The 'Oh s**t' moment

We all live in fear of the 'oh s**t moments'. It's the second you realise you've made a terrible, irrevocable mistake and the paper's gone to press. Not a mistake that will prompt a political complaint, something that can be argued about, debated. An honest-to-God factual error of gargantuan proportions that makes you look like an idiot.

It shouldn't happen, of course. But as busy journalists juggle multiple stories and frantically process ridiculous amounts of information from an ever-multiplying range of sources - well, it's probably a case of when not if.

Maybe you've had an 'oh s**t' moment. Maybe, so far, you've been lucky to avoid it. But we all know someone it's happened to and think: there but for the grace of God go I.

It's fair to say someone at the Metro in Boston had an 'oh s**t' moment earlier this week.

On Tuesday the Metro splashed on a survey that ranked the relative intelligence of different cities across the US. 'Boston's brains 3rd in the nation' screamed the headline.

The next day, this - immortalised forever by the unsparing Regret the Error blog:

Oh s**t.

There but for the grace of God go I.