Annoying Phrases

Hi All,

I'm back and so is the blog. Full steam ahead as they say. I was wondering what I was going to write about tonight...and then it hit me. Annoying phrases. And I'll give you the inside scoop on some reference books that might shed some new light on the various phrases.

Click here for a link to a site that talks about 10 Annoying Phrases That Serve No Purpose. Pretty funny and a light hearted way to begin the blog tonight. Note that the site is from the UK...Not only are the sites' examples of annoying phrases interesting (It's all good, To Be Honest, No Offense, Whatever, and Don't Get Me Wrong among others....) and very amusing, the comments are pretty darn funny also. Good stuff and a good start for tonight.

From the Oxford University comes this list 10 Most Annoying Phrases. Note that the list is from 2008 - but it is still very relevant. With phrases like 'At the end of the day', 'Absolutely', 'It's a nightmare', 'Shouldn't of' and '24x7' you can see why I added the site to this list. Click here for the link to the article - which btw came from Wired.com.

From a site called lemondrop comes this list of 'The Most Irritating Phrases in the English Language'. Click here for the link - and again it is from 2008 - but the phrases are still (again) apropros. Lemondrop does something different on the site thought - they actually bunched phrases together and briefly talk about the phrase.

For instance, they discuss 'Office Jargon' phrases like: team-building, value-added, grassroots, reach out, multitasking, no-brainer, low-hanging fruit, monetize and ping as being annoying. Indeed - they are right on track with this list.

And finally, from the Windy city of Chicago, comes this list of 'The Most Annoying Phrases of All time'. Click here for the link - and here are a few of the winners: 'Not so much', 'Don't go there' and 'Sweet'.

Now, in order to make this entry at least a bit educational, click on this link to the library card catalog for the book entitled, 'Literally, the best language book ever: annoying ords and abused phrases you should never use again' by Paul Yeager. And yes, the Farmingdale Public Library does own the book -and as of this writing (Wednesday night 6/15/11 at 6:45pm) - the book is on the shelf in the library.

Enjoy the links!
Stu