So v. S – The battle within

Actually no, there should be no “battle within” around whether or not to use ‘So’ or ‘S’ when abbreviating ‘South’ in an address or any other case of short-handing “South”.

None-what-so-ever.

In fact, I can’t think of one time I thought to myself: “gee, I’m troubled because I don’t know which to use: So or S?“

Nor has there been even one instance of me thinking: “yes, I shall put ‘So’ instead of ‘S’ because that is the correct thing to do.”

Not. Once.

In fact, after an extensive search of the internet, I can’t find one good reason for ‘So’ other than it was used sometime in the past. I don’t know how long in the past, but it wasn’t yesterday. Or 5 years ago. Maybe not even 10.

I have two words for everyone who still uses ‘So’:

Time to move on, folks.           Time… to move on.

Super what? (Aka: why is everything so super?)

In honor of the recent super moon, I would like to list a few things that are ‘super’ by today’s standards, which, apparently, are a lot of things – few of which are warranted to be ‘super’. Enjoy.

Super moon – Did you happen to see it? Did you notice how much closer it was? Me neither…

Suberbad – I’m still not sure why this is the title of the movie.

Superman – The only alien accepted in today’s society, other than those from The Event.

Super-size – I wish this option would go away.

Super-duper – Yessssssssssss!

Supercharger – Nothing to say here. Move along.

Super Bowl – Too bad the rest of the world doesn’t have football teams American style.

Super Shuttle – Nothing to say here. Move along.

Super 8 – Sometimes this is a good idea. Sometimes it is not.

Supercuts – Sometimes this is a good idea. Sometimes it is not.

Super foods – Gimmick? Perhaps.

Super glue – Tasty. But I don’t remember how tasty, exactly.

Superhero – Is there an supernonhero classification for a super-human-thing-character?

Superintendent – Super guy/gal in charge of stuff.

Super Mario – What happened to you…

Super Nintendo – Too bad you didn’t make it.

Supernova – Awesomeness. (Apparently Word agrees that ‘awesomeness’ a real word. Good.)

Super volcano – Shitguys! We’re all in trouble if this thing goes off.


In conclusion: please, if you’re going to name something, name it something other than ‘super’ – we have enough of those. Thanks.

An Ode to Corned Beef

Oh, corned beef, where ever did you get your name?

I understand the beef.
I do not understand the corned.

You rarely ever have corn in your makeup.
Yet, you’re called corned.

Where, oh where, does your name come from?


(I realize that ‘corned’ means ‘cured’. Let me have my fun.)

Lol’ing your way through life

I don’t ‘lol’. I more or less refuse. Primarily on the basis that it means, literally, that I’m laughing out loud. It also means, literally, that you’re laughing out loud when you type it as well. Are you aware of that?

I rarely laugh out loud, but if I do, chances are there’s someone I’m conversing with in real-life who is standing near me or on the phone with me and there was something that genuinely made me create a laughing sound from my mouth. Do some things seem funny enough to make me ‘lol’ and type it? Sure. Do they always? No. That’s just insane. Please read further.

I don’t type ‘lol’ because that would mean I’m laughing out loud, quite literally. Unlike probably 98% of the population, when I ‘lol’ I’m actually laughing. And you’re probably not laughing out loud when you type it. So stop. Please. No one laughs out loud after every seemingly funny text that comes across their eyes. Or email. Or instant message. It’s just not right to fake it that much. And it’s not right to go changing the meaning of ‘laughing out loud’ from “I’m actually laughing with some sound” to “I’m not making any sound, but my thought is that it’s funny.”

So stop.

Please.

Thank you.

_

Brushing the cow’s tail

Have you heard this expression before? You know, used as: ‘don’t go brushing the cow’s tail’ or ‘he was brushing the cow’s tail’?

How about, ‘it was so crazy it was as if she was brushing the cow’s tail’?

I didn’t think so, neither have I. Nor do I want to. Although, small part of me wishes for this expression to start up. I wouldn’t mind being the proprietor of ‘brushing the cow’s tail’. Better to be the proprietor of ‘brushing the cow’s tail’ than ‘walking the way with dinosaurs’. I don’t even know what that means. Actually, I don’t know what either of them means.

Disregard I said anything.

_

Grasshopper

So apparently the word ‘grasshopper’ is racially discriminatory, so says Big Brother on my workplace instant messenger:

“The instant message that you are trying to send matches the "Racial discrimination" rule. IM Security took the "Replace all" action.”

Great. Thank you for replacing the word ‘grasshopper’ with who-knows-what. I wouldn’t want anyone thinking I’m into racial discrimination or up on the newest fads for racially discriminatory words in today’s society. Good, …good.

