Wednesday, April 28, 2004
Top Five Annoying Sayings
More negativity, but here goes. There are certain expressions that people use that make my skin crawl. Here are the five greatest offenses, unless you can think of others that can trump these verbal sins. This list can be considered as a sub-list of the previous list "Top Five Things People Do When Talking That Piss Me Off." This list is more specific. It can only include rote, specific phrases or sayings.
5. "What can I do you for?" I think some people say this without irony, thinking it's a folksy way of talking. Taking this into consideration, this expression stays at #5, despite being a double-entendre that was lame even in third grade.
4. Insead of saying "What did you say" on two, yes TWO, separate occasions two different Iowans said to me, "Twat? I cunt hear you. I have an ear infucktion. My dicktor gave me some penisillin." This does not speak well for Iowa. I mean seriously, a simple "What? You're mumbling," would have sufficed.
3. "If you don't like the weather around here, wait five minutes. It will change." This is the quote that inspired this whole list. As mentioned on Rachel's blog, we are going through some weather extremes here in Minnesota. And as I already mentioned I have heard this "If you don't like the weather" quote in Minnesota, Colorado, Texas, and Iowa. These proclomations are said with pride, as if it's some unqiue fact about the state. But the fact of the matter is, very few regions in this country are free of dramatic climate shifts. The Sonora desert is about as close as it gets, as far as I know.
2. "Exsqueeze me?" Not really used anymore, but it was damn annoying. Annoying enough to make it #2, over a decade after Wayne's World hit the silver screen. And it is at #2 because it represents one of my all-tme annoyances: movie/TV show quotes that make it into American vernacular. The Honorable Mention list (below) includes other such examples. I chose "Exsqueeze me?" mostly because it was the first time this overuse of a pop culture phrase really annoyed me. But it doesn't me as much as...
1. "Smell you later." Criminal. If you come across a person who uses this without irony, and truly thinks it's clever, consider it a warning sign. Maybe I'm a snob here, but seriously, stay away. "Smell you later." Cripes. It makes me cringe just to type it.
Honorable Mention:
-Is that your final answer?
-You're fired.
-Shwing! (another Wayne's World reference)
-"Beep beep!!" as a substitute for saying "excuse me" or, depending on the speaker, "get the fuck out of my way."
-Not that there's anything wrong with it. (Seinfield)
