BS: Irritatin' phrases....

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Peace
Date: 20 Nov 05 - 05:05 PM

"I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Ms Lewinsky."

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: kendall
Date: 20 Nov 05 - 04:20 PM

Gnome sane?

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Peace
Date: 20 Nov 05 - 04:20 PM

People who use an English expletive and then say, "Pardon my French."

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Firecat
Date: 20 Nov 05 - 04:01 PM

If one more person says "At the end of the day" to me, I can NOT be responsible for my actions.

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Peace
Date: 20 Nov 05 - 03:58 PM

"I myself . . ." ranks right up there, too.

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: DMcG
Date: 20 Nov 05 - 01:38 PM

I recently heard an account of a football match where one side had many advantages over the other - better funding, more support etc. The losing team complained they did not have a level playing field.

Well, I can see how that wouldn't have helped...

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: GUEST,mick
Date: 20 Nov 05 - 09:50 AM

I personally think that "I personally" is the most irritating phrase .

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: kendall
Date: 19 Nov 05 - 03:01 PM

Phrases such as "Her and me went downtown". Worse yet, "me and her went..."

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Don Firth
Date: 19 Nov 05 - 02:17 PM

Passive sentences. Governmentese. Jim Dixon, I hear you!

I'm sure that the passive voice is de rigeur for government documents in particular because nobody has to accept responsibility for anything. "A mistake was made" allows everybody to tuck their heads between their shoulders and mutter, "Not me!"

During the late Eighties I worked for a couple of years as a technical writer, writing up residential weatherization inspectors' reports for the Bonneville Power Administration. In a six page report, about two of those pages were boilerplate that was downright opaque, mainly because of long, convoluted sentences in passive voice. One afternoon when no data had come in yet from inspectors and there was little for me to do, I took a 120 word paragraph out of the boilerplate and tried to suss out what it was really trying to say. I managed to rewrite it into two fairly short, clear paragraphs totaling 90 words. In my next report, I replaced the boilerplate paragraph with my clear, more concise paragraphs. I naively thought that I was doing the BPA a favor and whenever I had the opportunity, I'd go through the whole document, clean it up, and make it readable.

Guess who got his hand slapped and told to replace the original paragraph?

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: GUEST,guest pedant
Date: 19 Nov 05 - 10:14 AM

The use of the word "panties" in books enrages me. Especially if being worn by a mutilated corpse in a good thriller.

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Ron Davies
Date: 19 Nov 05 - 08:28 AM

I think it's great that "cool" is still around.

But it's sure true thet folks shuld proofrede anything afore they let it go.   An they sure don't.

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: gecko
Date: 18 Nov 05 - 10:31 PM

As I see it, the only good thing about 'catchphrases' is that they go out of fashion eventually - though not soon enough for me.

Four that currently drive me to distraction are:

whatever
level playing field
it's all good - Dave's wife beat me to that one, and
not a problem.

Don Watson's recent book 'That Death of the English Language' should be mandatory reading for all politicians and bureaucrats, to mention just two groups who regularly indulge themselves with mis-use of our beautiful language.

YIU
gecko

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: GUEST,Dave'sWife w/out cookie
Date: 18 Nov 05 - 09:24 PM

Jim.. one of my degrees is in Linguistics - I taught a University course in Socio-linguistics for a time. I have found that people who habitually rely on passive voice often cmomunicate through other cues that they fear blame, failure or fear confrontation. I realize that doesn't seem to apply in the case you mentioned, but if you look at other subtle cues within the sentences, you may see that the person is attempting to deflect attention away from themselves, for whatever reason.


Passive voice has come into common business usage as a result of public acceptance of 'spin' speak. It has seeped into daily usage and become the norm. It's a sympton of the larger lack of accountibility that has become tolerable in our culture. it has its place in legalese and in literature, but has become over-employed in common usage.

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Peace
Date: 18 Nov 05 - 07:06 PM

I'm with you on that one, Jim.

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 18 Nov 05 - 06:32 PM

I have grown to abhor the passive voice, especially in business communication, because its vagueness often leads to misunderstanding. Passive voice says something will be done without saying who will do it. People read things like "The files will be backed up weekly" and think, "Is he promising he will do it, or telling me to do it, or—?" That's assuming the readers are bright enough, and responsible enough, to ask the question.

