Words, usages, and phrases that annoy the shit out of you...

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So true, I have to be careful to remove excess "definitely" and "very" usage, and I still don't get to all the ones that ought to go. Verbally, with no hope of editing, I add these stupid "definitely"s to the point where I sound like some sleazy car salesman closing a deal.

**************

Here's one closer to grammar pedant stuff, an association I don't want because I don't have any sympathy for 99% of the usage that bothers them, but anyway. Where I live absolutely everybody says and writes "based off" rather than "based on". Like, nothing is based ON anything, it's always based off of something. "This movie was based off of a true story." "We decided not to do it based off of our financial figures."

Why does this usage in particular irritate me, when I couldn't care less about "could care less" or "irregardless"? I can't explain. Even the illogicality of it doesn't explain it.

Vic Perry, Monday, 12 January 2015 04:51 (nine years ago) link

it's become an area of general prepositional confusion-- you never know whether you'll get an "on", an "off", or an "off of"... at this rate, it won't be long before "based of" enters the lingo. (I'd like to give a shout-out to the perennially underused "based in", before it goes the way of the neanderthal)

social experiment: next time someone drops "based off" in a conversation or a meeting, look puzzled and ask them to repeat what they just said

I can just, like, YOLO with Uber (bernard snowy), Monday, 12 January 2015 06:18 (nine years ago) link

**on 2nd thought "based in" strongly suggests location, which limits its general usefulness

I can just, like, YOLO with Uber (bernard snowy), Monday, 12 January 2015 06:20 (nine years ago) link

Googling the phrase led me to this site. Parody or real?

http://www.omgfacts.com/lists/5514/Dr-House-is-based-off-of-Sherlock-Holmes

Vic Perry, Monday, 12 January 2015 06:33 (nine years ago) link

clickbait. not sure if that's a category of its own these days.

salsa shark, Monday, 12 January 2015 07:40 (nine years ago) link

I'm getting used to "hot mess", but for a long time it had strong connotations of "diarrhea" for me.

i think it's supposed to? it's a euphemism for looking like shit, or something not entirely unshitlike.

mitt fleekwood (get bent), Monday, 12 January 2015 07:49 (nine years ago) link

relly dislike "creativity" or "creative" to describe a supposedly positive value in art, usually identifying a vague and purposeless unpredictability. It just seems to have so little to do with what actually makes art good.

walid foster dulles (man alive), Tuesday, 13 January 2015 02:42 (nine years ago) link

"man _____" e.g. "man clothes" "man purse" "man bag" "man cave" "man boobs" "the man show"

marcos, Wednesday, 14 January 2015 17:33 (nine years ago) link

^^^

walid foster dulles (man alive), Wednesday, 14 January 2015 17:34 (nine years ago) link

Any variation of "Can I just ask a quick question?"

the body of a spider... (scampering alpaca), Wednesday, 14 January 2015 17:37 (nine years ago) link

lol did not mean that as a dig against your poster name xp, i don't have a problem with it since it is its own expression

marcos, Wednesday, 14 January 2015 17:39 (nine years ago) link

while we're on the subject, "creatives" to describe designers and the like >:[

contenderizer, Wednesday, 14 January 2015 17:44 (nine years ago) link

have so had it with "the problem with"
1) kindly stop telling me what the problem is
2) the problem with the problem with the problem is the problem

spent time at a meeting trying to explain that what some people thought was "the problem" was merely a symptom of the actual issue we were discussing and it was very very very tiresome

groundless round (La Lechera), Wednesday, 14 January 2015 19:17 (nine years ago) link

Courtesy of dean burnett 2015:

No, no, no.

No. Na. Nein. Non. Nyet. Mhai. Illai. Não. Nee. Ne. Nope. Negatory. Nada. No way, Jose. Nil. Nu. Nie. Bu Dui. Iie. Nem. Nullus. Nej. Neen. And, in case any Klingons are reading this, Ghobe!

