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

one time i left my house to to pickup a friend from the train station 5 mins down the street. when i got back i realized we were robbed. the windows were open and some things were missing, doors and cabinets were opened, etc. the thing is, at the time i didn't know if anyone was still in the house or not. this is why we called the cops. not sure what they wrote down and i don't really care. they arrived and accused us of lying and being on drugs. it sucked.

you shoulda said burgled, they would have believed you

"The prisoner was hung" has connotations that bring to mind horses more than executions.

there is actually such a thing as "death erection" though, in which case, unfortunately, one could be both hanged and evidently hung

it always bugs me that the term is "pleaded guilty (or innocent)" rather than "pled guilty" because the preferred use of language was variable

I also realized that the dictionary version of "robbed" I was looking at had general theft under "informal dialect" and listed "burglary" as a synonym

so there you go, I'm just from a bad dialect area

legal language is a gated system used to control those who in general do not understand it. there is a legal class that can understand the accepted contexts of all of these words and then there is everybody else, the vast people the laws are applied to, many of them legally illiterate. in a way we haven't changed much since the days of the Holy Roman Empire controlling everything through Latin.

To my ear, "pled" is about as correct as "syllabi."

That is, I understand the arguments in favor, but it seems just too stilted for normal use. For almost every audience, I'd prefer a more conversational choice.

I was taught pled either in civics class or mock trial and I wonder what was up with that

pled/pleaded drives me insane -- I can never remember which one to use when and I'm a fucking lawyer

He pled "innocent" to the capital crime he was charged with and during the sentencing he pleaded for his life.

syllabuses?

i work in one of the least orthodox higher education environments known to me and mankind and even we say syllabi

i was at a gig once where the singer was talking about someone being hung and the guy behind me kept yelling 'hanged!' and shaking his head

anyway that's how I remember the difference

Twas poor form of him indeed to go so far as to mime it

couldn't see a thread for malapropisms so i'll park this here. sales guy just emailed me to explain some pricing inconsistencies on his company's website - apparently they were due to "some clichés on the system"

That’s beautiful.

sounds like he's got a bad platitude

here's a malapropism story for you:

a friend of mine worked in a fabric shop in Glasgow called Remnant Kings. they had a chaise longue in the window of the shop that they used to re-upholster periodically in a fabric that they were trying to punt. my friend was working behind the counter one day when some older Glasgow women were having a look at that piece of furniture. One of the women came up to my friend at the counter and said:

"Excuse me, hen, can you tell me the name of the fabric you've got covering your Champs-Élysée?"

I have thought of that story so often that when I see a chaise-longue now I can't remember what it's really called.

LOL. It might have been my mother, she was never out of that shop, back in the day.

For a while I had a delightfully malaprop-prone boss who came up with lots of things like that. I'd sometimes have to hold a folder in front of my face during meetings.

One of my favorites was "Man, I hate poppyseed bagels. The Rembrandts get stuck in your teeth."

probably Tom!

In some respects I feel bad for laughing because it was a great job and she was a great boss. And _usually_ you could figure out what she meant.

"For Christmas, let's do a Yankee Candle swap!" Okay, not actually what it's called but I know what you mean.

Sometimes, though, I was just stumped.

"Are you excited about the papple visit?"

"The what?"

"The papple visit." Took a while before it was clear that she was talking about the Pope coming to Nationals Stadium.

"Absorb" as used by my friend recently wjn she told me to "absorb the lesson". Probably should find friends who don't thrive on breezy ass language

*when

Papal probably

the paypal visit

it's like you're always stuck in dentures heeeere

“I’m just gonna leave this here”

oh my god otm. that one has sort of died off though thankfully

that was sort of supplanted by "Boom." which was really only a twitter phenomenon and has also died off

http://gaia.adage.com/images/bin/imgstore/work/full/v/e/r/Verizon_DroptheMic17.jpg

yeah not only mic drop but that guy too, whoever he is (bootleg seth meyers?)

i've been told he's on 'silicon valley' and is okay but i don't care, i want to kill him

hell yeah

"burgle" as a verb is a back formation from the noun "burglar", I think, so "burglarize" also kind of makes sense.

"Play stupid games, win stupid prizes"

― erudite beach boys fan (sheesh), Saturday, October 29, 2016 1:36 PM (one year ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

This one drives me up the fucking wall.

that's a new one to me
what does it mean, aside from being totally dismissive?

i loathe all glib canned responses like that
i think i loathe glibness in general

Basically it means that if you engage in risky behavior, you should expect negative consequences. In context, there's also an implication that you deserve the negative outcomes.

mess with the bull, you get the horns amirite?!
it sounds like a dismissive shitty thing to say

I would only say that to an actual bullfighter

not all back formations are created equal

There is, for example, a subreddit by that name that mostly shares varying degrees of 'fail video' type antics. But I've also heard it used in real life regarding someone who OD'd on heroin.

jesus
that's cruel
why is everyone such an asshole

Like everything else, gammon is now done lads

I've noticed a lot of people using "macguffin" as insta-snark, like it should be immediately understood as a pejorative - kinda don't think Hitchcock was dissing his own films when he started using it?

Just standard hatred of the scotch I'm afraid

maybe they are confusing macguffins with mcmuffins

[location of latest tragedy]Strong

Otm^