Viewing 40 posts - 81 through 120 (of 252 total)
  • Words which grate against the very fabric of your soul
  • TandemJeremy
    Free Member

    Americanisms for me – especially in MTBing. We don't have fire roads in this country. A switchback goes up and down – it is not a series of hairpins.

    In use all the time on here and just wrong.

    stuartie_c
    Free Member

    The "Charlie Nicholas"

    A grammatical solecism which may or may not be peculiar to Scottish football pundits is the omission of the letters "l" and "y" from the end of their limited repertoire of adverbs.

    Some examples:

    "Aye, the boy's played brilliant today."

    "He's ran in there quick and boof! ball in the back of the net!"

    molgrips
    Free Member

    In use all the time on here and just wrong.

    Says who?

    Fresh Goods Friday 696: The Middling Edition

    Fresh Goods Friday 696: The Middlin...
    Latest Singletrack Videos
    molgrips
    Free Member

    Totally stoked (Like a steam engine?)

    Another frigging metaphor you thick sod.

    scaredypants
    Full Member

    don't really make me cross, but noticeable and much overused

    words & phrases off of here:
    hive-mind
    darkside
    boils my piss (although "… and when I piss, it stings .." always made me smile)

    Politics (mostly):
    refute (does not mean deny)

    everyday life:
    simples, bovvered – because theyre kack catch-phrases from the telly
    (most other "bruv" type crap, I give the benefit of the doubt & assume it's tongue in cheek)

    (oh, yeh – "off of". Admit it, you were already composing a reply)

    mcmoonter
    Free Member

    Uni

    Onzadog
    Free Member

    Molgrips, I realise realtime has a technical basis and used in that context it's fine. What grates is the characters asking for real time update. My point being, when you're chasing terrorists, who's going to give you updates 30 minutes after the event? Everyone in that situation would know that you need the information as it happens.

    "I need real time updates"
    "really? Because I was just going to sit on the intel while I went to lunch. I thought 'one hour after' time would be good enough."

    deadlydarcy
    Free Member

    The collective that is the English speaking world will always keep an open mind to new words, phrases and uses thereof, and will chew on each if them for a few years. Most get spat out and disappear into obscurity. Some, however will remain to annoy pedants the world over.

    I love splitting infinitives. I like to occasionally finish sentences with a preposition. All these things were frowned upon once. 🙂

    Zoolander
    Free Member

    Lush . Even typing it makes me mad!
    Gorge' ( as in gorgeous not the geographical term)
    And anything that's written or spoken in txt spk.

    TandemJeremy
    Free Member

    Molgrips – a fire road is a track built into the forest to allow fire engines to get in in case of forest fires – its something they have in north America and not here

    We have forestry roads or estate roads or whatever. We don't have fire roads and a switchback is correct English usage for a road that goes up and down not hairpins. Google switchback road bearsden for an example

    Check your dictionary or encyclopedia

    deadlydarcy
    Free Member

    ZL, u typd tht post rlly wl m8 🙂

    grumm
    Free Member

    Some of this is pretty silly – as dd pointed out the English language is constantly evolving and the concept of a single 'correct' language is a fairly recent one. Shakespeare for instance invented loads of new words and phrases – if only there had been internet forums around for people to whine about it at the time eh?

    Innit.

    deadlydarcy
    Free Member

    I reckon "switchback" itself is a fairly "new" word and probably pissed any number of plank-up-the-back-of-their-shirts pedants at some stage.

    Lighten up.

    stanfree
    Free Member

    Glasgow Rangers

    And or

    Glasgow celtic…

    deadlydarcy
    Free Member

    Funny you should mention the bard grum…

    The spelling we all insist upon is the one he never actually used. 🙂

    Colin-T
    Full Member

    The noise, for I shan't use the term word to describe it, "blogosphere" was used today during the news on Radio 4. I almost cried.

    deadlydarcy
    Free Member

    Fancy people coining words for that which has no word to describe it. 🙄

    Burls72
    Free Member

    "I want you to give it 110%". I know it's not a word but the saying drives me mad. How can you give it more than 100%? Always saying it on shows like x-factor, "You've really got to up your game this time and give it 110%" boils my blood!

    Norton
    Free Member

    "I'm liking that" – what wrong with I like that ?
    "Steed"
    "Singletrack weapon" – its a bicycle ffs
    'Tis or 'Twas – you are not a pirate
    "Quiver" – unspeakable

    Spaceman
    Free Member

    Health and Safety.

    Average speed check.

    'Pulls up chair' is one used on here all the time that makes me want to cyber chib the fecker using it!

    Colin-T
    Full Member

    Dealdlydarcy, fair point. This lack of existing words is a real definitiongate.

    simonfbarnes
    Free Member

    words are good – we're all carried along on an unstoppable pandemocratic flood. You may nurture your petty prejudices, but almost no one is listening, and your objections will be swept away in the flux. Language changes by its nature, and we all get to take part in those changes by voting with our mouths :o)

    scaredypants
    Full Member

    TJ, out of curiosity I looked up switchback in the (only concise Oxford, mind) dictionary.

