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

Four Words: Use Other Words Please
"Use other words please."
Commonly used phrases that inexplicably bug you
Most irritating cliche/phrase/expression
"Taking Things to a Whole `Nother Level!"
words that annoy
Words that should earn the author a slap
PROVERBIAL and other tip offs to poor writing

-- caitlin (wpsal...) (webmail), December 23rd, 2003. (caitlin)

Oh yes, yes yes. I second that one. And the people who say it, say it over and over.

I also have a horror of people who write prolifically in all caps.

This is true.

But, this is a topic that should be dealt with routinely and harshly... the only way we can correct the language and suppress it's organic growth is by exposing and banning every new usage as it occurs... Isn't that what the French do?

Also: 'fridge,' girls who refer to each other as 'girl,' proactive...i'll be back when i think of more....

'poetic justice'. Used by the lazy to describe all 'justice' the speaker approves of, instead of a particular type. The adjective is rendered meaningless.

Agree re 'bird' for woman/girl, and lament its threatened return. Stinks of 'I'm being un-PC, where's my medal?'. Also the C-person uses it, which kinda ends the argument.

Wait, huh? Fridge is the thing you put food in, whats wrong with it?

I'm picturing him saying things such as "Would you like me to remove another beverage from the refrigerator for you, whilst we watch some association football?"

No one:
Alba: Me: I read this as a parody of awful Twitter templates
Also me: Keep this shit off my timeline

Let that sink in

Louder for the people in the back.

No lies detected

HOLD 👏 MY 👏 BEER👏 !

https://i.imgflip.com/6j8gne.jpg

I mostly hate "louder for the people in the back" because it's often used as a reply to really insipid, nonsensical shit.

@sarahell - even "Pringle Bells!" or something.. wow, they blew it, so much potential

Merry Pringles LOL

Reminds me of Brian Regan's bit about "Fiedler Roofing Company."

yes!!! thank you both!

Also Arrested Development 'Mock Trial with J. Reinhold'

When I was doing advertising and marketing work, it was customary to present clients with three options.

It was usually pretty easy to generate one safe idea and one slightly edgy idea. To round out the choices, we would sometimes include a comically bad idea, on the theory that its badness would force the client away from it and toward the one we actually wanted to run.

Had to stop doing that when clients kept choosing the terrible idea.

https://mpd-biblio-covers.imgix.net/9781250620972.jpg?w=900

"Big beast", to describe influential figures in political parties.

Interesting about the meme phrases.

I have never heard 'no notes' or 'got milk'.

Poster Alba's satire of meme phrases above was very good.

Has no-one mentioned '(checks notes)'? The thing about this is - it's another dumb meme phrase, but it has a kind of use, and people who are good and sensible sometimes use it.

https://www.nydailynews.com/resizer/_kNj8h1DOIsNoGEejE44pzv2NIU=/800x1077/top/arc-anglerfish-arc2-prod-tronc.s3.amazonaws.com/public/IAKHBZHVVM3VQQKY3HCTVPHQQ4.jpg

"got milk?" was an american ad campaign (for milk, obv) full of pictures of (american) celebs and sports stars like the above

I was aware of that but never quite understood it. Is 'got milk?' meant to mean 'have you got any milk?' Like if someone asks what you want to drink?

The intial Got Milk? phrase was created by the American advertising agency Goodby, Silverstein & Partners. In an interview in Art & Copy, a 2009 documentary that focused on the origins of famous advertising slogans, Jeff Goodby and Rich Silverstein said that the phrase almost didn't turn into an advertising campaign. According to The New York Times, people at Goodby, Silverstein "thought it was lazy, not to mention grammatically incorrect".[5]

The advertisements would typically feature people in various situations involving dry or sticky foods and treats such as cakes and cookies. The people then would find themselves in an uncomfortable situation due to a full mouth and no milk to wash it down.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Gkqzxss8Ss

It’s probably been visited before, but “stepped foot into” instead of “set foot into” or “stepped into”. You don’t “step” your feet, jeez.

Also “milk to wash it down” there makes me want to heave, but that’s just me.

Me too. Is drinking glasses of milk solely the province of the very young and very old? I enjoy a variety of dairy products, but I can't remember the last time I drank milk. Probably when I was a teenager or younger. Meanwhile my 8-year-old child drinks it all the time and my septuagenarian father has either milk or red wine with just about every meal. Sometimes both, one after the other, in the same glass!