My boss recently wrote a lot of policies and procedures for our internal web site. They were meant describe the kind of work we do in our department, and to be read by people in other departments, so they would know what to expect from us. I found she had used passive voice repeatedly. I tried to explain why passive voice was undesirable. She said she liked passive voice because it sounded "less directive." In other words, she thought it sounded more polite to suggest that something might be done rather than tell someone to do it outright. In every case where she wrote in passive voice, she wanted the reader to understand that she was describing something the reader was supposed to do, but she didn't want to come right out and say that!

When I pointed out the possible misunderstanding—people might think we were promising to do the very thing she wanted them to do—she agreed to let me make the changes.

My grammar checker is set to flag all instances of passive voice, and it does a pretty good job. For example, it flagged "will be done," "were meant," and "might be done." It missed "will be backed up" and "was supposed."

The classic passive voice cop-out: "Mistakes were made."

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Peace
Date: 18 Nov 05 - 05:28 PM

"Here's a quarter . . . ".

I'm in Canada. It's $.35, idiot!

Feel better now.

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Musique174
Date: 18 Nov 05 - 04:34 PM

My personal pet peeve is: "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger."

Others include:
"Get over it"
"You'll live"
"You're so mature for your age"
"Wow, you're so old for your age"
"wow you're only __ age, you seem so much wiser than that"

~Nat

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: MBSLynne
Date: 18 Nov 05 - 04:32 PM

aaaaagh! Just reminded of one while watching "Children in Need" ...why do people who want you to applaud someone these days say "Give it up for ____"? Give what up? Why?

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: kendall
Date: 18 Nov 05 - 04:19 PM

And the most often mis used word...Hopefully.
Oh, and Partying.

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Don Firth
Date: 18 Nov 05 - 03:16 PM

The word is "cool," and it had an immense amount of currency back in the Sixties. I didn't use it much myself, but it didn't particularly bother me, other than that it was applied to everything. But a friend of mine taught Art in high school, and he heard it about forty times more often than I did. One of his students turned in a cartoon which my friend thought was not only not funny, but in generally bad taste. He said so. The student said, "Well, gee, Mr. Landberg, I though it was real cool!" My friend responded, "If, by 'real cool,' you mean 'not so hot,' then I quite agree!"

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: GUEST,Nancy King at work
Date: 18 Nov 05 - 01:25 PM

"Presently," when misused to mean "currently." It really means "soon."

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Peace
Date: 18 Nov 05 - 01:06 PM

A preposition is a word one should never end a sentence with.

Thank you, Winston.

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: ard mhacha
Date: 18 Nov 05 - 12:47 PM

This is used all of the time, I hope we "get a result", this began by some gormless English footballer and every bloody stupid commentator uses it now.
I heard one of our young boys use it, I told him if the game finishes both teams will get a result, if you are beaten 10-1 that is a result.

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: kendall
Date: 18 Nov 05 - 12:45 PM

I aint never uased one of them split things, not no way.

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: ossonflags
Date: 18 Nov 05 - 11:30 AM

Am I bothered?

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: MBSLynne
Date: 18 Nov 05 - 02:46 AM

And I can't stand split infinitives, but they seem to have passed into 'correct' English now due to common usage. So....William Shatner has a lot to answer for!

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: GUEST,dave'swife w/out cookie
Date: 18 Nov 05 - 01:52 AM

"It's All Good" - which is a conversational shrug
"My bad"

I laso hate Hollywood-ese. Instead of saying something was "Filmed in poland" it suddenly becomes "lensed in poland.' Something that was directed by Spielberg becomes "helmed by Spielberg."

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Bert
Date: 18 Nov 05 - 01:12 AM

I'm with SINSULL on the 110% issue.

"Oh my God" should really be "Oh my Gawd" and I think we have to thank Charlie Drake for that one.

Ah yes Annamill - All those polite refusals, when you'd give anything for a "Get your sorry ass in here at 8 O'Clock Monday morning"

And 'thinking outside of the box' takes on quite a different meanbing when your cat does it.

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: GUEST,Billy
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 11:15 PM

Momentarily -- no my dear cousins, it does not mean   "In a moment ", or "Soon". It indicates a short space of time, e.g. an instant.

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: number 6
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 11:02 PM

Oh Oh


sIx

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: leftydee
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 10:52 PM

Hello... I'm Martin Gibson

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Little Hawk
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 09:51 PM

"Guesstimate" (!) (I bet Dubya uses that one...)

"Maximize"

"Prioritize"

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Peace
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 09:41 PM

Misunderestimate.