^this trope is for cunts

ØYE MATS (wins), Monday, 19 January 2015 13:41 (nine years ago) link

When I visited my folks, we took my daughter to a puppet show in suburban maryland and the woman who was kind of herding everyone into the theater (where most of the seating was on the floor) kept saying "Our style of seating is criss-cross applesauce, please move forward and we are sitting criss-cross applesauce." It made me never want to leave New York again.

walid foster dulles (man alive), Monday, 19 January 2015 15:24 (nine years ago) link

wtf does that mean?

this is just a saginaw (dog latin), Monday, 19 January 2015 15:26 (nine years ago) link

It means cross your legs. Also unfortunately referred to, in my childhood, as "indian style."

walid foster dulles (man alive), Monday, 19 January 2015 15:27 (nine years ago) link

Which, it actually never occurred to me until now, was probably a reference to a caricatured yoga pose rather than Native Americans.

walid foster dulles (man alive), Monday, 19 January 2015 15:27 (nine years ago) link

weird.

this is just a saginaw (dog latin), Monday, 19 January 2015 15:27 (nine years ago) link

More likely Native American? My granny used to tell me off for sitting on my haunches, saying "You're sitting like a Chinee".

Peas Be Upon Ham (Tom D.), Monday, 19 January 2015 15:31 (nine years ago) link

haha http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Indian_style

kola superdeep borehole (harbl), Monday, 19 January 2015 15:41 (nine years ago) link

criss-cross applesauce (not comparable)

(childish, US, regional, idiomatic) (of sitting): cross-legged

Usage notes

Generally used by nursery school and primary school teachers to children, sometimes followed by “spoons in the bowl” to mean “hands in your lap”, strengthening analogy with a bowl of applesauce; alternatively, “spoons in your bowl”, “spoons in your lap”.

Ottbot jr (NickB), Monday, 19 January 2015 15:42 (nine years ago) link

i've also heard pretzel-style lately

Mordy, Monday, 19 January 2015 16:00 (nine years ago) link

please move forward and we are sitting criss-cross applesauce

this is killing me

example (crüt), Monday, 19 January 2015 16:03 (nine years ago) link

Yeah, that annoyed me when I first heard it too, when my kid went to nursery school. Gotten used to it though. Better than Indian Style. Now, he says they just say "cross-legged" or "pretzel-legs".

american tail/american pie (how's life), Monday, 19 January 2015 17:29 (nine years ago) link

"Tailor-fashion" is kind of interesting. I've never heard that before.

jmm, Monday, 19 January 2015 17:33 (nine years ago) link

definitely think of tailors in 19th century cartoons or children's book sitting cross-legged, at least in the UK

Gombeen Dance Band (Noodle Vague), Monday, 19 January 2015 17:35 (nine years ago) link

Yeah, it makes sense, since a lot of tailors probably sat on the floor to have more room. It's interesting that it was such a conspicuous way of sitting as to find its way into the language.

jmm, Monday, 19 January 2015 17:39 (nine years ago) link

Not sure what's wrong with just using cross-legged tbh

Peas Be Upon Ham (Tom D.), Monday, 19 January 2015 17:39 (nine years ago) link

I've never used anything else

venting lex stream anger. (wins), Monday, 19 January 2015 17:41 (nine years ago) link

offensive to christians iirc

Mordy, Monday, 19 January 2015 17:45 (nine years ago) link

cross-legged could imply legs crossed while sitting in a chair or with legs stretched out and crossed at the ankle

Gombeen Dance Band (Noodle Vague), Monday, 19 January 2015 17:46 (nine years ago) link

Yeah I use it for those too

venting lex stream anger. (wins), Monday, 19 January 2015 17:50 (nine years ago) link

It is also named after various plains-dwelling nomads: in English Indian style, in many European languages "Turkish style", and in Japanese agura (胡座 The sitting style of non-Han ethnics (particularly Turks, Mongols and other Central Asians.)?).

