Bad Fiction

Back in the day, (I can’t believe I used that phrase), Saturday Night Live used to do a sketch featuring Dan Akroyd, called Bad Opera, or Bad Shakespeare Plays or something like that. Akroyd played this rather snooty character, Leonard Pinth Garnell, who would review these rather poor works of art, interpreted and played by the talented cast of Saturday Night Live.

Each year, San Jose State University offers the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest. “For the past 25 years, the contest out of San Jose State University has challenged writers to concoct the worst opening line of a novel.”

Jim Gleeson of Madison, WI offers up the 2007 winner with this opening:

Gerald began–but was interrupted by a piercing whistle which cost him ten percent of his hearing permanently, as it did everyone else in a ten-mile radius of the eruption, not that it mattered much because for them “permanently” meant the next ten minutes or so until buried by searing lava or suffocated by choking ash–to pee.

The runner-up, a Scott Palmer from Oregon, is second best with these words:

The Barents sea heaved and churned like a tortured animal in pain, the howling wind tearing packets of icy green water from the shuddering crests of the waves, atomizing it into mist that was again laid flat by the growing fury of the storm as Kevin Tucker switched off the bedside light in his Tuba City, Arizona, single-wide trailer and by the time the phone woke him at 7:38, had pretty much blown itself out with no damage.

There is much more to be found on this web page, showing “winners” in several categories.

As the aforementioned Leonard Pinth Garnell would have stated, having tossed these tomes into a waste basket, “Bad writing. Oh so bad.”

Enjoy!

Irritating Language

Words and phrases that seem redundant, obtuse, marketing-speaking, or just plain stupid. Please feel welcome to add to my less than exhaustive list.

• Upcharge. In market-speak, apparently this means that we’re going to charge you more. Redundant. You pay more, the bill goes up.
• Back in the day. Modern way of saying “in the old days, when we were young.” My question: which day do we go back to? Monday? How about Tuesday?
• Gift. A word-saving verb that means to give a gift. Back in the day, we didn’t gift our friends and family, we gave them a nice present. I like the idea of giving.
• Regift. Another word-saving verb. Regifting is what people do when they are gifted with stuff they don’t like. Back in the day, we’d save these gifts for a rummage sale or yard sale.
• Ingathering. This is a big made up word at our church. In the fall, we have a service, ingathering everyone in the congregation from their summer travels. Redundant. How else does one gather? Outgather?

Eloquent Insults Redux

Back in April, I posted a list of rather eloquent insults that surpassed the more traditional “your mama” or my favorite, “bite me“. Here are some additional insults to add to your own collection. Use them at your own risk, of course. Part of that risk might be that both the insultor and insultee understand what is being flung about.

So here we go…

I liked your opera. I think I will set it to music.
– Ludwig van Beethoven to a fellow composer

Your manuscript is both good and original, but the part that is good is not original and the part that is original is not good.
– Samuel Johnson (attributed)

Vile worm, thou wast overlooked even in thy birth — William Shakespeare

You are not worth another word, else I’d call you knave.
– William Shakespeare (All’s Well that Ends Well)

I do desire we may be better strangers.
– William Shakespeare (As You Like It)

There’s no more faith in thee than in a stewed prune.
– William Shakespeare (1 Henry IV)

Grammatical Rules (Or Guide to Good Grammer)

Blogging is all about good grammar and language. So to provide a service to my fellow bloggers (and you know who you are), I offer the following for your thoughtful, but careful consideration.

Some of my readers are teachers. You know who you are. Please feel free to copy these rules for classroom distribution and/or use. You don’t have to pay me nuthin’

1. Each pronoun agrees with their antecedent.
2. Just between you and I case is important.
3. Verbs has to agree with their subjects.
4. Watch out for irregular verbs which have crope into our language.
5. Don’t use no double negatives.
6. A writer mustn’t shift your point of view.
7. When dangling, don’t use participles.
8. Join clauses good, like a conjunction should.
9. Don’t write a run-on sentence you have to punctuate it.
10. About sentence fragments.
11. In a letter themes reports articles and stuff like that we use commas to keep a string of items apart.
12. Don’t use commas, which aren’t necessary.
13. Its very important that you use apostrophe’s right.
14. Don’t abbrev.
15. Check to see if you have any words out.
16. As far as incomplete constructions, they are wrong.
17. Never use a preposition to end a sentence with.
18. It is important to never ever under any circumstances split an infinitive.
19. Last but not least, avoid cliches like the plague.
20. The active voice is preferred.
21. Use of the passive voice is to be avoided.
22. Eschew obfuscation.
23. Never use a long word when a diminutive one will do.