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: kendall
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 09:12 PM

I worked for the government for many years and there is something called "Governmentese" Examples:

I communicated telephonically with so and so.
A critical high response area (potential trouble spot)
The defendant was in a state of non compliance.

Drove me nuts! I refused to use that gobblegook in my reports, so the boss sent me to report writing school. First thing the instructor said was : Watch the language in your reports. If you wish to say, "Mary had a little lamb, for Pete's sake, SAY Mary had a little lamb. Do NOT say "Mary possessed a dimunitive sheep."

I continued to write in plain English to the day I left the service.

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: LilyFestre
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 07:44 PM

LOLOL....sorry...I knew that didn't look quite right!

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Little Hawk
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 06:59 PM

I said "this thread", not "this forum"! Sheesh! If I even suspected that the real William Shatner had NEVER posted on this forum, why I'd...I'd...I'd be tempted to do something rash and desperate. It would be a terrible moment.

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Ebbie
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 06:56 PM

Little Hawk, I'm shocked.. You mean, all those times it wasn't him?

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Little Hawk
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 06:51 PM

Look, if you're going to complain about it, at least spell it right, eh?

Unfortunately, William Shatner has not yet deigned to make an appearance on this thread...

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: LilyFestre
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 06:39 PM

Unfortuneatly...

Unfortuneatly the concert was canceled due to a snow storm.

Unfortuneatley the Hornets lost the game by 3 points.

Unfortuneately there were no survivors on a plane that crashed.

Unfortuneately....I hate when people use this word when referring to a tragic incident. Clearly, these 3 events are not all the same and do not evoke the same type of feelings.

Unfortuneatly, Barry had a pimple on his butt.

Unfortuneatly, Morgan died from leukemia.

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR.

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: annamill
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 06:15 PM

"..Sorry, that position has been filled, but we'll keep your resume for 6 months".

Couldn't they tell me that before I spent time coming for an interview???

Love, Annamill

Yeh, it's been said often enough to be irratin'. Fit's right into this thread.

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Kaleea
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 04:26 PM

I almost forgot one of the questions I dislike the most--

    "Uh, do you think I'm a racist?"
          -geez, duh! Why do they even ask? If you have to ask, you probably are!

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Ebbie
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 04:25 PM

Interesting, pdq. Your approximately 1/10th of that total has given us about that same ratio of light. Stars are bright.

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: GUEST,very connected
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 04:07 PM

creepy
on the same page
cool
new age bullsh*t
go digital

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: pdq
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 03:15 PM

That was Peace's 15,000 th post on Mudcat. Congrats. Mudcat's fastest rising star.

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Peace
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 01:58 PM

'the person being interviewed kept talking about the building being "demolishioned."'

That person should be admonishioned, fer shore.

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Kaleea
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 01:57 PM

it's like . . .
   
   you know . . .

      the word "so" or "such" NOT followed by the word "that":
             I hate it so much! (so much, that ?????)

         I'm gonna take'n . . .
            I done went 'n . . .
                . . .when I gituhroun' tew it, . . .

    I abhor unimaginative cussing. I prefer to "cuss" in creative and colorful metaphors such as the following:

You horse's hind end!
    He's a donkey's p'toot!
      What a bunch of yayhoos!
         I think the cheese has completely
                      slipped off of her cracker!

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: GUEST
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 01:52 PM

'Giok' I agree that repetitious and redundant tautology is annoying, but you already said it.

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Don Firth
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 01:32 PM

Actually, I think "déjà vu all over again" started either as a deliberately humorous redundancy or yet another marvelous gaff from someone like Yogi Berra or Casey Stengel ("Nobody goes there anymore because it's too crowded."). Unfortunately, lots of people have picked it up and use it seriously without realizing that it is supposed to be funny.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 01:03 PM

Totally unique
One of two twins
Deja vu all over again

etc etc.
Giok

Subject: RE: BS: Irritatin' phrases....
From: Ebbie
Date: 17 Nov 05 - 12:53 PM

Even some song lyrics irritate me.

"Oh Lord my God when I in "awesome" wonder..."

No. Your wonder isn't 'awesome'. It may be 'awefilled' but it ain't awesome.

And lately I've been hearing - once on television - 'supposably' when they meant 'supposedly'. Are they getting mixed up with the form of 'arguably'?

One of my major irritants -if only because it is used so freely and with no embarrassment, is as someone noted above: giving an 'effort of 110%.' It can't be done. If you've given 100% of what you can give, you can't give any more.