she's just saying...

phraseology

 Happy Monday. Feels like a good time for a grammar rant.

Here's a few new favorite phrases I've been collecting:

"Personal Watermelon" - as promoted by my local Safeway. 'Cause I don't share my watermelon with nobody.

"Artisan Cocktails" - from an ad for a bar in (of course) Portland, Oregon, though I hear it's a national trend. This is what those medieval craftsmen were aiming for, ultimately: artfully hand-crafted alcoholic beverages.

"Glamping" - this is not a medical emergency; it's a portmanteau of "glamour" and "camping." Seriously. Check this out.

 

And some words that I wish people would look up before they use them to sound edumacated:

Blase - this does not mean "blah." Look it up.

Penultimate - the second to highest, most, best; not the highest most best itself.

Mute point - it's moot, not mute. MOOT.

 

Okay, got that off my mind. What are yours?

 

Revealed! The origins of this blog title

OK, moving on. More on Bindy Sue or Cindy Lou or Windy Poo later.

I'm guessing some of you heard Scott Simon's diatribe on NPR's Weekend Edition this morning about the phrase "I'm just saying." I didn't take it personally. In fact, the reason this blog is similarly named (aside from the fact that someone else owned "I'm just saying") stems from my own comments about the phrase some years ago.

An acquaintance made some homophobic comments to me about my boyfriend at the time (seriously?) and ended his speculation with "I'm just saying... ." I was relating the story to said boyfriend and went off on a rant about the phrase and its use, somehow ending up referring to Nazi sympathizers in wartime Germany  (there might have been some wine involved). It turned into a running joke between us and seemed like the right kind of ironic, tongue-in-cheek title for the new blog I was starting.

Still, I think Mr. Simon might have gone off a bit himself when he called the phrase "snide, snarky and insincere." Sheesh. He had just been tasting a bunch of port in the previous segment, so maybe he was under the influence himself. Whatever*.

 

*Another snide, snarky and insincere expression IMO. And I'll bet you thought I was going to end this post with I'm just saying...

A completely-sincere Scott Simon, revealed.

Retronyms

No more canning recipes, I promise. This is more of an amuse-bouche. 'Cause we love that stuff.

I stole this from Schott's Vocab Blog:

Free Parking, Fresh Air and Other Retronyms

"Retronyms?

Yes, retronyms – terms that have been created to clarify an existing word rendered ambiguous by evolutions in technology or social practice.

For example, the term “acoustic guitar” was only coined when the electric guitar was invented, similarly “free parking” only emerged when car-parks and parking meters were introduced.

“Black and white photography” would have been a bizarre tautology until color film, and if you had said “free range eggs” two hundred years ago, you would have been stared at.

Other retronyms include: unsafe sex, fresh air, dial-up Internet … you get the idea."

So, Schott asked his readers to send in theirs. His winners:

"All who participated will be sent whole milk by snail mail, but the following will also receive organic (heirloom) vegetables":

“Paper money.”

“Genuine leather.” 

“Natural flavor.”

“Straight marriage.” 

“Landline phones.” 

“Hairy legs.” 

“Paper edition (for newspapers).”

"Brick-and-mortar company, hand crafted."

"Dumb phone" (As in: I have a dumb phone – it only makes phone calls.)

“Birth mother.”

“Propeller planes, silent movies, conventional weapons, natural grass.”

 

So, readers? Add your own - you can beat the NYT folks fo' sho'!

Weeknight Caesar

One of my go-to meals is Caesar Salad.

(BTW, it's one of my pet irritations to see Caesar spelled wrong on menus. So annoying.)

I've made CS since I was in college and it's always a hit. It's a 10-minute recipe, perfect for the casual-but-impressive spontaneous entertainment meal you want to be known for. So, in the spirit of giving back to my wonderful supportive readers, I'm sharing it here.

(This is actually the classic Caesar recipe - I just explain how to cut corners and make it quick.)

Quick-but-Authentic Caesar Salad

all amounts are approximate - adjust to your taste

• 3-4 anchovies, smashed, or 2 tsp anchovy paste
• 1 coddled egg (see note below)
• 2 tsp Worcestershire sauce
• 1/2 cup olive oil
• juice of 1/2 lemon (or more - I like a lot of lemon)
• 1/2 tsp dijon mustard
• 1tbsp garlic (I use jarred minced)
• salt and pepper

• head of romaine, ripped into bite-size pieces
• 1/2 cup grated parmesan
• croutons (optional)

Place first eight ingredients into a jar and shake hard. Pour over lettuce, add cheese and croutons. Serve with more salt/pepper. Done!

