Tag Archives: Language

Heard Mentality

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difference-between-dictionary-and-thesaurus-dictionary

The word “heard” did nothing for me. Because of that, I went to myriumwebster.com, expecting to use their word of the day. But something caught my eye. It was an article on how the dictionary needs to be constantly changed (I know I’m a nerd when things like that fascinate me).

It said more than a thousand words have been added, in all categories. Sports to science. Slang to music.

Some 2017 editions include urgent care, air-ball, and Epi-pen. In slang, you have whack, boo-hoo, and yowzah. I see that spell check hasn’t caught up!

I wonder what people 50 years ago (heck, 10 years ago!) would have thought about not just recent dictionary additions but our language today in general.

This post was another post about nothing, but what words would you add?

It Would Be Awesome If These Words Literally Disappeared

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ban

As I’ve said, I love words. I’ve also said that I could read the thesaurus as a novel. Both are true, but then there are some words/phrases I despise. It’s how we use them. It wouldn’t break my heart if the following were banned.

The list is extremely scary. It actually gives me chills. After all, Halloween is Monday.

  • Man cave
  • Hashtag something- #annoying
  • Awesome- The Grand Canyon is awesome, not your new TV
  • Selfie
  • Literally- Unless you know how to use it
  • Bling
  • Vape
  • Tweet- Only birds tweet

Did I miss any? I would love to hear your additions!

Good Bye, Webster’s

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Courtesty illinoisreview.typepad.com

Who needs Webster’s Dictionary when you’ve got The Dictionary of Erin? Here is a preview:

Flangiprop– (adj) An expression of frustration, such as “Flangiprop, this suduku game is impossible.”

Trageldum- (adj) Absolute joy. “Tom and Nancy were in a state of tradgelum at the birth of their first grandchild.”

Lomt- (verb) preparation. “Sarah had to lomt for her vacation to her vacation to Hawaii.”

Polmic- (n) The fastest, best computer on the market. “Apple comes with a polmic probably every six months.”

Loy- (n) Sibling. “My loy were sure annoying as kids.”

Prab- (n) Cozy pajamas. “I love to wear my prab in the winter.”

Erin- (n) One who seems crazy but is just quirky. “If I didn’t know better I’d think she was out of her mind, but she’s just Erin.”

OMG, That’s Annoying!

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I told you that bad grammar was my pet peeve, but I’ve thought of something else that is right up there on the extremely annoying scale: laziness. I would never hear the end of it if I admitted this to my parents (actually I think I will be getting a huge I told you so from Mom, who posts my posts for me), but if you just do something right the first time, you’ll save yourself a whole lot of effort.

Probably like every kid on the planet at one time or another, I ran the toothbrush under the faucet instead of brushing my teeth. Instead of making my bed, I just pulled up the comforter, while the blanket and sheet remained a jumbled mess.

There is a new form of laziness for the 21st century, and you know what I’m talking about—it runs rampant on social media: LOL, OMG, IDC. Now that’s lazy! Just SAY it, already! And who comes up with that stuff, anyway?

Courtesy: squarelulu.blogspot.com

I know a lot of it came from text messages’ shorthand, which I get. But what about, say Facebook? Why not type the whole phrase? Just laziness, I tell you!

I so wish I had the nerve to say something! It would go something like this: If you took the time just typing what you wanted to say, instead of coming up with abbreviations and reinventing the wheel, you would probably be time ahead.

Now, I just need the guts to say so the next time I see it on FB (oops—I mean Facebook)!

Stylish

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Courtesy: Grammarsass

You have undoubtedly heard that people judge you based on what you say. For me, it’s your grammar, and when typed, punctuation. An error in either is worse than nails on a chalkboard—more like knuckle cracking, which is a sound that gives me the creeps.

But I would rather hear knuckle cracking 24 hours a day than things like, “Me and her are going to dinner.” Horrible. Or, “You is nice.” Awful. And my personal favorite: Misuse of the word “literal,” as in, “We literally froze.” It must be a miracle—a frozen person is talking to me right now!

Written mistakes might be worse because you can’t tune them out. For starters, how about they’re, their, and there? Or affect and effect? How about the same word with multiple meanings: Think about rose and rose. Saw and saw. Or a comma that can completely change the meaning of a sentence: “Can we eat Mom?” or, “Can we eat, Mom?”

Personal style in clothes is one thing, but taking liberties with the English language can label people lazy, not stylish.

Dead? Or Very Much Alive?

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I am uant-flay in ig-pay atlin-lay (I am fluent in pig Latin, for you non-speakers).

I love words, as I said in my About Me page. I could literally read the thesaurus as though it was a novel and I love coming up with other ways of saying things. Hot dog becomes sweltering canine, baby carrots, infant roots. There are more, but you get the idea. If I had the chance, I would study linguistics. Everything about the English language fascinates me, from synonyms to punctuation, even grammar.

Although it’s technically a dead language (another thing fascinating about language—how can an entire way of speaking just become extinct?), Latin is so interesting to me.

Courtesy myenglishkey.com

But I suppose it’s because we are surrounded by Latin. Maggie is a canine, which is from the word “canus,” which means dog.

Others include alter ego (alternative self), bona fide (genuine, sincere), circa (about), et cetera (and the rest), and alibi (elsewhere). There are many more where those came from!

I guess people need to check their facts: In English alone, Latin is alive and kicking!