Eloquent Insults

How many times have you desperately needed an insult to hurl at someone, and all you could come up with is “What an idiot”? Or “Jane, you ignorant slut!” (That should get my blog rating up: slut!)

Or my personal favorite, “the lights are on but no one’s home”.

Read on, then, for a list of insults from some famous people.

“He has all the virtues I dislike and none of the vices I admire.” — Winston Churchill”

A modest little person, with much to be modest about.” — Winston Churchill

“I have never killed a man, but I have read many obituaries with great pleasure.” — Clarence Darrow

“He has never been known to use a word that might send a reader to the dictionary.” — William Faulkner (about Ernest Hemingway)

“Poor Faulkner. Does he really think big emotions come from big words?” — Ernest Hemingway (about William Faulkner)

“Thank you for sending me a copy of your book; I’ll waste no time reading it.” — Moses Hadas

“He can compress the most words into the smallest idea of any man I know.” — Abraham Lincoln

“I’ve had a perfectly wonderful evening. But this wasn’t it.” — Groucho Marx

“Way down deep he’s shallow.” — Various

“I didn’t attend the funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved of it.” — Mark Twain

“He has no enemies, but is intensely disliked by his friends.” — Oscar Wilde

“I am enclosing two tickets to the first night of my new play; bring a friend, if you have one.” — George Bernard Shaw to Winston Churchill

“Cannot possibly attend first night, will attend second if there is one.” — Winston Churchill, in response

“I feel so miserable without you; it’s almost like having you here.” — Stephen Bishop

“He is a self-made man and worships his creator.” — John Bright

“I’ve just learned about his illness. Let’s hope it’s nothing trivial.” — Irvin S. Cobb

“He is not only dull himself, he is the cause of dullness in others.” — Samuel Johnson

“He is simply a shiver looking for a spine to run up.” — Paul Keating

“He had delusions of adequacy.” — Walter Kerr

“There’s nothing wrong with you that reincarnation won’t cure.” — Jack E. Leonard

“He has the attention span of a lightning bolt.” — Robert Redford

“They never open their mouths without subtracting from the sum of human knowledge.” — Thomas Brackett Reed

“He inherited some good instincts from his Quaker forebears, but by diligent hard work, he overcame them.” — James Reston (about Richard Nixon)

“In order to avoid being called a flirt, she always yielded easily.” — Charles, Count Talleyrand

“He loves nature in spite of what it did to him.” — Forrest Tucker

“Why do you sit there looking like an envelope without any address on it?” — Mark Twain

“His mother should have thrown him away and kept the stork.” — Mae West

“Some cause happiness wherever they go; others, whenever they go.” — Oscar Wilde

“He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lamp-posts for support rather than illumination.” — Andrew Lang (1844-1912)

“He has Van Gogh’s ear for music.” — Billy Wilder

“You will die either on the gallows or of some unspeakable disease” –Gladstone to Disraeli

“That depends upon whether I embrace your principles or your mistress” –Disraeli’s response

“If you were my husband, I’d put poison in your coffee” –Lady Astor to Winston Churchill

“If I were your husband, I’d drink it” –Churchill’s response

Slang of the Day

The Urban Dictionary is a web site dedicated to the compilation of slang. Like Wikipedia, anyone can add their own language to the dictionary, where it is rated by others reading the pages.

Here are a few of the entries I found:

Ear Spray.
Overflow sounds from someone listening to their ipod too loud, possibly first coined by an NPR editorial.
Sitting on the train for four hours with ear spray on me from the raging 15 year old brittany fan, what fun.

Dining al desko.
To eat lunch at your desk.
A: Are you coming to the canteen for lunch?
B: No, I’m afraid I’m dining al desko today.

Resolutionary.
People who join a gym after the New Year, only to quit going within 3 months.
I couldn’t find a free treadmill, the place was crawling with resolutionarys.

Re-gift.
verb. To repackage or rewrap a gift one receives and give it to someone else.
Elaine gave Tim a label-maker for Christmas — and he re-gifted it to Jerry!

Fly naked.
To fly somewhere with the bare-minimum of belongings, and purchase the rest where you are.

Professional celebrity.
A famous person who has no discernable talent other than being famous.
Anna Nicole Whatever and Paris Hilton were/are professional celebrities.

