If anyone ever says it to me now, I always reply “Your bad what?”
Stupid conversation then ensues explaining bad is an adjective not a noun. What the difference is between adjective and noun. Wondering what these people were taught when they were six.
It’s changed. As things often do. It’s now a noun -or- an adjective. There are other words that have done so in the past, no doubt.
You’re welcome to decline to use it as a noun, if that is your preference.
It’s just a bit of verbal shorthand to cover a number of circumstances where the speaker is admitting fault. It may be replaced by something more to your liking or even more annoying at some future point.
These words and phrases go in and out of fashion as time progresses. I mean nobody says “forsooth” any more because the usage changed. Or “fab” “groovy” and “gear”. It’s no biggie, dude.
I don’t mind it. Similarly I refuse to believe that the phrase ‘Can I get….’ is anything other than a perfectly polite, non-irritating and lucid request. As you were.
But *I would like* makes no sense – how do you know you ll like it until you’ve eaten drunk whatever it? What you mean is I would like you to give me – which is longer. Can I buy… is is accurate and the same length but no-one says it.
This reminds me that, when learning French at school, we were told that in a shop you said, “Give me.” Which seemed, at best, direct and possibly a little rude.
Marvin was being grammatically correct, @badartdog. He was asking if he was capable of getting a witness. In other words, is there a witness available. He wasn’t asking permission.
Similarly, I suspect you aren’t actually capable of creating an edit function. You are making a plea to the mods to put one in place, not asking to make one yourself.
I have never understood why “Can I get….” induces apoplexy in a certain constituency of the AW. Utterly bafflingly. And I’ve understood (most of) Pale Fire.
If one can’t grump pointlessly about “kids today” here, where can we grump? My simile collection (Keef or iggy for drugs, ELP for pretense, Mahavishnu for complexity, Status Quo for idiot simplicity) is now beyond repair, but who are the modern equivalents so i can show myself down with the kids, of exquisite taste, and still, in my own way, hip?
Coogan and Iannuci recall while doing location scouting for 2nd series of Partridge Coogan wearing a flat cap into the golf club bar, ordering a drink and being huffily scolded by a member “Hats off at the bar”
FPO n GLW is very 70’s BBC light entertainment – and nobody wants that these days
I like “civilian” and use it at every opportunity.
It perfectly describes your in-laws, your workmates and all those you encounter who don’t inhabit your world of music or share your intimate knowledge and burning passion.
Why, I bet they couldn’t even reel off all the Beatles B-Sides without resorting to Google. Huh, civilians!
Yes, I dislike civilian as well. There’s nothing worse than someone who thinks an interest in music makes them superior. It’s the sort of thing most of us grow out of in our teens.
Fair comment @jimCain. But has anyone a synonym that refers to members of the public who do not have a fanatical and embarassingly obsessive interest in popular culture?
I don’t know about you, but I find it a wonderful thing to be able to refer to the lyrics of a rather obscure Mothers of Invention song or a fast Show sketch in an OP and know that someone will know what I’m talking about.
Ha ha, and I’ll tell you summat else, an’ all. I don’t know how many “hole in the ground” khazis there still are in the gay city of Paris, but when I lived there there were still quite a few, and they were known as “Turkish” toilets. This is brilliant, isn’t it? When I pointed out that they in all probability hadn’t been made in and imported from Turkey for the use of Turks (who were presumably throwing the hated pedestal WCs out of the window), the French used to get rather grumpy about it. I pointed out further that the French were globally famed for these toilets and soap-dodging generally, before going on to say that Joan of Arc was asking for it. I don’t live there any more.
“There’s nothing worse than someone who thinks an interest in music makes them superior. It’s the sort of thing most of us grow out of in our teens.”
Fuck, I thought it was our zeitgeist, Jim
Me too. How wrong I was to use what I innocently thought was a little self mockery on a site that no one who isn’t thoroughly music-obsessed has even heard of.
Mea culpa, brother eyestrain. There I was finding some of these terms mildy amusing, and yet it seems I’ve been guilty of using all sorts of non-U expressions, without even realising it. I’m off to grow out of my teens, amongst other forms of penitence, before I dare put digit to keyboard again.
I use “civilian” in the sense of “normal, well-adjusted”. I am the one with the problem. Like when I was at a course and the facilitator put on relaxing music while we were doing our work. Of course I concentrate totally on the music – I wanted (needed) know who it was. When I asked, the guy doing the course shrugged in a slightly amused way. He didn’t know. Correctly, he deemed it to be irrelevant. He’s a civilian.
