Betcha thought I'd never be back, huh? Well, it took me awhile, but sure as the sun keeps rising every morning, I'll sooner or later find something else to complain about. Well, this time I'm revisiting the topic of American English, and our questionable modern usage of it. Are you ready for some more made-up words and improperly used expressions? Here comes part 2 of my pet peeves of modern English!
"Irregardless" isn't a word. I'll prove it to you: the prefix "ir-" and the suffix "-less" mean the same thing, so they cancel each other out. People compulsively tack extra syllables onto words in order to make themselves sound more intelligent than they (evidently) are. Either drop the "ir-" and just use regardless, or use the word irrespective if you feel the need to utter one extra syllable.
Nobody needs a "hot water heater". Okay, most of us are guilty of this little redundancy, including myself, and most of us don't even realize it until we stop to think about it. It's a "water heater", not a "hot water heater". Hot water doesn't need to be heated, 'cause it's already hot! Not very energy-efficient if you ask me ... and unless your house is powered by superheated steam, it's totally unnecessary.
Stupidest. Idea. Ever. Obviously this one has only polluted our language in written form ... you know, the way people dramatically pause to emphasize their superlative declaration, such as "That was the Best. Concert. Ever." Not only would this gross offense against the laws of punctuation propel most high school English teachers into conniptions, but to me it's Really. Really. Annoying. And. Pretentious.
A light-year isn't a year. Maybe it's not fair to have this one on the list, because you'd have to be some amount of a geek (like me) to know that a light-year isn't a measure of time, but is instead a measure of distance. "My mind was light-years away" makes much more sense than "It's light-years ahead of its time." I guess you'll have to just trust me on that one.
I've already vented a little of my frustration about some of our dorky-sounding modern-day portmanteaus, but what's pissing me off is how they're starting to get legitimized by being added to the prestigious Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary. (No wonder college students are starting to sound stupid.) Two that really rub me the wrong way: "staycation" (as in a vacation spent at home) -- Are we so pressed for time that we can't just call it an "at-home vacation"? -- and "frenemy" (someone who pretends to be a friend but is really an enemy). What I don't understand is why anyone would use a dweeby-sounding word like "frenemy" when the phrase "two-faced bitch" is so much more colorful.
Now let's talk about snowclones ... while trying to ingore how dumb the word itself sounds. We've all heard them used, though not a lot of people know them by that term (I was one of those people who'd never been exposed to that word until just a few weeks ago). They're those catch-phrase templates that are usually adapted from ones heard in movies, TV shows, or advertising, and used to fit any number of everyday situations or ideas. "Got [x]?" is a good example, originating with the "Got milk?" ad campaign ... oftentimes you'll see a "Got Jesus?" bumper sticker on some religious nut's car.
While some are used cleverly and I can tolerate them, the one I absolutely hate is "[x] is the new [y]". It gets on my nerves mostly because it's used to herald the arrival of new trends in fashion, pop culture, design, and what have you ... and I've never given in to trends. I wear what I want to wear and listen to what I want to listen to, because it's my life and nobody else's. "Red is the new pink." No it's not. Red is red, it's always been red, and it'll always be red. That's why there's a whole separate color already called pink. "Thirty is the new forty." Again, no. Thirty is thirty, and forty is forty. Ask anyone with a basic grasp of mathematics and they'll tell you the same damn thing. Sheesh.
Now, just to show you I'm not completely obsessive about proper English usage, let me say a word about the kind of people I call "grammar snobs". These are the people who make their every sentence grammatically correct to such an extent that they defy the laws of verbal physics (as I like to describe it). You know how the normal everyday way that people talk doesn't necessarily hold hard and fast to every rule of grammar, syntax, and sentence structure? I'm perfectly okay with that ... just 'cause you're not, don't get all up in my face about it. Let me give you a couple of examples.
When someone asks me, "How are you?", I always say, "I'm okay. How are you?". If they say, "I'm well", that's when I know they're a grammar snob. When I hear that, it sounds as though they're saying, "I'm GRAMMATICALLY CORRECT. How are you?". People who are that linguistically pompous oughta be required to show a bachelor's degree in English, or else just talk like a normal, everyday person.
People aren't getting married anymore. Did you know that? Now they're "being married". Where the hell did this come from? I've seen it in "Dear Abby" (okay, so I read it in the paper ... shut up) several times in the last few weeks, and now I've gotta say something about it. Is it all-of-a-sudden no longer proper to use the phrase "getting married" for some reason? That old song would sound just plain stupid with the lyrics "I'm being married in the morning; ding-dong, the bells are gonna chime." Long as I'm around, people are going to get married when they have a wedding, and once it's over they'll be married. Again, sheesh.