Connectile dysfunction.
The inability to gain or maintain an internet connection.
The inability to print, email, or get to the internet.
Yesterday I took my laptop with me to visit a client and was unable to access their website because of connectile dysfunction.

New Ageist
1. Used to describe individuals who discriminate against others who are not overly focused on self improvement.
2. The act of looking down on people who do not practice yoga, eat organic, and believe in energy fields.
A bunch of us were going to a steak house for drinks and dinner, until we discovered Mary was new ageist and started ranting about how unhealthy we are because we love big, red juicy hunks of meat.

All Eyes

My family leaves early for school, so often the television is on before and after they leave. Normally, I wouldn’t turn it on, but there it is. The Today Show, that bastion of quality interviewing and incisive news reports, opens with their usual teasers. Today, on Today, I hear another one of those phrases that just grates on me: “…and all eyes are on Hollywood, as…”

All eyes are on???

I don’t think so. Mine are certainly not going to be on Hollywood. So that statement is rather incorrect.

Besides, who cares?

If the most important thing that people have to consider or have “all their eyes on” is Hollywood, than something is very much amiss.

I was just thinking. I wonder if they said “…and today all eyes are on Brittany Spears as she gets out of a limosine without underware…”

I couldn’t resist. Enough. As a colleague of mine says, “Get back to work!”

Bad Words

Here are three commonly used words that describe people. In my mind, they have a negative influence on the way we think about the folks we work with.

Consumer. Isn’t that a horrible word when used to describe people? How about something a little more respectful like customer? When I am a consumer, I am merely consuming goods and services in the same way that a car consumes gasoline, but as a customer I actively buy goods and services.

User. Being in the software development business, this word is used frequently to describe the good folks who work with (and purchase) our software, hardware, and technology products. In a previous life, I worked as a therapist in outpatient alcoholism and drug abuse treatment centers. User is what we called the people coming through our doors.

End User. Obviously a variant on user. Isn’t a bit redundant though to call a person an end user? If there is an end user, it would seem likely then, that somewhere there must be a beginning user.

Words like these depersonalize people, coloring the way some folks think about others. When we use language that accurately reflects who we do things for, it is more likely our software, customer service (think carefully about the meaning of those two words), and products will be designed to serve the “real people” who work with our stuff on a daily basis.

Those of you out there who are end users of my blog are welcome to comment. Being the consumers that you are, please suggest other words of the same genre.

Weather Talk

My family is up about 6am every day, and invaribly the TV is turned on to generate noise and confusion. Tuned to WLWT Channel 5, we’re able to get brief nuggets of news about the latest auto accidents and murders, camera shots of police tape around a crime zone, live reports by talking heads in front of the county jail, traffic reports every 3 minutes or so (yes, it runs smoothly at 6am, thank you), and the occasional baseball or footbal score from our local teams.

But it’s the weather that’s most valuable. Not only can I discover that it’s raining outside my window, but I also get the opportunity to learn the latest hip jargon going on in the Weather World.

Here’s what I mean:

• In Cincinnati it doesn’t rain or snow, we have a rain event or a snow event. And if it’s really going to snow, we’ll have a major snow event. Which, given the way people drive here, will certainly create a major traffic event.
• When it’s really going to get cold here, no, it’s not an Alberta Clipper coming our way. We’ll be having a major cold intrusion. (I swear that’s what he said this morning. Not in my wildest dreams could I make that one up.)

Today, however, we can expect partly cloudy skies with highs in the 50s and no rain or snow events. Traffic is running smoothly, even through The Cut in the Hill. And I was relieved to come to find out that there will be no major cold intrusions for the next week or so.

You’re welcome to use the comments section below to add your very own jargon from the Weather World to our collection. Being the open-minded person I am, you’re not restricted to the Weather World jargon. News, Traffic, and Sports are also welcome.

And now back to your regularly scheduled programming…

On Writing

My last post started out as an article on my favorite football teams, yet ended up with memories of my father. I’m amazed at how the content shifted as I got in touch with my own feelings of grief over the loss of my Dad. As I noted, the feelings were bittersweet in my recollection of the good conversations and sharing between father and son on some common interests.

Writing is a good outlet for expression. Doing this blog has required that I take the time to consider what I post here and do the best I can to express what I have to say. Although I suspect that few read my posts, the blog is open to the rest of the world and my words are likely stored somewhere so that they can be read sometime by somebody.

It’s a rarity that I do this kind of writing. Most of the time my writing is much less formal, often consisting of a quick email reply. Rarely does this kind of writing lend itself to careful consideration and much expression of thought or feeling. It’s just email.