Lots of good options here.

jmm, Monday, 19 January 2015 17:51 (nine years ago) link

xp

sure and why not but the difference explains why people may have adopted more specific terminology

Gombeen Dance Band (Noodle Vague), Monday, 19 January 2015 17:52 (nine years ago) link

"applesauce" is probably just a convenient mnemonic for people too stupid to remember what sitting that way is called, such as the obnoxious woman herding us into the theater

walid foster dulles (man alive), Monday, 19 January 2015 17:53 (nine years ago) link

I say "sitting cross-legged on the floor" and all the alternatives itt are horrible, I'm open to other suggestions

venting lex stream anger. (wins), Monday, 19 January 2015 17:54 (nine years ago) link

Which, it actually never occurred to me until now, was probably a reference to a caricatured yoga pose rather than Native Americans.

lotus position is a totally different type of crossed legs though, couldn't imagine any teachers trying to force kids to do that

Ottbot jr (NickB), Monday, 19 January 2015 17:56 (nine years ago) link

Working on hunting shirts or any other project, we tailors sit cross-legged, while the two seamstresses of our shop don't do so primarily because of differences in our wardrobes. Most depictions of tailors from the eighteenth century show them sitting cross-legged (still known elsewhere as "tailor style"). It's not hard to find the reasons. It allows you to hold your work in your lap, given that, unlike other artisans, tailors didn't work at a bench or table. Secondly, it allows you to spread your tools around you and in your lap for easy access. Thirdly, and I can vouch for this from personal experience, once you train your body to sit in this fashion, your lower back muscles tighten slightly, allowing you to sit for extended periods without leaning against a chair or fidgeting much. In fact, one theory about the name (sartorius; think sartorial, as in clothes) and nickname (tailor's muscle) for the longest muscle in the human body, in the thigh, has to do with sitting tailor fashion. The practice continued well beyond the 1770s, as you can see in this image of a Wichita, Kansas, shop from around the turn of the last century. (link)

jmm, Monday, 19 January 2015 18:03 (nine years ago) link

après-ski

marcos, Monday, 26 January 2015 21:10 (nine years ago) link

"think ____" used instead of "for example, ____" or "such as ____"

i find "think" to be very common in dumb bloggy salon/slate/atlantic/nytimes thinkpieces that are trying to be authoritative. i really don't like the imperative tone, the "think THIS not THAT" as a way to way to make a point. i can't find an immediate example since it is hard to search for on its own, but something like:

"and the boundaries between fashion and tech trends are blurring everyday - think apple watch and google glass"

marcos, Monday, 26 January 2015 21:24 (nine years ago) link

think ____ sounds a lot like parenthetical read: ____

Mordy, Monday, 26 January 2015 21:25 (nine years ago) link

"_______ much?"

just1n3, Monday, 26 January 2015 21:28 (nine years ago) link

the woman who was kind of herding everyone into the theater (where most of the seating was on the floor) kept saying "Our style of seating is criss-cross applesauce, please move forward and we are sitting criss-cross applesauce."

I am annoyed by this even apart from the super annoying phrasing. I have a dodgy knee, I am not sitting on the floor in any formation for more than 2 minutes thanks

club mate martyr (a passing spacecadet), Monday, 26 January 2015 21:55 (nine years ago) link

"utilize"

guess that bundt gettin eaten (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 26 January 2015 21:56 (nine years ago) link

offensive to christians iirc

― Mordy, Monday, January 19, 2015 11:45 AM (1 week ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

A+ joke.

Vic Perry, Monday, 26 January 2015 23:18 (nine years ago) link

"_______ much?"

KILL

RAGE

*steam coming out of ears*

no fucks given or implied (get bent), Tuesday, 27 January 2015 09:56 (nine years ago) link

and thank heavens people have cooled it with the "got _____?"

no fucks given or implied (get bent), Tuesday, 27 January 2015 09:56 (nine years ago) link

"cow-orker"

it's funny cuz "cow" is in it

no fucks given or implied (get bent), Wednesday, 28 January 2015 00:05 (nine years ago) link

Yummy and, worse, yucky used in recipes and food blogs.

about a dozen duck supporters (carl agatha), Wednesday, 28 January 2015 03:43 (nine years ago) link


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