My nomination for the most over-used word in the US...

[NeonLX]

I'm really sick of the word "awesome". I've been sick of it for a long time; since whenever it took over as the only apparent adjective to describe something wonderful, fabulous, superb, brilliant...

Just took part in a political chat about today's local election where the "good guy" actually won...I counted the word "awesome" used over 45 times in the course of two minutes of chatting.

I have grown to absolutely loathe the word.

[Simulist]

Yep. Awesome is a truly awesome word to loathe.

[Project Willow]

Sssshhh.

I applied to the Awesome Foundation for one of their Awesome Grants and next week I'll be attending one of their Awesome Parties. Hopefully they'll think my clitoris is awesome. Wish me luck.

[Nordic]

But "awesome" is, like, so, like, understood. It's like, when you say "awesome, everybody like knows what you're talking about.

So my nomination is the word "like".

[Nordic]

Hopefully they'll think my clitoris is awesome.

Quick, somebody find the RI Quotes thread!

[NeonLX]

Hopefully they'll think my clitoris is awesome.

Quick, somebody find the RI Quotes thread!

<<meant in the old timey way, before Mr. Jones...

[Simulist]

"The most over-used word in the US" might be freedom.

(In fact, it's so over-used, its meaning has devolved to include slavery.)

[DrEvil]

terrorism, twitter, "After these messages".

[chump]

[Elvis]

---

Freedom is like almost as awesome as democracy!

[Nordic]

What about FUCK.

[Freitag]

Yeah it's an unfortunate, but well-known linguistic rule that superlatives get watered down over time. Thirty years ago, "awesome" described God and... not much else. Nowadays the Cheerios I had for breakfast can be awesome.

So where do we get more superlatives, when they're all ruined? We just make 'em up (e.g. tressla).

It's easy to overuse pet words, my coworker across the hall used to (mis)use "literally" all the time. Drove me nuts. I do it too, though. I've been saying "vagaries" a lot lately.

My personal pet peeves are phrases that start in office culture, and escape into the wild:

"Reach out" (to describe any form of contact, for any purpose)
"Moving forward" and variants
etc.

I think there are some very interesting, major changes to the English language currently underway in society:

1) We are losing the plural form of "to be". The most common example is when someone says "There is [plural noun]" instead of "There are [plural noun]". (e.g., There's several things I want to talk about today...)This is ubiquitous, you'll hear it everywhere once you're aware of it.

I don't really mind the change. It's difficult to think so far ahead in your sentence, and it's easy to get into the habit of starting off with "There's..." and then the subject ends up being plural.

Spanish and German, for example, only have one expression for "There is/are" (i.e. "hay" and "es gibt"). It's much easier this way.

2) We're losing the plural forms where "f" changes to "v", e.g. knife/knives, life/lives, etc. I hear people say "knifes" and "lifes" all the time.

Anyway, my $.02.

[Nordic]

A superlative that always annoyed the fuck out of me was "sick!"

Its use seems to be dwindling.

"Bad-ass!" seems to perhaps making a coneback. I'm hearing it a little more lately.

Anybody remember "Bitching!"

[AhabsOtherLeg]

I've only ever used "awesome" on the internet. Much like "bad-ass" - or "pwned!" -it's just not something you can say in real life, unless you're taking the piss.

I have a "though" problem, though. I keep saying "though" in the middle of, or at the end of, sentences, though there's literally no need for it though.

[NeonLX]

Anybody remember "Bitching!"

GROAN. Yes. As in, "bitchin' Camaro".

Fortunately, "bitchin'" didn't seem to last very long.

"Moving forward" drives me up the wall, too. Several walls.