{"id":617,"date":"2012-07-28T15:10:23","date_gmt":"2012-07-28T03:10:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/?p=617"},"modified":"2012-07-29T10:15:44","modified_gmt":"2012-07-28T22:15:44","slug":"are-you-sure-its-not-brain-surgery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/?p=617","title":{"rendered":"Are you sure it\u2019s not brain surgery?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Some years back, I met an All Blacks selector at a conference.<\/p>\n

When he discovered that I was a writer he said: \u2018You and I have something in common.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u2018Really?\u2019<\/p>\n

\u2018Yep.\u00a0 Pretty much everyone thinks that they can do my job at least as well as I can, and I\u2019d guess that pretty much everyone thinks they can do your job at least as well as you can.\u2019<\/p>\n

He had a point.\u00a0 In the minds of many people, picking a national sports team or writing something like a newsletter or a business proposal requires little more than a dash of common sense.\u00a0 It doesn\u2019t take real skill.\u00a0 It\u2019s not brain surgery.<\/p>\n

The boss of a well-known real estate firm certainly wouldn\u2019t let any old bloke with a box of spanners loose on his $350,000 Porsche. \u00a0But he\u2019s quite happy to leave the writing of his firm\u2019s newsletter to someone with no evident notion of grammar and no sense of style.<\/p>\n

\u2018Five hundred bucks for a couple of pages of words?\u00a0 Don\u2019t be ridiculous.\u00a0 Kev\u2019ll do it for free.\u2019<\/p>\n

It has been estimated that the average adult reads or hears well in excess of 100,000 words each and every day.\u00a0 For many people, the total is more than 150,000.\u00a0 And for some it is closer to 200,000.<\/p>\n

If you want your words to be among the very few that will make a lasting impression, it pays to get someone who knows what they are doing to help you to select, arrange, and polish those words. \u00a0And, if you\u2019re worried about the cost, you can probably save a few bucks on your vehicle maintenance.<\/p>\n

I know a bloke who will work on your Porsche for just $15 an hour.\u00a0 Of course he doesn\u2019t know a lot about Porsches.\u00a0 But then, judging from your latest newsletter, Kev doesn\u2019t know a lot about words.\u00a0 And that doesn\u2019t seem to bother you.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Some years back, I met an All Blacks selector at a conference. When he discovered that I was a writer he said: \u2018You and I have something in common.\u2019 \u2018Really?\u2019 \u2018Yep.\u00a0 Pretty much everyone thinks that they can do my … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3,6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/617"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=617"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/617\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":620,"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/617\/revisions\/620"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=617"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=617"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=617"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}