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Words which set your teeth on edge

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flufeemunk effluvia

03:28 / 12.09.04

SMS slang in general makes me want to destroy buildings with my bare fists...

ROFLOLMAO!!!!!1!!!!one!!!!

04:01 / 12.09.04

Tasty
Oh how I fucking hate the sound of that word.

Grub or Tucker when talking about food.
Call. It. Food. You. Prick.

More-ish (ie. It makes you want more of it.)
I'll kill you if you say this in my presence. And it's not even a real word.

04:04 / 12.09.04

Hello ? As in " are you sure about that ? " as in, hearing what's otherwise a perfectly reasonable term used that way makes me want to go " postal, " again a word that conjures up that special feeling of an ice-cold insect crawling up the back of your neck. There's something uniquely bloody awful about Buffy-isms outside the context of the show, especially out the mouths of Brits.

Also sad as in " you are, " get a life and No, I've got a boyfriend - the most innocuous phrases can get a bit wearing if you hear them often enough.

06:22 / 12.09.04

I'm hating my thread. Already.

01:17 / 13.09.04

Given that I've just been through two hurricanes and possibly a third this week, I've grown intensely hateful toward the phrase "hunker down."

Every five minutes on the damn tv or in overheard conversations. Damn it! Damn it all to hell! Hunker this you sonsofbitches!

A Haus of Minions
(prev. Jenna Elfman's Hollywood Haus)

01:32 / 13.09.04

Going forward

What exactly the bollocks is wrong with the far more accurate in the future or from now on?

02:34 / 13.09.04

I'm hating my thread. Already.

Your bad.

nedrichards is confused

09:31 / 13.09.04

Synergy, an unparalleled shortcut to wankerhood.

14:21 / 13.09.04

I really hate More-ish as well. And anyone who makes rhyming slang up - saying things like 'lady godiva' for a five pound note - hoxtonite cock-knockers the lot of 'em.

Used to work with a woman who hated the words 'moist' and 'tunic' so would slip them into as many emails and conversations to and with her as possible.

Moist seems to be a word that several ladies I know dislike, a friend of mine hates it also.

A Haus of Minions
(prev. Jenna Elfman's Hollywood Haus)

14:23 / 13.09.04

The only way to deal with "synergy" is to pretend that you have misheard it as "zymurgy", and see how long you can carry on the conversation before everyone else notices.

Hattie's Kitchen

14:34 / 13.09.04

Oriented.

It's OrienTATED, you lazy bastards.

15:43 / 13.09.04

Just "tinfoil" in the abstract is a brilliant touch. Eeeee.

16:00 / 13.09.04

I've mentioned this before, but, "Adaption". I think it might be a word in German, but my worst grammatical nightmare is that it catches on to the point where it starts showing up in dictionaries.

Ooh, and using quotation marks as emphasis "shits" me something chronic.

16:06 / 13.09.04

It's OrienTATED, you lazy bastards.

Except that, um, you know, it's not.

You must be the Bizarro me, because "orientated" is itself one of the words that sets my teeth on edge. Except that I've actually got etymology and common sense on my side to justify my bias.

"Orientate" is derived from "orient," and means exactly the same thing. But it's clearly a variant.

In fact it's an exceedingly stupid and spurious back-formation from the noun "orientation," and as such I am frankly appalled by its acceptance in common usage and by its presence in any reputable dictionary without any caveats.

I mean, you wouldn't say "presentated," would you? Or "informated"?

No. And neither should you say "orientated."

16:09 / 13.09.04

I think that's a trans-Atlantic thing, isn't it?

Hattie's Kitchen

16:20 / 13.09.04

Fair point Mr Fear, but indeed it is a Transatlantic variation that riles me in the same way that "aluminium is pronounced "aloominum on your side of the pond. The lovely Huw Edwards of the BBC would never say "oriented".

16:23 / 13.09.04

I think there are occasions when it's OK, aren't there? 'I can't quite orientate myself in this setting' vs 'I can't quite orient myself in this setting'. 'I feel very disoriented' vs 'I feel very disorientated'... in both those instances the 'orientate' version feels more 'right' to me than the other...

16:30 / 13.09.04

Well, you may chracterizate it as "feeling right," but that's a slippery way to justificate it. Language, of course, must adaptate or die—we cannot specificate usage out of some misguided attempt to purificate the tongue—but you must realizate that such irregularities, if not limitated, can lead to a breakdown in understanding. N'est-ce pas?

16:37 / 13.09.04

Depends to a certain extent how widely spread they already are in common usage, really - and since 'orientate' and versions are already commonplace over here, and readily comprehensible to many, it's too late to do anything other than fulminate.

I am sure there are many neologisms, back-formations, etc. which are more disgusting, after all...

Vincennes: Bringing Sassy Back

16:41 / 13.09.04

Advise to mean inform, so that notices read (for example) 'We would like to advise the public that pissing off this bridge will result in electrocution and possibly death' rather than 'Pissing off this bridge will result in electrocution and possibly death: we would advise you not to do it'.

I am pretty much alone in this one, since it's a perfectly legitimate use of the word. At least, my old history teacher thought so when he ditched about half an hour of lecture on the Weimer Republic to get a dictionary and make sure I knew I was wrong.