    1st definition is a zig-zag railway or road to allow ascent or descent of a steep slope, followed by your alternating up & down road, then by roller-coasterish definition (the latter two are identified as typically non-american but still placed behind the "wrong" definition of zig-zags)

    molgrips
    Free Member

    Molgrips – a fire road is a track built into the forest to allow fire engines to get in in case of forest fires – its something they have in north America and not here

    I know that thanks.

    What I meant was, who says these things are wrong? The best thing about English is that you can't be wrong. You can be grammatically incorrect, but you can make up words to your heart's content. The OED actually add new words based on the things people say, so they reflect us not the other way round.

    Although grammatical rules are beginning to be adapted based on common usage.

    Thankfully, there are and always have been plenty of creative and inventive people in the UK. Like Milton, for instance. And not everyone's like the miserable gits on this thread.

    Ti29er
    Free Member

    No one has mentioned:
    MTFU & WTF.
    Not words, but they great, m8. 😉

    antigee
    Full Member

    molgrips – Member

    App was in use many many years before iPhones came out.

    Some right pathetic losers on this thread. Get a grip!

    think you'll find that is "loosers" in our developing language
    🙄

    TandemJeremy
    Free Member

    Scardey pants – mine has it the other way round.

    A switchback railway is not quite the same thing as hairpins anyway IIRC – the train does not go round a curve at teh end of each zig zag but reverse and points are changed to allow it to go up the next inclined track – hence switch back

    Molgrips the fire road is wrong simply because "fireroad" has a definition as above and it does not fit the forestry roads we have. Our forestry roads would be "logging roads" in americaneeze. Tehy are not there to allow fire engines in therefore thay are not fire roads

    Another one I hate is prioritize. No such word.

    Spongebob
    Free Member

    Ti29er – Member

    No one has mentioned:
    MTFU & WTF.
    Not words, but they great, m8.

    They "grate", or are great?

    Spongebob
    Free Member

    "The community is pulling together" or any other reference about a bunch of people in the event of some disaster, who barely know each other (if at all), but suddenly become referred to as a cohesive group .

    ex-pat
    Free Member

    Pretty much anything from this site:
    Buzzword Bingo!

    nickc
    Full Member

    You guys need to drink less coffee. A lot of the bullshit business phrases are funny really, whenever I hear some one using them in a serious way, it just makes me laugh. Lingustic tics are what makes this language what it is. The alternative is some worthy board of old men deciding what you can or can't say, like they have in France.

    Language changes. Hooray

    mogrim
    Full Member

    Another one I hate is prioritize. No such word.

    Obviously there is such a word, as you managed to type it. Doesn't seem that bad a word, either.

    Personal pet hate: "Work", as used by the STW journalists. For example, "This bike is great for singletrack work". It's not work, it's play.

    BadlyWiredDog
    Full Member

    Thankfully, there are and always have been plenty of creative and inventive people in the UK. Like Milton

    Was he the guy who invented sterilising fluid? Hardly a massive claim to fame, I'd have thought you could come up with someone a little more significant than that. What about Alexander Graham Ball who invented pennycilin? Or that Hoover guy who came up with the Dyson?

    hels
    Free Member

    "Staff" for people who work somewhere, which becomes even more tortured when reference is made to something that belongs to the people who work somewhere "staff's pay slips". "could all staff please keep staff's microwaves clean for other staffs" etc etc.

    billybob
    Free Member

    Jedward & Brangalina or any other allegedly famous couples who have their names shortened to one word.

    BadlyWiredDog
    Full Member

    'T'is' and 't'was' and other weird anachronisms don't do a lot for me, ditto 'steed' for bike, which is in the same vein when you think about it. 'Nom nom nom' as used incessantly on twitter which instantly marks out the poster as an infantile moron. And pretty much any word with more than three syllables used by Louis de Berniereres in his showy, faux Marquez drivel 😉

    MadPierre
    Full Member

    Any management bollox. Obviously.

    Particularly at the minute: "It's in your gift" to sort out whatever!

    People saying "brought" instead of "bought."

    In relation to bike journalism I particularly hate the use of the word "hack". I've never been for a "hack" in my life!

    Ti29er
    Free Member

    Sponge: that was point of the mis-spelling!

    Scaredypants: "off of" – seriously, fundamentally, wrong!

    Hack is a riding term, as in a cross country ride (on horseback).

    Ti29er
    Free Member

    And finally:
    "down to London" No. No. No.
    It's always "up to London" (or any capital city for that matter) from wherever you are geographically in the country.

    yunki
    Free Member

    'Tis or 'Twas – you are not a pirate

    Don't be so certain of that…

    Louis de Berniereres in his showy, faux Marquez drivel

    philistine.. at least de Bernieres isn't likely to bore anyone to death… unlike Marquez with HIS showy drivel..

    It's always "up to London" (or any capital city for that matter) from wherever you are geographically in the country.

    Ti29er – I had you pegged for a bit of a mentalist after you furiously insured me that kids don't take drugs as a right of passage… But THIS little gem proves that you are indeed a raging crack head..

Viewing 40 posts - 81 through 120 (of 252 total)

The topic ‘Words which grate against the very fabric of your soul’ is closed to new replies.

New deal added to Members Discounts