And to make sure that the system was crazy, in addition to sending the word ‘grasshopper’ by itself (thinking that perhaps the system thinks a one-word use of ‘grasshopper’ could be a derogatory statement), I typed the following statement: I saw a grasshopper on the trail today during my walk.

Sure enough, that’s racial discrimination… somehow.

Yet, the word ‘retarded’ is allowed… … …

So I conducted highly scientific research on the internet to to the bottom of this. What did I find? Racial discrimination causes breast cancer, something about an ant and a grasshopper in India, and a grasshopper has its own tale. Here are my search results.

What? Nothing about ‘grasshopper’ being racially discriminatory? Oh. Okay then.

_

Yurt and Strawberrt

Turns out ‘strawberrt’ is a little more popular than I had originally expected. I hadn’t given it much thought, actually, but when I just Googled it, I found 10+ pages of results. Now of course, not all of those pages are pertinent; however it should be noted that ‘strawberrt’ is a word in use around the world today, oddly enough.

In other news, a while back I learned about yurts. At the same time, I also learned that I want one. Unfortunately, I don’t have a yard big enough for one at the moment. Someday I will, or at least I will have a piece of land hanging out, lonely, looking for a friend… and I will put a yurt on it to make it feel better. And for me to stand in.

_

Chasing a squirrel on caffeine…

I just received an email at work containing the following line: “getting them pinned down has been like trying to chase a squirrel on caffeine.”

I promptly forwarded the email to my boss and asked if he has ever chased a squirrel on caffeine. His response leads me to believe he has not. Neither have I. And chances are, I don’t know anyone who has.

After hearing this, I have a few questions:

1) Where did the squirrel get the caffeine?
2) Why would you be chasing a squirrel in the first place?
3) How high can squirrels jump after consuming caffeine?
4) What happens to tortoises (torti?) when they consume caffeine?

If anyone can answer any or all of these, it would be greatly appreciated.

_

The Ish Clause and PainterMan

I enjoy the Ish Clause. For those who may not know, when someone adds “ish” to the end of a word, most frequently regarding a time, they’re giving you a guesstimate or loose estimate (side note: somehow guesstimate is a real word according to Microsoft – you learn something new every day).

I don’t like to overuse the Ish Clause, and I certainly don’t like when others overuse it… that’s just outright abuse. And I don’t stand for abuse… in most cases at least.

Anyway, utilizing the Ish Clause allows for a window of opportunity, which I think is still pretty firm. In regard to time, when someone says “ish”, I don’t think that goes beyond 20 minutes in either direction; there’s definite boundaries for the Ish Clause.

Last week, a coworker told me he would have his PowerPoint slides to me around Wednesday-ish. It is currently Friday. I haven’t encountered a day-“ish” before, so I didn’t really know what to expect. The jury is still out, but I would say that in day-ish terms, there is a one-day window there; certainly, 20 minutes wouldn’t be appropriate, and 20 days is entirely too ridiculous a timeframe.


In other news, I got home after work yesterday to find painters hanging on the side of my house. Apparently the HOA had contracted them to repaint all the units in my area. I knew about this ahead of time, but they didn’t give a specific date they’d start painting.

So I walked inside, let the dog out, walked back into the living room and saw this, which doesn’t seem too safe to me:

















I was expecting PainterMan to come crashing through the window after I took his picture and really didn’t want to deal with that.

Fortunately he didn't.

_

Words

Tornadoes
Potatoes
Photoes
Tostados

I don’t get it. The English language often times makes no sense. Sure, I speak and write it well, and can convey a good story through its means, but really… wth is going on with the “oes” and “os”? Tornado becomes tornadoes, potato becomes potatoes, but photo doesn’t become photoes, and tostado well… that’s just another language, but it too doesn’t become tostadoes… nor does taco become tacoes.

Also, what’s up with having words that are bad? Who’s stupid idea was it to deem certain words “bad”? I mean really… why is one word “bad”, making another obviously “good”? That makes no sense, and is illogical. Whomever thought it a good idea to label certain words as “bad” clearly had issues in life. I personally don’t see a use in having “bad” words – why can’t the current list of “bad” words just simply be strong markers in a sentence; strong adverbs or adjectives, strong conveyances of expression? Making a word “bad” is just ignorant if you ask me. It’s like saying a certain type of tree is “bad”, or a certain breed of animal is “bad”. Come on, people, get real.

A word is a word. A word is a sound that comes out of your mouth which has a specified definition standing behind it so we know what we’re talking about. Throwing in the “bad” words shouldn’t be a problem, if anything they add passion and description to an otherwise boring sentence. Yes, the “bad” words tend to be strong in their conveyance of feeling, emotion, or opinion, but sometimes you just need to go to that level to fully express what you’re trying to say. These words shouldn’t be “bad”, they should just be words.

_