You can top with chicken, shrimp or salmon. 

Note: to coddle an egg: tuck it into bed with a blankie and a cup of tea. Or alternately, boil it for about a minute. When you crack it open, it should be just starting to emulsify - you'll need to mash up the whites a little. If you don't like to eat raw eggs, you could chop a soft-boiled egg, but it won't be the same. Can't help you here.

Note #2: We keep a mouli grater pre-loaded with parmesan in the fridge in a plastic bag. It's always ready to go for fresh grated parmesan.

Family memory: When Doctor Sister was pregnant and living in Princeton and I was in NYC, she'd beg me to come down on the train on the weekend to make Caesar salad to satisfy her anchovy craving. Funny.

Weird Words of the Week

(And it's only Thursday)

Freemium: heard in a business meeting: "Are you giving out anything to get people to join the club?" "Oh, a freemium? We will be doing a sweepstakes..."

Prizing: as in "...an exciting demo weekend of activities, events, the celebration of golf and plenty of additional prizing."

Lotionized: (see bottom of can)

Pity the poor apostrophe

At the Museum, we hold a day for kids once a year (though really, every day is for kids). We've been having a little debate about the proper punctuation of that day, in particular, where (if at all) to insert the apostrophe. (OK, we're nerds. We work at a museum -- what do you expect?)

I finally gave up and banned the apostrophe from the day altogether, but it kept sneaking back. We managed to print it three different ways, depending on who was writing the blurb, sign or article. Here are our varied approaches:

Kid's Day (a day owned by a kid, or as we put it: "It's your day!" )

Kids' Day (a day owned by lots of kids: plural possessive for you grammar wonks)

Kids Day (a day about kids, kind of like Reptiles Day. We Celebrate the Reptile, but they don't own the day.)

There's actually a movement out there to kill the apostrophe. The website's writer goes on about how it takes too much time and money and it's snobby or something. While writing this post, I also ran across a website for apostrophe catastrophes (extra points for the cute name) that's guaranteed to increase your blood pressure if you care about these things.

I've been keeping a collection of flyers, letters and notices from Henry's school that contain misused apostrophes, mostly so I can rail on about how public education is going to hell and how our taxpayer dollars are going to punctuation abuse. It's shocking. I mean, c'mon, teachers and education administrators getting it wrong? Shouldn't there be a grammar test before you can teach school?

Or maybe it is an archaic custom. Maybe we should just kill the squiggly little nuisance. But I think I'd miss it.

Phrases I'll ban when I'm Queen

This is officially a Friday Frylet, as it's Friday.

This week's phrase: "Game changer" 

GAACK! I HATE this phrase. Everything's suddenly a game changer this year. Who started it? There are books, blog posts, editorials and pedantic pundits who are now calling anything new a "game changer." Quit it!

In my opinion, this is the only thing that can be called a Game Changer:

Yes, that's a doggy remote-control holder, available here.

And Kathi D: they didn't make a Sheltie version.

Grammar rant: verbs that aren't

I know you're all waiting breathlessly for a sock post, but in the meantime, allow me to complain.

There are some nouns that just shouldn't try to be verbs. Some have slipped in and are now accepted, but we have to draw the line somewhere. (For example, to table something seems to be legit. But you wouldn't desk something. Yet.)

Top of my list is "journal," i.e. to journal. Just typing that makes me itchy. I see wall hangings, a scented candle, new age music in the background and someone writing endlessly about nothing. (Unlike to blog which is perfectly acceptable.)

MyBigBro mentioned one he doesn't like: to gift. Actually I think there's a nuance there versus "to give," but I can't put my finger on it.

How about to parent? I don't know how to parent. I do know how to nag, cuddle, nurture, lecture, feed, support and yell a lot, though.

I can accept to medal and to impact. After all, I'm in advertising, where we concept regularly. To concept an ad is not really anything like conceiving. It's less physical, for one thing.Of course, we also wordsmith a lot.

And then there's dialoguing. This kind of fits with the crowd who journal and parent.

This brings up the old story about xeroxing stuff with a small x, but that one has kind of escaped Xerox's control. But I think Google likes the verb to google - I would if I were them.

When we worked on cell phones, Sony-Ericsson was attempting to verbify their logo, as follows:

as Logoblink.com shows it.

(I can't remember what they called that - the orb? the sphere? ) It was awkward.

As for me, I think verbing certain nouns garbages up the language. Really. So let's refusal it.

Another random grammar rant - local dog version

Our local cable company has a pretty good reputation for customer service and innovative technologies. What they seem to be lacking is a sixth-grade grammar education.