At last! A moan I can join I with! Mildly amusing once, about ten years ago, pretty unpleasant used repeatedly. If that’s how you really feel about your significant other I believe divorce forms you can fill In yourself are available online.
I let most of this stuff go, it doesn’t really bother me but I do like to tease my son when he says “sick” meaning good. It just seems wrong.
My other pet hate is garage pronounced “garridge” but I would never comment on it in company.
Oh dear. This is why I wouldn’t normally comment as I don’t mean to offend and I know garridge is a common pronnounciation. Ahem, the closest I can get would be “garraahj” if that makes sense.
You’re a bit posher than people round my way, obviously, Dave. Which is nothing against you. One speaks as one is taught, generally.
It’s universally Garridge around here (Watford). You do occasionally hear it as Ga-Raj when luvvies are being interviewed on the telly. Or on Radio Four.
Not far from the sadly-no-more (demolished and redeveloped) Rayners Hotel in Rayners Lane, then. I went to many a good gig there.
I used to go out with a lovely girl from North Harrow. Sadly, her parents didn’t take to me at all and the romance was therefore doomed. Ah well.
Rayners Lane! Living between Pinner and Eastcote, I knew it well @Mike_H. I frequently went to the cinema there on Saturday afternoons. It’s now a temple or church of some kind.
I once saw my great idol, Viv Stanshall, at that pub which is on the way to South Harrow.
I used to go into Sellanbys on a Saturday afternoon pre CD. Very smoky and dark with ashtrays on the racks. They always had multiple copies of Ogdens Nut Gone Flake in the round sleeve, Blind Faith and the Average White Band album.
Actually, you’re joking about this, but the Sellanby’s (Keith and Maureen) first business venture was bee-related! “Sellanby’s Home-Made Honey” was run from their farmhouse home in Iver, Bucks. for many years.
Nothing wrong with My Bad (language evolves, get over yourself) , everything wrong with GLW and FPO.
I’m with Kaisfatdad – civilian used in context within this forum is perfectly acceptable.
But it does look as though the term “civilian” is used by golf-playing thespians, and if we use it we may be branded as Friends of Liz Hurley. Or have our names linked with some other sizzling siren of the silver screen.
Personally, I do find it rather useful to have a word that refers to those who are not very familiar with Mavis Staples, Megatron, Manfred Mann, Pino Daniele, Young Thug, Lonnie Donnegan, Crowded House, Ice Cube, Roman Polanski, just Cause, Dangermouse, Half Man Half Biscuit, Ron Manager, Elis Regina, Bagpuss, Alizee, the Conchords, Mariza, Göran Kafjes, Dr Strange, Teenage Fanclub, Basil Brush, Bloodborne, Dr John, Sigur Ros, Jack Kirby, Jo Nesbo, Antonello Venditti and Pencilsqueezer.
Sorry @ruff-diamond and anyone else who baffled by a few names on my list! It was late at night, I was a little BriCameroned and was being deliberately obscure with a couple of them.
Then again, I’m sure we all have bands, writers, films, video games, TV programmes, painters etc that we know very well who are totally unknown to almost everyone else here. Discovering about some of these is one of the pleasures of coming here.
I want 60 seconds on each of the names here please, without hesitation, repetition or deviation. Time starts NOW!
Dave Aerni, Joan Baez, John Beck, Molly Bee, Richard Berry, Charles Brown, Clarence “Gatemouth” Brown, Teddy Bunn, Albert Collins, David Crosby, Skip Diamond, Willie Dixon, Eric Dolphy, Don & Dewey, Bob Dylan, Bill Evans, Johnny Franklin, Ernie Freeman, Gene & Eunice, Vernon Greene, Buddy Guy, Slim Harpo, Chuck Higgins, Joe Huston, Bobby Jamieson, Don Julian, Terry Kirkman, Roland Kirk, Chatur Lal, Preston Love, Junior Madeo, Steve Mann, Little Arthur Matthews, Barry McGuire, Big Jay McNeely (“Cecil James McNeely”), Charles Mingus, Vic Mortenson, N.C. Mullick, Johnny Otis, Joe Perrino, Elvis Presley, Bob Reiner, Sabicas, Ravi Shankar, Jim Sherwood, Frankie Lee Simms, Guitar Slim, Lightnin’ Slim, Alice Stewart, Don Vliet, Donald Woods.
Ouch! Time for me to hand in my Afterword uniform and head back to civvy street. I know about half of those names. And could say something interesting about five of them.
