BS: Department Of Redundancy Department

Subject: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Genie
Date: 30 Nov 06 - 07:50 PM

Redundant phrases seem to creep easily and often into our common usage.   Not to mention frequently.

Some of my favorites (or I should say the ones that cause the most eye-rolling) are:
- Deja vu all over again (Thank you, Yogi!)
- It's a win-win for everyone.
- 8:00 AM in the morning
- HIV virus
- PIN number

You may have others in mind.

Then, of course, there are the musically related ones, such as
- out of tune banjo
- loud drummer
and
- arrogant soprano

Anyway, anyone have others to contribute to this unimportant and inconsequential thread (which is far from monumental in significance)?

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Bill D
Date: 30 Nov 06 - 07:54 PM

"previously recorded"....and I have even heard "previously recorded earlier"...

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Joe Offer
Date: 30 Nov 06 - 08:03 PM

Would you like that with au jus?

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: bobad
Date: 30 Nov 06 - 08:26 PM

At this point in time.

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: JennyO
Date: 30 Nov 06 - 09:33 PM

- ATM machine

- LCD display

- cease and desist

- free gift

- end result

- close proximity

- true fact

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Bill D
Date: 30 Nov 06 - 09:51 PM

Oh, my. I have been asked if I wanted that sandwich "with au jus"....that was a long time ago.

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Don Firth
Date: 30 Nov 06 - 09:57 PM

JennyO beat me to my list of favorites, "free gift" in particular.

I will quibble with one of hers, though. LCD = Liquid Crystal Diode. So LCD display isn't really redundant.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: JennyO
Date: 30 Nov 06 - 10:36 PM

OK Don, you got me on that one. I think most people, me included, thought that the D stood for Display.

Meanwhile, here are a few more:

- tuna fish

- added bonus

- the reason is because

- hot-water heater

- advance planning

- consensus of opinion

- first and foremost

- repeat that again

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Seamus Kennedy
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 01:04 AM

This show was recorded before a live audience.

Seamus

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: JennieG
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 01:22 AM

Which is probably better than a dead one.......

Cheers
JennieG

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Gurney
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 01:58 AM

Bobad, I've heard "at the present moment in time" which may be in the Department of Redundancy Department Department.

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 02:08 AM

' For the sake of Auld Lang Syne '

eric

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Genie
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 02:22 AM

Re the "recorded before a live audience,"
one of my favorites is:
"Chet Atkins was a great guitarist before his death"
or
"Elvis was a great singer before he died,"

etc.

I guess maybe those aren't really redundant, but I can't help feeling like it would be better to just say "The late Chet Atkins was a great guitarist," etc.

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: catspaw49
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 02:48 AM

Anything "pre" is screwy. Bill mentions pre-recorded and of course something can be either recorded or not but pre-recorded would be sitting around and waiting?   This leads to my favorite, "pre-heat." How do you preheat? Literally that means "before heat" so if you have to preheat to 400 degrees, you can't! You have no heat; it has happened yet. You can heat it to 400 but there is no way to preheat your oven.

What the hell is a preview? You're either viewing or not.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: ClaireBear
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 02:50 AM

My husband (who's from Texas) heard "the great Rio Grande river" many times throughout his childhood, and it always made him wince.

I, on the other hand, grew up in California, where most mornings we listened with much wailing and gnashing of teeth to the New York-based weather guy on the Today Show as described our eastern mountains as "the snow-covered Sierra Nevada mountain range."

Claire

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Paul Burke
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 05:00 AM

No, it doesn't stand for liquid crystal diode, it IS display. You're thinking of LED diodes, MOSFET transistors, UPS supplies, and PCB boards.

Changed history forever.

Rio Grande river is just standard language progression. In Lancashire, there's Pendle Hill. Pen means hill. "Pendle" is a contraction of "Pen hill". No doubt Mount Pendlehill next.

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Paul from Hull
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 07:24 AM

That would be Lancastrians making mountains out of molehills again then, t'Other Paul...*G*

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Paul Burke
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 07:38 AM

Bloody Yoksher folk. They even built a Needless Hall. Or more likely got someone else to do it forrem. Like the YYY monkeys.

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 07:55 AM

Actually "cease and desist" has a good reason for existing.

When the Normans took over the Anglo Saxons territory, the new laws were written so that ideas from both languages and cultures were accommodated. The two words come from the two different roots - and each word means something slightly different, so that in order for there to be no misunderstanding, or 'technicalities', both meanings of "stop" were included.

