What's your least favorite word or phrase?

Candie wrote: »

Moist is just about as ugly a word as a word can be, but it has serious competition in the word gusset.

I, personally, think “context” is important with words like that, C. I mean, gusset isn’t great at the best of times but it’s really more down to how it’s used.

I mean, take the word damp, for example. It’s a, normal enough, word. You could say something like ‘this bench is damp’ or ‘these clothes are still damp’. Ordinary, like.

But, one day, someone puts a use to it that just stops you in your tracks and sends a shiver down your spine. That is happened to me when I was getting, you know, “intimate” with a Wexford lass.

Things were progressing nicely until she whispered in her, throaty, Wexford drawl ‘oh, that has gotten me damp’.

Instant horn killer. But, don’t fret, like Lazarus he rose again and, after a bit of “composure” was regained, the job was done but, still, it really ruined the word for me. Ruined it.

Staycation
Pottering
Using 'super' as a verb
Actually any Americanisms that have crept in
Awesome
Online rowing if someone is 'woke' or a 'snowflake' etc

I'll think of more later!

iamwhoiam wrote: »

I absolutely hate the phrase “ We are pregnant “ spoken by a man
No , she is pregnant he is expecting a baby .

I have literally never heard any man say that



Overuse of the word literally is very annoying

If someone uses the word "like" in every sentence and the phrase "reaching out"

.anon. wrote: »

She was talking about her clunge, wasn't she?

Yep. Lot of bush too, wasn’t prepared for that but it was very late in the “game” and I’d already weathered one speed bump. Was all good fun.

On television no one goes to a restaurant. It has to be that " new Italian place"

Edgware wrote: »

Usually awarded by the food critic of the local free rag in the Best Boiled Egg category

Multi Award Winning... local rag plus a mention in local free ads paper.

Stevieluvsye wrote: »

Discharge is another beaut of a word

Yes, I agree.

Especially as we are hear it more and more in relation to America police officers “discharging” their weapons at peaceful demonstrations over there.

It has become such an ugly word.

corner of hells wrote: »

"Homeless Activist" , normally a clown wandering about wearing a high viz jacket .

"Activist" in general.
Once they were notables like Ghandi, Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks etc.
Now they're a shouty assortment of crusties, third wave feminists with purple hair and the unemployable.

hurleronditch wrote: »

Exactly.
In corporate speak you would often hear something like “First of all Mary is going to summarise the financial performance over the last 12 months, and then Anne will speak to the strategic cost reduction program for the remainder of this year”

I know it may be accepted now as grammatically correct but it just wrecks my head. Just use about.

How on earth can it be grammatically correct? It's using the wrong preposition. It makes as much sense as saying 'speak from' or 'speak at'. You speak 'to' someone 'about' something. It isn't interchangeable. When grammar starts getting hazy so does meaning generally. It's a sign of the times, I think.

Sentences with a quantity of interstitial "You knows?"

No, I don't know.

This mania started in the sixties, and continued relentlessly.

‘I fell pregnant’

"The narrative " I'm seeing this literally everywhere these days. Everyone talking about "The narrative "

tuisginideach wrote: »

‘I fell pregnant’

He fell out of love with the girl who fell pregnant.