Also - being called a 'customer' and not a 'passenger' while on trains. It makes me feel as though I'm being mocked for choosing that particular train company, and they're telling me it's my fault that I've been waiting somewhere outside Darlington for the past 3/4 of an hour.

16:43 / 13.09.04

I am sure there are many neologisms, back-formations, etc. which are more disgusting, after all...

True. But it's a personal peeve of mine, and the smug certainty of HK's post, with no absolute authority to back it up, kind of irritated me.

Aluminum vs. Aluminium—blame Noah Webster for that one: he was a notorious advocate of "simplified" spelling, and, believing the role of lexicographer included advocacy as well as mere reportage, slipped that one through, along with a number of others. "Aluminum" stuck: "soop" for "soup" didn't.

I'll concede that the British "aluminium" is more correct—but judged so using the same criterion by which "orientate" is less correct—that is, it conforms to a pre-existing pattern of usage (calcium, magnesium, et cetera), which "orientate" fails to do.

Dropping this now.

16:45 / 13.09.04

Speaking of changes in usage that became accepted, when the fuck did "I couldn't care less" become "I could care less"? Doesn't that mean the opposite?! I feel like I'm missing something but I can't see it ...

DRR... DRR... DRR...

16:59 / 13.09.04

"Momentarily" to mean "in a moment." It may be correct but it's WRONG WRONG WRONG!

17:00 / 13.09.04

Urban used to mean black. That pisses me off so much, if you mean black say black for fucks sake. How is hip-hop any more urban than rock and roll or even opera for that matter (last time I checked very few villages had symphony orchestras). Garrrgh.

Goodness Gracious Meme

17:20 / 13.09.04

urghhh. well said. can't bear that.

see also MTVBase, or more accurately MTVBlackmusic. argh.

17:50 / 13.09.04

I don't like people pretentiously using French loanwords for "high society" matters, as though Anglo-Saxon equivalents would just be too barbaric. Like haute and de rigueur.

Y'all realize this thread is just begging for a Creation project using all the hated words...

Tryphena Absent

18:13 / 13.09.04

ROFLOLMAO!!!!!1!!!!one!!!!

that's not SMS, that's Internet. Blame mIRC. Blame Microsoft.

18:36 / 13.09.04

PENAL - Urrgh! A proper tinfoil reaction, this one. Causes instant, almost physical repulsion. Images of cocks, institutions and toilets. Imagine being forced to spend long hours hanging around a prison exercise yard on a cold, damp October afternoon with your knob hanging out. Grurgh.

PENILE - Even worse! Sweaty dog's cocks, or tubes of spongy pink meat saturated with clear, yellowish fluid, like the oily spam fritters we had to eat at school. Or wires being drawn - a fine sinew being pulled through a withered pizzle. Yuck.

INTERLOCUTOR A frustrating word, there's nothing to get your teeth into, no fat section, no climax. Each syllable is a half inflated bin bag. You get to the end of it with your lungs bursting to exhale but they're still only half full.

19:14 / 13.09.04

What about pianist?

Stop saying tinfoil! Augh, I said it!

19:16 / 13.09.04

Radix hates the words tasty and juicy, for some reason.

Who Is Grumpy-Pants, Anyway?

19:42 / 13.09.04

Hate to get all autobiographical, but...
Sharp scratch!
Nurses say this when they give you an injection. Every time. I suppose it's preferable to 'Just a little prick', but on the 35th occasion it gets... a little... wearing...

19:46 / 13.09.04

Loomis, thank you. I've always thought the same thing. "I could care less" would imply that you actually do care. So why do people use it to mean the opposite?

19:47 / 13.09.04

Oh, and "panties" always makes me want to run screaming off into the distance.

23:32 / 13.09.04

My boss won't stop saying irregardless. Aluminium and orientate sound and look awful, from over here (Los Angeles). Orientate is particularly bad since it sounds as though it's an attempt to dress up the otherwise perfectly fine orient.

00:16 / 14.09.04

As Sax says, orientate/orient has become a transatlantic thang, with the back-formation version far more common over here. To me, 'orient' looks wrong simply because I'm used to 'orientate', but it's not one of my prime filling-tinglers. 'Aluminum', on the other hand...

Oh yeah, and while we're on the subject of Americanisms

herbs
The 'h' is not a toy.

tightie whities
Gnaaargh! Worse than 'knickers'; worse than 'panties'.

Agree with Fridge on 'chemical imbalance' (because it's a crappy pseudoscientific way of saying nothing at all). File alongside

psychotic
When used to mean psychopathic. Jonathan Porritt did this on Any Questions, making me want to hurl the radio at the cat.

energy
In the 'I am channelling positive healing energy into your fractured spine' sense.

And some more broadly Barbe-flavoured ones:

fuck shit up
For extra Tinfoil, be sure to extract all traces of Selfawaria.

Dizzee Rascal
Nothing at all against the man or his music - but 'dizzy' is, for me, uncomfortable close to 'ditsy' (even without the wackaday spelling); and 'rascal' is what old ladies call their dogs. I just can't get past the name.

sheeple
Bah.

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