Bend has the reputed highest per-capita dog ownership in the state, most of which are black labs, and they're smart and fast and loyal etc. so I get the visual and have no quibble with that.

However, though this will once again label me a grammar prude, the tagline bugs the heck out of me. "We better be good." It's just wrong. "We'd better be good" is the correct usage here. I know, I know, it's ad-speak, informal, colloquialism, etc. but it grates on me every time I see or hear it.

Of course, this time of year whenever I see that particular tagline I tend to follow it up with "We'd better not cry, we'd better not pout." And I'm telling you why.

Wordy Wednesday

UPDATE: All's fine with the eye. It's not completely where it should be yet, so we're in the "watchful waiting" mode. Surgery went well - I was awake the whole time which was freaky. Actually, due to the sleepy meds, I experienced a bunch of waking dreams, of which I only remember one which involved cleaning out my refrigerator.

Anyway, wordy Wed: I don't have time to write a whole post, so thought I'd focus on some misused words that bug me. Today's:

Penultimate.

Some folks like to show off their vocabulary by using this to mean the "most ultimate," which is incorrect and actually causes them to look dumb and pretentious. Penultimate means "next to last." That's all it means.

OK, back to work.

grammar peeve of the month

I'm hearing this one all the time these days. For some reason it really bugs me, so I will elucidate.

Who versus that

Use who when you are talking about a person and that when you are talking about an object.

Example:

She's the blogger that thinks she's so smart.  Incorrect.

She's the blogger who thinks she's so smart.  Correct.

Top Ten Tuesday: phrases III

Current catchphrases that annoy me:

1. It's all good.
2. Not so much.
3. It is what it is.
4. For reals.
5. Good times.
6. No worries.
7. Chillaxin'
8. Cool beans!
9. My bad.
10. Woot!

And all that inane Life is Good crap stuff...

 

What are yours?

T.T.T: Workphrase edition

Phrases I use a lot at work.
After 20+ years in advertising, I've picked up a number of catch phrases that come in handy, or at least I seem to say a lot. These can actually be useful, as opposed to the bizarre biz-speak I wrote about here.

1.    Let’s not fix it in the room
This is a classic ad agency line that’s useful when a client/boss/colleague wants something changed in a piece of copy or concept, and everyone starts to throw out suggestions right there in the meeting.  It means “let us go away and work on it and we’ll come back with an alternative.”

2.    Give it the overnight test
Sleep on it and come back with your thoughts tomorrow.

3.    Reach x frequency
Not a catch phrase as much as a useful concept. This is the basic media measurement of how well you're communicating. Reach means what percent of your target is receiving your message and frequency means how many times they get it. The balance of the two is the art of media, and communication. (Shout-out to KG here.)

4.    Off strategy
Only once you’ve identified what you want to accomplish with a marketing effort can you then judge the creative. No matter how clever/funny/original an idea is, if it doesn’t meet your objective, it’s off strategy. You’ll see people trying to retro-fit the strategy to the cool idea, but it’s not good marketing.

5.    Mother-in-law research
When a client or colleague takes the idea home and gets a random opinion of it. This is not the optimal way to test creative. Also known as “secretary research” back when they existed.

6.    Fast/cheap/good
Pick two of the three. That's all you get.

7.    Share of stomach
Like market share, but on an individual consumption basis. Originally only applicable to food products, but I have used it instead of "mind share" which sounds too brainwashy.

8.    Need-to-know vs. nice-to-know
When I design a research survey, clients often want to throw in all kinds of questions on the theory that “If we’re going to ask them this, let’s find out that.” That’s fine if you have all the time in the world to ask questions, but respondents burn out after 3-5 minutes max. So we need to identify the need-to-know questions versus the nice-to-know stuff. Not that easy.

9.    Sick Demo Well
This is an advertising formula that describes 50% of the commercials out there. Something is wrong, the product is introduced with a demonstration of how it works, then everything’s all better.  Cold medicine, motor oil, chainsaws, airlines, you name it; it’s sold via this formula, 'cause it tends to work, and it's easy.

10.    Let’s take a step back
This is my go-to phrase for any crisis or tortured/detailed/panicked plan. In other words, let’s identify what it is we’re trying to accomplish before we launch into random action. It’s a great phrase that calms the room and puts things into a workable perspective.

And the Lucky Strike Extra (another old ad phrase):

11.     “Got a minute?”
This is never a good question. It’s usually followed by the layoff conversation, so when you hear it, say no, you’re too busy doing crucial stuff that will save the account.  I speak from experience.