it's all about finding the loopholes

Most of my glorious Sunday has been spent typing up the final paper for my international business class. On the up side, the class will soon be over, which means no more of Satan's little Professor. Lately, I've taken to counting the number of times she says 'okay' simply to stay awake. She's been averaging about 180 'okays' per 2 hour class. I would think that as a woman, and women as I'm sure you know are supposed to be the more articulate of the sexes, she would have a wider ranging supply of words than to have to use 'okay' once every minute. But as for the paper, I had 10-15 pages to fill, and generally my resources of knowledge are tapped by page 7 or 8. So here begins the page layout lotto.

Everyone is well aware of your standard 'space fillers' when doing a report...you have your manipulation of the margins...always a classic, your font size readjustment, your single verse double spacing fillers...but these have all become targets for homogenization by professors and teachers. Standardization of margins, and font size, and font type, and spacing have all been instituted. One result of this is that you now find much lengthier words, ones which are never used in normal, everyday speech, appearing in increased frequency...such as 'therefores' and 'henceforths' instead of 'so' or 'thus'. And when quoting someone (which, coincidentally is a great way to fill up space) they never just 'said' something...now, to increase page length, everyone is 'pointing out' or 'making mention of the fact that'. But there is a limit to how many experts you can quote. And unlike my professor, using the same word over and over is bound to get noticed once in print. With this said, new methods are needed.

Now, you have to realize that I take great pride in my 'cutting corner' techniques and I devote a good amount of time to them. And here, I will share with you a little known secret...kerning. With this amazing little tool, words are instantly stretched out simply by changing the little space in between each letter...and it was through kerning, that my barely eight page paper became eleven pages. But even if noticed, and I'm doubtful that it will be, I've got the built in loophole that no specifications were outlined detailing the use of kerning. I'm completely in the clear!

Of course, if I spent as much time working as I do thinking of ways not to work, I'd probably have had eleven pages anyway...but where's the sense of achievement in that?