It is not the only such apparently, not of originally so, redundant usage from this source. Just ask a legal eagle.

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 08:03 AM

From: http://www.thefreedictionary.com

There is even today a subtle distinction for Word Smiths.


cease (ss)
v. ceased, ceas·ing, ceas·es
v.tr.
To put an end to; discontinue: The factory ceased production. See Synonyms at stop.
v.intr.
1. To come to an end; stop: a process that never ceases.
2. To stop performing an activity or action; desist: "fold our wings,/And cease from wanderings" Tennyson.
n.
Cessation; pause: We worked without cease to get the project finished on time.

---------

[Middle English cesen, from Old French cesser, from Latin cessre, to stop, frequentative of cdere, to yield; see ked- in Indo-European roots.]


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
de·sist (d-sst, -zst)
intr.v. de·sist·ed, de·sist·ing, de·sists
To cease doing something; forbear. See Synonyms at stop.


[Middle English desisten, from Old French desister, from Latin dsistere : d-, de- + sistere, to bring to a standstill; see st- in Indo-European roots.]

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: kendall
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 08:14 AM

One of my unfavorites is, "underneath"

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Big Mick
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 08:16 AM

irregardless -

MAKES ME CRAZY!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Becca72
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 08:51 AM

Past history...I do transcription for the Radiology Dept of a local hospital and one doc in particular uses this phrase a lot.

I also deal with a company whose recorded phone menu asks "if you would like to have that information repeated again, press 2". Well, I've only heard it once so far...

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Linda Goodman Zebooker
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 10:12 AM

Please RSVP

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Grab
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 10:23 AM

Re Pendle Hill, apparently there's a "Torpenhow Hill" which translates as "Hill-hill-hill Hill".

No-one's yet mentioned "MIDI interface".

I'd quibble with some of the others. "Hot-water heater" isn't necessarily a tautology, because you might not necessarily be heating the water until it's hot. You could conceivably have a "tepid-water heater" and a "slightly-above-freezing water heater" (a car block heater, for example).

And "repeat that again" is only a tautology if you haven't previously repeated it.

Graham.

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Amos
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 11:35 AM

Using "pre-" in the sense that Spaw objects to is a 20th century illiteracy that has evolved to mean "prior to a referenced event". This is not wholly useless. Pre-heating an oven means heating it before the main cooking is to occur, getting it ready. Pre-view is the bit of a film or show you get to see as a teaser, before attending. Some corporate wonks even invented a "pre-meeting" which is a meeting held before another meeting to discuss a strategy or a plan for the larger later meeting. I spit.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: catspaw49
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 11:42 AM

Amos, that makes it no less horse shit! Why not just say "Heat the oven to 400?"   I'm going to check my post by clicking preview, but it will allow me to view the post, not a blank screen. Perhaps if I were to prescreen the preview..............

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Amos
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 12:38 PM

You can only preview it before you post it. I sympathize completely with your hatred of this degraded management-speak, and I agree it is horse shit. I was just commenting that there is method to the madness of it. Everything in life becomes a project management relativistic psychobabble nightmare, and the center cannot hold. It ruins tense, and living in the present, and corrodes human thought. I think I'll pre-heat the oven and pre-insert my head...


A

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Mooh
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 12:45 PM

Begin to start, as in "We shall begin to start commencement [high school graduation around here]...".

Peace, Mooh.

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Genie
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 01:27 PM

Yeah, Claire, that "snow-covered Sierra Nevada mountains" is one of my faves.   It's a double reduncancy. Not to mention repetitious, too.

Do you guys ever get frozen icicles or white snow out your way? (Yeah, I know about the yellow snow, but that's only when Spaw's been around.)

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Genie
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 01:33 PM

And, Mooh, how about when people make a noun by adding the "tion" or "ation" ending and then make a new verb that includes that ending?   It can potentially go on ad infinitum.

orient (v.) -> orientation (n.) -> orientate (v.)
which occasionally leads to atrocities such as "orientationate" or "orientationing"


Oh, and how about shrimp scampi?

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: GUEST
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 01:33 PM

Pay day is every two weeks, bi-weekly.

