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The Daily Dose/December 21, 2008
By Gaylon Kent
The Writer's Shack
Notes from around the Human Experience! Pics will return!
A TOTAL QUALITY PARADIGM: Lake Superior State University in Michigan is out with their annual List of Banished Words, words they would like to see banished from the English language.
Leading Off: The list wastes no time, leading off with one of the most annoying phrases to leak its way into the lexicon: Perfect storm, which has gone from the title of a book nad a movie to a phrase used - too much -to describe coincidences.
As Long We Have The Barf Bag Out: Also on the list is term that is probably more annoying because it's used a lot more:
It is what it is.
Official Writer's Shack policy states not only should the phrase be banished, but the person responsible for it should be banished, too.
Back In The Day: This from the 1990 list:
Fax - New verb - "I hate to have some one ask 'Fax me a copy, will you?'"
Outside The Box: An early sign of the corporate mumbly speak we are now subjected to can be found in the 1983 list:
Office Effectivity - University of Michigan assistant registrar Edward C. Lover found this in several departmental reports, including "Overall office effectivity improvement will come only through increased automotive support." This means "We need new equipment."
Your Attention Please: This is from the 1980 list. It's one we, too, have always found annoying:
Pre-Board - Used by airport announcers
FunFact: A variation of this term, presale, is also annoying, and is used to describe game or concert tickets going on sale before they go on sale. We know, it makes no sense. We're just saying.
Y2K: The 2000 list took several nouns to task for posing as verbs, including to action, to transition, to solution and to summit.
A Favorite: The 1998 list had one of our all-time faves on it, a phrase use we use regularly: my bad. This got the shorts of some old biddy school teacher in Michigan all knotted up. Sorry. Our bad.
Yeah, Whatever: Yadda, yadda, yadda made the 1998 list, too. Ooooh, we do despise this one, used by blatherskites unable to think of an appropriate word to use.. If you have nothing better to say than these three words, please keep quiet.
A Warm, Personal Thought: Blah, blah, blah falls into this category, too. We take great pride here at the Writer's Shack in using the exact word we want at a given time. It may not make much sense, but rest assured we slave over every sentence here.
Thought For The Day: Never use two words when one will do. Thomas Jefferson.
With that in mind, it was pleasing to find ethnic cleansing on the 1996 list. Well, not pleasing because that means ethnic cleansing exists, of course, but it was pleasing to see its idiocy recognized. Call us traditionalists, but people of a certain race being massacred should be called 'genocide'.
WE ARE THE CHAMPIONS…AGAIN: Striking early and often and holding off a late rally, official Writer's Shack fave Mount Union College won its tenth NCAA Division III football championship Saturday, defeating evil, defending champion, Wisconsin-Whitewater 21-26 in the Amos Alonzo Stagg Bowl in Salem, Virginia.
God, We Love Mount Union: Our Raiders move to 10-2 in the Stagg Bowl.
Go Mount Union! Mount Union finishes 2008 15-0, their ninth undefeated season since 1993.
Uncharted Waters: Mount Union's Nate Kmic rushed for 88 yards in the national championship game and became the first player in NCAA history to rush for more than 8,000 yards (8,074).
Holy Crap: Mount Union's 10 national championships in football (nine more than UW-Whitewater has won) is impressive, but it's nowhere near the all-time NCAA record for titles in an individual sport. The all-division record is held by Oklahoma State, which has won 34 D-I wrestling titles. Second on the list is Kenyon College, which has won the last 29 NCAA men's swimming titles.
Screw The Army: On this date, in 1861, US President Abraham Lincoln signs Public Resolution 82 containing a provision for the Navy Medal of Valor "…to be bestowed upon such petty officers, seamen, landsmen, and Marines as shall most distinguish themselves by their gallantry and other seamanlike qualities during the present war."
Sorry, Our Bad: A similar award for the army would be authorized the following summer.
3…2…1…Blastoff: On this date, in 1968, history's first manned mission to the moon, Apollo 8, blasts off from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. 2 hours and 50 minutes later performs a maneuver called trans-lunar injection, which sends it on a trajectory to the Moon. Following TLI, the crew of Frank Borman, James Lovell and William Anders become the first humans to leave Earth's gravity. Later, the three would become the first humans to see the far side of the Moon. They would orbit the Moon 10 times before returning to Earth on Dec. 27.
I Guess He's Out For Hosting The Next Block Party: Des Plaines, Illinois police arrest John Wayne Gacy on this date in 1978. Soon the remains of 33 males are unearthed in the basement of his home. Eight of his victims remain unidentified. Gacy was convicted of murder in March, 1980 and he was executed in May, 1994. Some minor hilarity ensued at his execution when the chemicals to be used to kill him solidified, but a clogged tube was replaced and the execution continued.
This Is Definitely A Violation Of International Law: On this date, in 1988, a bomb explodes on Pan AM flight 103 while flying over Lockerbie, Scotland. A total of 270 people in the air and on the ground were killed.
Dry, Technical Matter: The flight had originated in London and was on its way to New York...Two Libyans were tried in connection with the bombing, one who was found guilty and another who was acquitted.
Missed It By That Much: Interesting, more or less, is who was not on the flight. The musical group The Four Tops missed the flight due to a recording session going to long, Actress Kim Cattrall was supposed to be on the flight but didn't make because she went shopping and one Jaswant Basuta got hammered before the flight and got to the gate just as the doors had been closed. Fortunately for him, he was unable to persuade the agent at the gate to reopen them.
The Trivia feature will return next time!
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