But to make a more general point: While it's true that some copy editors fall into that category of persnickety homebody cat owners, there's an enormous range of personalities and abilities on almost any newspaper's rim.

I've worked at several big papers and can truthfully say that, almost without exception, the most capable people I ran across were copy editors. There are super-competent, fiercely loyal, sharp-eyed people on every desk who are supremely well-informed on a broad range of subjects, have unparalleled integrity and an unmatched passion for journalism.

Seems improbable, I know, but consider this: Copy editors usually work through the night. Unlike senior editors and reporters, they're not around to play office politics during the day, which, I believe, is the surest way to mush up one's mind and compromise one's principles. Copy editors have to read everything that goes into the paper (something most senior editors seem to have a great distaste for) and don't have their egos wrapped up in any particular piece of copy. They're the paper's greatest and best-informed critics--and as such a valuable resource that goes unused. (I've often wondered what senior editors and reporters would think if they could simply hear the groans of dismay that sometimes greet their lovingly crafted prose when it hits the rim. If people being paid to read this stuff do so only reluctantly, why should we think the end users, the readers, will be thrilled with it?)

If someone in the upper echelons at most papers would simply begin paying attention to their rims, they'd find a gold mine for promotions (of course, this assumes they care more about the product than stroking their own and their dayside buddies' egos). If an executive editor or managing editor were to have spent a few years rimming, I can almost guarantee that the newspaper he/she would put out would be a good deal livelier and sharper than the dull-as-dog-poop papers we see in so many markets today.

As someone with experience in this, there is nothing more pointless and self-defeating than going to the mat over a miniscule detail in your copy. And yet, for a certain kind of person - me, you, many others - it's frustratingly irresistible.

Why do we do this to our coworkers and ourselves? I wish I knew.