to that particular trap. 

Needless to say, the early version of that particular AP story was corrected within a few minutes. 

Since coming back to Powell nine years ago, I’ve noticed that there are many ways for spellcheck to get me in trouble while writing stories about the Big Horn Basin. 

It didn’t take me long to decide I needed to add the names of towns in the Basin to my spellcheck library.

Just imagine these headlines: 

• Lovely mayor to address Gerbil Town Council.

• Game and Fish Department holds Meatiest meeting.

• Highway work planned from Frankie to Deader.

• Storm dumps hail on Thermopiles.

For the record, overall, I really do appreciate spellcheck. I’ve often thought how much more difficult it would be to write for a living without it. If my high school typing class is any indication, it would have been nothing short of miserable. 

My fingers often become dyslexic when I type — I hit the right letters, but in the wrong order. That’s something I blame on my dad, from whom I apparently inherited the trait. The result is that, although I know exactly how to spell most words — I have dad to thank for that, too — what I type often would indicate otherwise. But, much of the time, spellcheck looks at my garbled prose and figures out what I intended to say, saving me a lot of time and embarrassment. 

Occasionally, I would like to be able to accept spellcheck’s suggestions even though they’re wrong, just because they’re a lot more fun than what I intended to write. 

Several years ago, Country Western star Kenny Chesney and the ’70s band The Doobie Brothers were two of the groups that were booked for concerts at Cheyenne Frontier Days. I was assigned to do preview stories for those performances, and while making arrangements, I composed an email with both of their names in it. I spelled both correctly, but spellcheck had other ideas and suggested instead: Kenny Cheesy and The Doughboy Brothers.

That suggestion sounded so good my mouth started to water. I decided they should team up to star in a show on the same night and offer melted cheese on fresh-baked bread as refreshments. What a draw!

But it’s highly doubtful they would have appreciated the suggestion as much as I did, so, regretfully, I clicked “Ignore.”

Spellcheck comes with other pitfalls as well. A word to those who believe it will solve all of their spelling woes: Nope. 

There are just some things that spellcheck can’t correct. Misuse of homonyms, for instance. 

Homonyms are words that sound alike when spoken but are spelled differently, and they mean something completely different: There, their and they’re; its and it’s; two, too and to; your and you’re; threw and through; pray and prey; rain, rein and reign; bail and bale; buses and busses; write and right.

Unfortunately, in today’s social media world, it seems there are more and more people who misuse these words by switching one for another, apparently believing it makes no difference.

But it does! To those of us who believe it still is important to use the English language correctly, your for you’re, or there for their, is like a fingernail on a chalkboard.

Using the wrong word never will be write, so there are some words your going two have too learn to use correctly on you’re own. And spellcheck agrees — I just chequed.