From the TYPOS YOU WISH YOU COULD TAKE BACK file

I had the best of intentions when I sent a personal email invitation to hundreds of contacts to attend The Global Address with best-selling author and political pundit Ezra Levant.

I took my time going through my entire digital Rolodex to pick out the folks in our region who might be interested in attending what promises to be an entertaining and enlightening speech about the importance of our oil sands development, or our "Ethical Oil", as Levant describes it in his book of the same name.

Ezra spoke in our community at a Fort McMurray Chamber of Commerce luncheon last year.  I got to sit next to him at the event and found him to be both interesting and interested.  When he got up to the microphone when it was finally his time to speak, the words he used and the way he delivered them completely captivated the influential audience of business, industry and community leaders.

I thought it would be fun to start the body of the email message with the words he used to start the presentation, words that were meant to be presented like this:

"I love you guys," said Ezra Levant, as he began his speech during a Fort McMurray Chamber of Commerce luncheon event in November 2010.  "I love everything you are doing, your passion, the size of your development, your innovative thinking..."

Leaving out one word gives the message a completely different meaning.

"I love guys," said Ezra Levant, as he began his speech during a Fort McMurray Chamber of Commerce luncheon event in November 2010.  "I love everything you are doing, your passion, the size of your development, your innovative thinking..."

It took about 20 seconds to get an email from a colleague pointing out my unfortunate error.

EEEEKKKK!

I scrambled to my Outlook trying to figure out how to recall the message.  Always difficult to do under duress, especially in the version of the Microsoft email program that I'm using, several very long minutes passed before I was able "take back" my mistake and send out a second corrected message that started with: "Oops. Let me fix the first line. Can you see my red face?"

Fortunately or unfortunately - being one of the final days of work before the holidays - a lot of people were sitting at their computers with time on their hands and were treated to some unintended levity.

"Needed a laugh this morning."

"I actually quite enjoyed the first version."

"I think it is safe to say that you grabbed everyone's attention with the first line of your original email."

"Thanks for the giggle on a VERY quiet day at work."

"A lot of double entendres appear in the rest of the intro with that as the first line."

"I thought is was hilarious....lol."

"I know you recalled it, but too late! Thanks for the chuckle!"

"My face is red too, from laughing for the last 5 minutes."

My deepest apologies to Mr. Levant.  It was an honest mistake that unintentionally brightened up the morning for many of your fans in Fort McMurray.  We look forward to your inspiring presentation at Keyano College on January 19th.  My suggestion for those reading this and wanting to attend would be to buy your tickets early.