When is 6 Actually 4?: The We-Wu for February 10-14, 2025

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Or, if you’re not a practitioner, Happy Single’s Awareness Day!

If you’d rather not talk about it, Happy Friday!

This was a single issue week in the T&M world. I spent all week copying and pasting a Hausa translation of the VCP Implementation Manual.

You may be asking why I was copying and pasting. And it would be fair to ask that. We do normally have a script that takes all of the translation text and shoves it into the Indesign template.

Except it doesn’t work.

I could have spent the week figuring out why the script doesn’t work, except I don’t know how the script was built or how to code it or anything about it whatsoever except what buttons to press to make it do the thing.

So copy/paste it is.

All 52 pages of it.

Well, 54 now. I had a bit of overrun.

But the first draft is done, and I’m pretty sure there will be a second draft, because I had some questions. Namely, why is 6 translated as 4? Why is every “Field” translated as “Fili” except for “Field 3,” which is translated as “Filin 3?” And why does the transfile cut off 2 Timothy 2:2 in the middle of the sentence? As in, “And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable-”

Reliable what? I know it’s supposed to be people, but there are a lot of things you could describe as reliable. Furniture. Lampposts. Transmissions. Career politicians.

Etcetera.

Anyway, that process has been fun. I get to do it all over again next week with the twice as long Camel Method.

Otherwise, it’s been fairly quiet. I was able to catch up on last week’s workshop and attend this week’s on Tuesday. This time we talked about questions we ask to draw application and meaning from stories. It makes you a better storyteller, but it also makes you a better reader. You start thinking about why people made the choices they did and why they didn’t make other choices. This helps in writing, too. And it helps me try to make sense of people.

All you can do is try.

I am not enjoying this cold weather, and unfortunately more is on the way. I like being warm. I’m just gonna have to wrap myself up like a burrito this weekend. Or snuggle with a dog. Fortunately, I’m taking care of one overnight.

We hosted our neighbors from across the hall again this week. Back before Christmas, there were rumors that Communications was going to be renovated. It’s been a process since then, tearing out the old stuff and putting in the new. We were happy to give our friends a spot to hang out in our wing, but sadly, they are now tucked away in their brand new (improved?) setting.

Not much else to cover this week. I got some free food from a training event, so that was nice. I spent some time with friends. And that was pretty much it.

Whatever you get up to this weekend, I hope you have fun. Remember your small stuff.

Bye!