Warning: the following breaking news might make English language purists weep. Read on at your own risk and hang on to your Roget's.
The Oxford English Dictionary -- the dictionary of all dictionaries -- has decided to include LOL and OMG in its next on-line edition.
Wait, there's more. "Wassup" is also among the new entries. I saved it for last since it might push the "Stop Language Alterations and Atrocities" groups over the edge. I know I'm teetering.
Perhaps Noah Webster's rolling over in his grave, but I think if he were around today he'd be one happy lexicographer -- and possibly a texter. I'd like to think he'd bookmark the Urban Dictionary. There's an abundance of colorful, descriptive words being coined and infused into every day conversation. No one could ever accuse spoken English of being a dull, dry language. Of course, there are the French who'd rather not have their native tongue tainted with words like Levi's or Google, but that's a discussion for another day.
I don't know wassup with the OED or what criteria they use. But, oh my god, these entries make me laugh out loud.
Saturday, March 26, 2011
Saturday, March 19, 2011
Visit California -- While You Can
Living in earthquake country is an every day gamble. You never know where those seismic dice will land. At least when you park your tush in Vegas you have some idea of the odds, and you get free booze. Here seismologists predict "the big one" -- that's when Nevadans will inherit beach front property since most of California will have fallen into the Pacific -- sometime in the next 30-100 years.
Could they be a tad more specific? Apparently not. They know why earthquakes happen. Just not when.
However, there's a maverick geologist making the rounds on the local news who claims we'll have an earthquake here in the next eight days. He's basing his prediction on various scientific pre-quake indicators -- some of which, like the beaching of dead whales along the coast, have not yet occurred. This is the part where you keep your fingers crossed and don't read anything too biblical into unusual phenomena like thousands of dead fish in a Southern California harbor.
Do I believe him or not? Does he know something other seismologists don't? It's like anyone telling your future or reading your horoscope. You want to believe the good bits but pooh pooh the bad. Only in the case of an earthquake there are no good bits. Unlike Carol King, I'd rather not feel the earth move under my feet.
I think it just makes people more anxious than they already are. We're already sitting in the path of a possible radiation plume and the stores are out of whatever iodine capsules we're supposed to be taking as an antidote. Was that a passing truck shaking the windows or.....?
Whether the guy is right or wrong, I am motivated to replenish my survival kit. The canned tuna is beyond its shelf life and I ate the chocolate in a bout of depression over the holidays.
Could they be a tad more specific? Apparently not. They know why earthquakes happen. Just not when.
However, there's a maverick geologist making the rounds on the local news who claims we'll have an earthquake here in the next eight days. He's basing his prediction on various scientific pre-quake indicators -- some of which, like the beaching of dead whales along the coast, have not yet occurred. This is the part where you keep your fingers crossed and don't read anything too biblical into unusual phenomena like thousands of dead fish in a Southern California harbor.
Do I believe him or not? Does he know something other seismologists don't? It's like anyone telling your future or reading your horoscope. You want to believe the good bits but pooh pooh the bad. Only in the case of an earthquake there are no good bits. Unlike Carol King, I'd rather not feel the earth move under my feet.
I think it just makes people more anxious than they already are. We're already sitting in the path of a possible radiation plume and the stores are out of whatever iodine capsules we're supposed to be taking as an antidote. Was that a passing truck shaking the windows or.....?
Whether the guy is right or wrong, I am motivated to replenish my survival kit. The canned tuna is beyond its shelf life and I ate the chocolate in a bout of depression over the holidays.
Sunday, March 13, 2011
Where Everybody Knows Your Name
Did you remember to change your clocks last night? It's fascinating how we can alter time with a mere spin of the hour hand. A reminder just how arbitrary time is. We all agree it's two o'clock and swoosh, we all agree it's three.
Last night it was just an hour. Every four years we add an entire day to the calendar.
If we can so easily mess with time, then why are we so hung up on age? Some of us hesitate to tell the truth. Others pick a particularly good year and stick with it. And the adage "sixty is the new forty" has become a mantra. Frankly, I'm not at all sure what that means. Why can't sixty just be the new sixty? After all, we're not the same sixty our parents were.
I'll be turning sixty-five soon and I plan to celebrate. But check back with me in a few months when the day actually arrives. You might just find me under the covers curled up in a sixty-five year old ball -- reading the heaps of Medicare brochures I'm currently receiving in the mail.
How do these insurance companies know my name, address and birth date? Is there a national soon-to-be-geezer roster? If so, I want to be on the "do not mail" list.
Last night it was just an hour. Every four years we add an entire day to the calendar.
If we can so easily mess with time, then why are we so hung up on age? Some of us hesitate to tell the truth. Others pick a particularly good year and stick with it. And the adage "sixty is the new forty" has become a mantra. Frankly, I'm not at all sure what that means. Why can't sixty just be the new sixty? After all, we're not the same sixty our parents were.
I'll be turning sixty-five soon and I plan to celebrate. But check back with me in a few months when the day actually arrives. You might just find me under the covers curled up in a sixty-five year old ball -- reading the heaps of Medicare brochures I'm currently receiving in the mail.
How do these insurance companies know my name, address and birth date? Is there a national soon-to-be-geezer roster? If so, I want to be on the "do not mail" list.
Saturday, March 5, 2011
Take Two of These and...
You don't actually have to work on Madison Avenue to know that an advertiser places commercials where they will be seen by the proper demographic. Beer during a sporting event. Sugar laced cereals during Saturday morning cartoons. Just about any kind of prescription drugs during the network evening news.
Have you watched any of the three major networks news broadcasts recently? If not you're missing out on a litany of remedies to lower your cholesterol, keep your heart healthy, have great sex -- well maybe just sex, period -- and a laundry list of other ailments frequently associated with older adults, including gout. With all due respect to those who suffer from it, I thought gout ended with the Victorians.
They all begin with a grey haired actor complaining of some malfunctioning body part. Scene Two: they talk to their doctor about this miracle drug. Scene Three: grey haired actor romps with the grandchildren, wins at tennis, or flirts with their partner -- and we know where that leads.
I need to know -- have you ever asked your doctor about a drug you've seen in a commercial? Show of hands, please. Used to be the doc would just hand you a prescription and command you to pop a few pills daily. Now you can be pro-active with your meds all because of some advertising creative team whose combined ages don't yet match ours.
Do these children think we obsess about ailing health? That we're just one walking mass of pain? We may no longer be able to kick like a Rockette, but we're not ready for bucket kicking either.
Have you watched any of the three major networks news broadcasts recently? If not you're missing out on a litany of remedies to lower your cholesterol, keep your heart healthy, have great sex -- well maybe just sex, period -- and a laundry list of other ailments frequently associated with older adults, including gout. With all due respect to those who suffer from it, I thought gout ended with the Victorians.
They all begin with a grey haired actor complaining of some malfunctioning body part. Scene Two: they talk to their doctor about this miracle drug. Scene Three: grey haired actor romps with the grandchildren, wins at tennis, or flirts with their partner -- and we know where that leads.
I need to know -- have you ever asked your doctor about a drug you've seen in a commercial? Show of hands, please. Used to be the doc would just hand you a prescription and command you to pop a few pills daily. Now you can be pro-active with your meds all because of some advertising creative team whose combined ages don't yet match ours.
Do these children think we obsess about ailing health? That we're just one walking mass of pain? We may no longer be able to kick like a Rockette, but we're not ready for bucket kicking either.
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