Pet Phrases

You know there's a holiday for everything, right? Like the crazy, obscure holidays that cause you to wonder why a holiday was even thought up in the first place?

Well, when you work in radio, those holidays come in awfully handy, because they give you conversational fodder. (This I know, because National Frappe Day fell on the day Ryan proposed to me, and I delayed my own proposal by too many minutes by talking frappes with Lynne.)

Apparently yesterday was National...excuse me, International Yadda, Yadda, Yadda Day, which prompted my former work buddies on the morning show to talk about favorite and least favorite phrases. I read through the whole thread on Facebook, because I wanted to see what people loved and hated! In truth, I wanted to see if anyone hated what I hated or how many hated things I say! (You should also know I'm second guessing every word I type in this post, for fear it's one of your least favorite phrases.)

So here were some of their least favorites that I agree with wholeheartedly.

* It's painful when someone uses the word literally for emphasis. The funny part (for me) about this comment was that I'm friends with the person who said that, and she thanked me the other day for using the word literally correctly in one of my own Facebook posts. I try hard not to throw around literally when I don't mean it. "I was literally dying." Really? Because you seem pretty alive right now!

* It is what it is. (Several people mentioned this one.) That may be my all-time least favorite phrase, and my mom LOVES IT!!!! So did Ryan's mom.

* When a person keeps saying you know throughout a conversation. It's not the actual phrase you know that bothers me, but it does bother me when someone keeps repeating a word or phrase and I start to notice it. Because as soon as I notice it, I lose the whole content of the conversation, waiting for the next time they say the phrase. It's like when you notice the faucet is dripping and then that's all you can hear.

* Thanks in advance really irks me. Depending on the usage, I agree. If someone asks me to do something, and I agree to do it, and then they say thanks in advance, it doesn't bug me. I feel pre-thanked and am pretty sure if they're conscientious enough to do that, they'll probably post-thank me after I do it, and I'll feel all warm and fuzzy inside. But if a person says to me, Thanks in advance for picking this up for me, I feel a sense of obligation to do what they've asked, because clearly they already expect it. And then I just resent the whole thing.

* I know how you feel. I used to say this one, but as I've gotten older, I have tried to stop using it. Even if I have walked the same road as the person I'm talking to, I probably don't really know exactly how they feel, because no two people feel the same thing - even about the same thing. I try to use my own experiences to relate to how other people may be feeling, but I try to make a specific point of saying "I may not know exactly how you feel, but..." Example: I was talking to a friend the other day who is experiencing anxiety in her pregnancy. She waited a long time to have a baby, and she worries something will go wrong. Obviously I've never been pregnant or had a child, so I don't know how she feels. Not exactly. But I remember my days of dating Ryan and all the anxiety I felt in fearing God would lead him to end our relationship like my previous relationship had ended. I know what it's like to long for something and fear you'll lose it. So I do know a measure of how she feels in the realm of that kind of anxiety. But do I know exactly how she feels? Nope. And even if I had been pregnant at some point and struggled with anxiety over that baby, I still wouldn't feel every emotion she's feeling in the way she feels it.

* We're going to unpack this Scripture passage. I don't have strong feelings toward that specific phrase, but it does remind me of one I have come to bristle at when I hear it: He makes the Bible come alive. Scripture flat out says that Word of God is living and active, so none of us can make it come alive. I used to say the whole phrase about someone making the Bible come alive until I heard someone point out that no human can do that, since it's already living and active, so I stopped using that one.

Now...for the ones I say that made the list:

* Have a good one. The person who didn't like it said "A good what?" I guess when I say it, I'm leaving it open for the hearer to have a good whatever he or she chooses! Limitless possibilities.

* Awesome Sauce. I don't actually say it, but it is Ryan's nickname for me. (Hope the person who hates it isn't reading today! If so...I'm sorry!)

* No problem...in place of you're welcome. I know it's not the right phrase, but I confess I say it sometimes.

* Right?!?!  Gulp. I do use that one quite often.


So how about you? Least (or most!) favorite phrases?