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Genie
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 01:39 PM

Foolestroupe: "Foolestroupe - PM
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 07:55 AM

Actually "cease and desist" has a good reason for existing.
... The two words come from the two different roots - and each word means something slightly different, so that in order for there to be no misunderstanding, or 'technicalities', both meanings of "stop" were included.

It is not the only such apparently, not of originally so, redundant usage from this source. Just ask a legal eagle."

Ah, yes.   And the Legal Department, which deals with rules and regulations, is now and henceforth, at present and in perpetuity, a partition and subdivision of the Department Of Redundancy Department.   With good reason and for important purposes, of course. Naturally.

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Bert
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 02:25 PM

Preheat makes a little more sense when welding. The pre meaning to heat the metal BEFORE welding it.

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Amos
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 03:19 PM

LEt's set and talk some palaver, you an' me, about this hyar redundancy thing....


A

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Genie
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 03:29 PM

Amos, some of your fancy words are unintelligible - and hard to understand, too,

G

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: BuckMulligan
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 03:36 PM

Am I the only one bugged by "The thing of it is, is ...." and suchlike, e.g. "The reason is, is..." and "The point is, is..." all of which remind me of Andy Griffith's "What it was, was football." Except that what that was, was funny.

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: GUEST,memyself
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 03:38 PM

On behalf of all English-speaking morons, illiterates, idiots, uneducated buffoons, rustic clowns, and run-of-the-mill peasants, I'd like to apologize to our betters for not necessarily knowing the meanings of such words as: scampi, sierra, nevada, rio, grande, au, jus ... (not to mention auld, lang, syne) ... We do hope to be more privileged in our next lives.

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Amos
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 04:47 PM

Memyself, no apologies needed. Invest in a good dictionary -- the American Heritage is one for Yanks. It'll do wonders for your self-esteem, too! :)


A

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Bill D
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 05:30 PM

The sin is not in not knowing, it is not being curious.

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: John O'L
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 05:47 PM

Buck, I was always annoyed by that too, until I realised that what was being said was actually "What the thing of it is is...", which is still extremely annoying, even more so in fact because it makes sense.

I dunno, it's all very tres ordinaire...

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Amos
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 06:29 PM

It just goes on and on and on incessantly ad infinitum, and never stops also.

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: GUEST,memyself
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 06:40 PM

"The sin is not in not knowing, it is not being curious."

If we are going to bring religion into it now, the sin is not in omission, it is in neglect. (Or is that awkward construction intentional? In which case, if you'll forgive my redundancy, you have committed a damned sin).

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: GUEST,memyself
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 06:45 PM

"It'll do wonders for your self-esteem, too!"

Yes, I've often noticed that lack of self-esteem is a problem that seldom surfaces on this forum. That must explain it ...

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Bert
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 06:47 PM

lack of self-esteem is a problem that seldom surfaces on this forum

LOL Just too true. Or is Too True redundant?

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 07:13 PM

There are many rivers up and down the country called 'River River' (Rother, Trent, Avon, Piddle, Thame etc.).

It's because Roman invaders asked the locals 'what's this called' and they'd say, in their own language 'river'. So the invader would say 'Ah, the river Rother' which stuck. Avon is the English way of saying Afon, which is Welsh for river. Caernarvon Castle is 'castle on the river castle'.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 07:19 PM

If we'd know this thread was coming, we could have had a pre-thread discussing it before it happened. It's too late for that now, but we can still have a postmortem after it's done, I guess. I wonder when that will be?

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Genie
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 07:56 PM

'Tis a mystery and a puzzlement.

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: Genie
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 08:00 PM

BuckMulligan : "Am I the only one bugged by "The thing of it is, is ...." and suchlike, e.g. "The reason is, is..." and "The point is, is..." all of which remind me of Andy Griffith's "What it was, was football." Except that what that was, was funny."
In a word, no. Not at all. Nuh-uh.

Amos: "Invest in a good dictionary -- the American Heritage is one for Yanks. It'll do wonders for your self-esteem, too! :)"
Not to mention making you feel better about yourself too.

Subject: RE: BS: Department Of Redundancy Department
From: GUEST,memyself
Date: 01 Dec 06 - 08:22 PM

And another thing: what led this wise consellor to conclude that I am of the American persuasion? Was it a perception that none but an American could be ignorant of the meaning of the listed foreign and dialect words? Or that only an American would be sensitive to snobbery?

I beg you all to understand, that with a name like memyself, I'm a little touchy on the subject of redundancy.