You tend wince? Are wince a bunch of creatures that need tending? If so, then wince is plural and you “hear it” should be “hear them.” Or do you tend TO wince? Just throwing the pedant ball back in your court.
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Words or phrases that annoy you (even if you can't explain why) . . .
- Thread starter usagora
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I live in the UK and my biggest are regional sayings
YOUSE as in what are YOUSE lot doing tonight.. its meant to be the plural of You. I don't mind when the Scottish say it but I can't stand it when folks from Liverpool or Manchester say it.
YOUSE as in what are YOUSE lot doing tonight.. its meant to be the plural of You. I don't mind when the Scottish say it but I can't stand it when folks from Liverpool or Manchester say it.
You tend wince? Are wince a bunch of creatures that need tending? If so, then wince is plural and you “hear it” should be “hear them.” Or do you tend TO wince? Just throwing the pedant ball back in your court.
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Things Not to DoThese habits can produce warnings and repeated violations can produce bans.
Corrections. There is no need to point out another poster's spelling or grammatical errors unless you think it is causing confusion. Remember that not all members are native English speakers. Communication, not correctness, is our goal.
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What's that phrase about missing the trees for the forest? I never get tired of that one.
I work in Liverpool and hear senior management say “and youse all know”. Drives me nuts!
English is the language the English foisted upon the rest of us because they lost their empire...
Even that sentence, where the word "English" has two different meanings, exemplifies itself, recursively and redundantly repeating itself unnecessarily.
Redde linguam Latinam ut universalem.
Back to annoying phrases…
I hear this one all the time when watching sports on TV, but I'm sure it comes up elsewhere. It's usually the "color commentator" who says, "If you're* insert name, then you've got to _____." I sometimes reply out loud, "Well, I'm not whoever." Why can't they just say, "Name has got to ____."?
* usually "If yer…"
I hear this one all the time when watching sports on TV, but I'm sure it comes up elsewhere. It's usually the "color commentator" who says, "If you're* insert name, then you've got to _____." I sometimes reply out loud, "Well, I'm not whoever." Why can't they just say, "Name has got to ____."?
* usually "If yer…"
Sports announcers and color commentators are one of the main things that I dislike about sports. Here's another one. When blathering on about some sports dude that makes more money in a year than I will make in two lifetimes, instead of saying something like:
"When you have Joe Sportsdude1 and Joe Sportsdude2, you know that your team is going to WIN!"
You get:
"When you have a Joe Sportsdude1 and a Joe Sportsdude2, you know that your team is going to WIN!"
Why the gratuitous use of "a" in this sentence? That is something that really bothers me.
Another one. When referring to a sports dude, instead of saying:
"Joe Sportsdude1 is doing a great job!"
or
"How about Joe Sportsdude1!"
they say:
"That Joe Sportsdude1 is doing a great job!"
or
"How about that Joe Sportsdude1!"
Drives me crazy. I don't watch any sports and I am the only one in my family who doesn't. When they are talking about sports, they use "that" a lot and it just bothers me. It's unnecessary.
That is all.
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Interesting that I find "so" starting a sentence to be beyond grating but "well" seems to be tolerable -- to me. Both are verbal pablum. Not sure why one is better than the other to me. I do hate it when people use "in fact" and then offer their subjective opinion.
Something that really irks me is "pet peeve". Like, what do pets have anything to do with it? Just say you're annoyed. Or say you're just peeved. Maybe irritated. But where did the "pet" part come from? It doesn't make any sense.
I guess you could say that's one of my... pet peeves.
I guess you could say that's one of my... pet peeves.
I've always understood that to mean it's a fact that this is their opinion (not that their opinion itself is a fact). For example:
"I really like coconut cake. In fact, it's my favorite dessert of all time."
Gotta be careful about saying "annoyed"--you might get analyzed here by the resident psychologists 😉
This is more of an observation than an annoyance per se: Something I see a lot from non-native speakers is the word "since" when they mean "for". For example, a post in another thread says something like "I wish Apple would ship my new Mac. I've been waiting since five weeks."
The thing I find fascinating is that this particular error seems to crop up all over the place, with seemingly no relation to the speaker's native language or where they live. I'd love to know what the "root" of this particular oddity is...
The thing I find fascinating is that this particular error seems to crop up all over the place, with seemingly no relation to the speaker's native language or where they live. I'd love to know what the "root" of this particular oddity is...
I am almost never annoyed at non-native speakers trying to speak english. It's the native speakers that debauch the language that really irk me.
When people use the word "thong" for something they put around their butt.
That's not a thong,
This is a thong...
That's not a thong,
This is a thong...
That's a slipper -- possibly a flip-flop. A thong is something people (mostly women) wear as a type of panty.When people use the word "thong" for something they put around their butt.
That's not a thong,
This is a thong...
It comes from German speakers.
Ich warte seit fünf Wocken, where "seit" is translated as both "since" and "for", with "since" usually listed first.
You hear it in parts of Australia, too.
I take it as a sign that the speech centre is rebelling against the ungrammatical loss of the plural form* and wants the distinction back. Who knows, in a hundred years’ time the word “youse” may well be a respected dictionary word again.
* it was actually the singular that was lost, with ”you” taking up both roles
Australian detected.When people use the word "thong" for something they put around their butt.
That's not a thong,
This is a thong...
What @adrianlondon says is true, but Nermal also mentioned he hears it from all sorts of non-native speakers (so we can safely say not just native German speakers). But think about it. English also uses "since" in this context, but only when in reference to a specific point in time in the past. For example, "I've been waiting since yesterday" or "I've been waiting since last Christmas" or "I've been waiting ever since he told me about it" etc. So I can easily see how many non-native speakers might erroneously carry this same construction over to time quantities (e.g. "I've been waiting since five weeks"). However, by simply adding the word "ago" to that, it would be correct, because now it's referencing a specific point in the past: "I've been waiting since five weeks ago," though that's not as common in usage that I hear.
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