When I was a kid there was an ad campaign from the Canadian Milk Board (or whatever the body may be called) attempting to sell milk as a refreshing beverage. The ads simply said

"MILK ON... ICE".

I always thought "MILK... ON ICE" would make more sense, but I'm not in marketing.

Here's a promotional button that I have saved for about 35 years for just such an occasion as this.

https://i.imgur.com/IUGi9AC.jpg

I regret to inform you that this was the British equivalent:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hN1r5vTznAs

i thought that was going to be this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvumt4BJpfk

(there's a Humphrey about...)

the milk marketing board also used to sponsor a round-Britain bike event, the Milk Race

Is drinking glasses of milk solely the province of the very young and very old? I enjoy a variety of dairy products, but I can't remember the last time I drank milk.

I feel like it definitely was by the 1980s ... hence the US advertising campaign to encourage more people to drink milk

Milk
It does a body good

i drink milk quite a lot, it's good for acid stomach and also i like how it tastes (like milk)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cfJMw9UAFdE

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drinka_pinta_milka_day

has been described as one of the most successful advertising slogans of all time, though the consumption of milk per person generally decreased over the period it was used.

I didn't know that slogan before the 'Drink-a Jar-a Wine-a-day' riff on it in Asterix...The Gladiator?

In American novels of the early 20th-c I’m regularly coming across characters enjoying an ice-cold glass of buttermilk on a hot summer day. Now I grew up drinking milk at lunch and dinner and I still like it fine, but I just can’t imagine grabbing a frothy glass of buttermilk to cool off.

oh god i can. i love buttermilk so much.

i had in my head that the "drinka pinta milka day" slogan was invented by salman rushdie but that was "go to work on an egg" and also it was fay weldon

salman rushdie was "naughty but nice" (important to use quote marks in that sentence.)

salman rushdie was "’naughty but nice’,” according to ledge

My parents bought my childhood home off the man who came up with “This is the age of the train”.

Blimey, he also did “milk has got a lotta bottle” and “I’m a secret lemonade drinker”

https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Rod_Allen_(advertising_executive)

the man who animated the sleepy penguin in the “this is the age of the train” ad used to live directly opposite me

he wasn't elvis costello's dad tho

Julianna Margulies’ dad came up with ‘plop plop, fizz fizz/oh, what a relief it is!’ for Alka-Seltzer.

Hoyt Axton's mother wrote (or cowrote) "Heartbreak Hotel." She was also completely unrelated to Elvis Costello, as far as I know.

I learned an interesting story yesterday about Elvis Costello’s mother getting contraband Lee Konitz records from the US through a Liverpudlian Merchant Marine who later changed his name to Michael Holliday and had a couple of number one UK hits.

Have you read his memoir? It's like 85% about his parentage and family history, 7% about being a person of Irish extraction, and like 5% about having created indelibly exciting New Wave music. Then another 3% of sheer random stuff he has to say about, like, early 20th century passenger ships.

If you open it expecting 300 pages of anecdotes about Nick Lowe or Paul McCartney or the Pogues or T-Bone Burnett, it's a disappointment. But if you just want to let him ramble it's fine.

Something that gets used to death by a couple of the Blue Jays broadcasters: "approach," as in "he's got a great two-strike approach," or "I loved his approach in that at-bat." It's not meaningless, they just use it way too often.

more off-topic milk stuff. i forgot how big a thing the milk marketing board was in the 80s UK:

"Milk Cup – The first major trophy to be sponsored in English football was the League Cup, supported by the Milk Marketing Board between 1981 and 1986."

and

"The Milk Race was the most prestigious cycling event in the British calendar running for 35 years between 1958 and 1993 with sponsorship from the now disbanded Milk Marketing Board."

(the milk race used to come through tewkesbury when i was a lad. and the upcoming 2022 tour of britain is starting a stage there)

"after aligning internally,"

sounds uncomfortable tbh

"i'm conscious of time"

sounds exhausting

lol

I don't find it annoying (yet?), but "gatekeeping" seems to be on the same route to ambiguity-via-overuse as gaslighting

"We've decided to go in a different direction."

They should do what they did in Dilbert

"Knock knock"
"Who's there?"
"Not you, anymore"

"We've decided to go in a different direction."

Ah, yes! We think your [choose one: a) idea b) experience c) talent] is really amazing and fabulous, but we've decided to go in a different direction; we think [stupid, clueless, no-talent] is a better fit for what we have in mind.

"So the direction we've decided to go is . . . down."