| OCR Text |
Show "Lorraine Nelson A Biography " |7 ., ( j ^ A week earlier when the proofing plates for the pamphlet had first crossed my desk, I'd \ IK X ' ty%» pf laughed so hard I nearly wet myself. Dutifully, I'd signed the plate (with Tina's initials) and penned-in stout, block characters, untraceable to me-RUSH JOB across the top margin, sending it out back for printing. For the balance of the week, the mere thought of it sent me into convulsions. On Friday Katie asked me if I'd be joining the girls for lunch and I doubled over in a fit of uncontrollable • ' laughter prf*1* V^ S V U V ^ ^Y^^Y ^ ft" MrrJb*^' Like all other mediums in the advertising industry, direct mail is dependent on a host of other enterprises for its success. Most crucial among these is research, the slow, steady accretion of material, credit reports, mortgage, eiirplmjbnt and graduation information, internet habits, spending patterns-basic demographics. Data was collected, tabulated, and transformed from analog numbers and letters, carbon filled circles, to blips of light stored in massive databanks. This information was currency, and those who possessed it were paid handsomely. Etymology, too, is dependent on the careful research of philologists and linguistocrats who pour through arcana sketching out the evolution of the language. Though never an exact science, their work often goes far to reveal the ghostings of meaning trapped in the machine of language, powering it from within. Take, for example, DDS; Data, the lexicographer notes is the plural of the Latin datum, whose etymon is dare: "to give." Digital, the philologist explains can be traced back to the Latin, digitalus, meaning "finger." Datum digitalis. The linguist thinks you can take the joke from there. By my second week at DDS I had begun to fantasize about leaving. By my third I was taking half hour cigarette breaks and brazenly visiting girly sites on the web at my desk. The particular dynamic of the group I worked with and my position as a temp made my ^professional activity almost risk free. |
