a very funny episode spilled out in the back pages of the chronicle last week. the columnist was quoting Armistead Maupin, and here's the quote she attributed to him: "My only regret about being gay,'' wrote Armistead Maupin, "is that I repressed it for so long. I surrendered my mouth to the people I feared when I could have been out there loving someone. Don't make that mistake yourself. Life's too damn short.''

when i read this quote i thought it sounded a little strange but i assumed that maybe he meant the word 'mouth' to be like a 'voice' and let it go.

in the next week's column, a correction was made whereby the columnist noted that she transposed an 'm' instead of a 'y' which made the correct word of 'youth' ito the incorrect term 'mouth.' now reread the quote and it makes so much more sense: "My only regret about being gay is that I repressed it for so long. I surrendered my youth to the people I feared when I could have been out there loving someone. Don't make that mistake yourself. Life's too damn short.''

the columnist wrote on the correction, with Armistead also chiming in tongue-in-cheekly: "In Maupin's phrase about regretting surrendering his youth to bigots, I'd typed "mouth'' instead of "youth,'' a gaffe that gives rise to all sorts of off-color wisecracks. Maupin, who has a great sense of humor, took it well. Nonetheless, my typo makes the original statement sound vulgar, which it wasn't. "I don't know what bothers me more,'' said Maupin, "that the Concerned Women for America seem to have a reasonable objection or that I seem to be disparaging my favorite form of sex. You blew it, Leah.''