Bear in mind there are different regiments and different corps with different skills. JC represents, of course, the lowly foot soldiers, integral mules of the military, cannon fodder even, reliant on a limited repertoire of guitars and drums.
(I rely on Corporal Cat of the sappers to tell us of the link between this song and one of his favourite beat combos.)
Wasn’t here a moment in the past when the world got confused and “Bad” meant “Good”?
Language – constantly developing, I’m just an old git that can’t keep up anymore. At least when the lexicon was enhanced by Only Fools & Horses and Allo Allo I could get the reference point.
An ugly phrase but it does make sense, grammatically. Maybe the speaker -could- care less. How much do they care when uttering the phrase? Not much, one would assume, but who knows? Perhaps there’s yet scope for caring even less than it would appear.
Still on an American – I listen to a lot of podcasts from very smart young Americans and, almost without exception they will always say “anyways” instead of “anyway”. I can’t understand where the stray “s” comes from as it sucks meaning out of the word.
Another pet peeve is people who start a sentence without knowing whether the word they are going to need is “understate” or “overstate”, but when they get there they seem to flip a mental coin and hope for the best. Being kind, they seem to confuse themselves by using the negative word “impossible”, as in: “it’s impossible to overstate/understate the importance of…
Save yourself the grief of saying exactly the opposite of what you mean by just saying the same thing another way..
yeah, definitely in common use around these parts as well. In fact, we will sometimes – shock – shorten it even further, to just “new year”.
“what are you doing for new year, KD?”
“I expect I will go to bed about eleven, just out of spite, and then be woken to watch fireworks an hour later. Probably grumpily acquiesce, get up, have a moan to bring everyone else down, and then silently consider mortality, and how, since this exact same thing happened last year, I and everyone I know have moved approximately forty two million heartbeats closer to death.”
That said, I definitely heard the goalie on my footerball team in upstate New York use the term “my bad” – in apologising for a howler- in the summer of 1987. His three Irish defenders fell about laughing, but I have to say I’ve used it non-ironically ever since. (To all intensive purposes.)
I remember hearing ‘my bad’ on an episode of Oprah (I know) WAY before Buffy was around. The exact circumstance was a black guy saying ‘I’m sorry my brother, my bad’ to someone in the audience. It stuck in my memory because I hadn’t heard it before and it sounded rather cool to my Warwickshire ears (TMFTL).
As a child, I was admonished strongly by a friend’s father by saying “ad-ver-tize-ment” instead of “advert-issment”. He may well be right but it was the tone of the admonishment that got me. Delivered as always, as if I was the latest in an irritatingly long line of thickos to darken his door. He never acknowledged me when I greeted him and he commanded his wife to get him things, snapping his fingers. He would often go off on one talking about young people’s lack of standards and moral decline. On reflection he can’t have been much older than 40. I remember thinking that his manners were far worse than any young person that I knew.
He was the dad of a very good friend and I spent a lot of time at their house – usually steering well clear of him. I never saw him smile – but he would start many of his statements “what I find highly amusing is…”.
How very unfortunate for your friend to have to suffer a total cunt for a dad.
I’m pleased to say my dad and all of my friends’ dads were pretty much OK (subject to the usual disclaimers).
Yes, I was lucky to have a nice dad. Some mate of mine might be sprawled on our couch on a Sunday morning after a night out and my dad, who was always up by 7, would not bat and eyelid. I’d come downstairs and a cooked breakfast and tea would be well underway for him.
Late to the debate but I always assumed that “my bad”, derived from some adult delivering “Am I Bad?”, in an infantile manner in an effort to get off the hook by being cute…maybe imagine Sherilyn Fenn circa Twin Peaks saying it. (I’d struggle to find the modern equivalent and I know my audience). In time the conflated version took on a life of its own.
It’s also possible that once upon a time a genuine infant uttered “My Bad”, instead of “Am I Bad?” and the parents found this so impossibly adorable that they told people who told people who started to use it ironically and it went viral, eventually becoming part of the language.
Going back to the original post, there are more annoying phrases in the English language – many more. My most despised phrase seemed to take off among the younger set in that there England a few years ago but thankfully never made it to Ireland – “a bit of me”, as a means of expressing a liking for something eg. “that new Brian Eno album is a massive bit of me”. I’m not making this up. If you’ve never heard it, you’re fortunate and probably less cool and happening than I am.
It doesn’t “annoy” me when people use what are perfectly well known and widespread expressions. If I don’t like them (eg FPO, GLW), I simply don’t use them myself. As a frequent user of virtually all the modern terms that grind the blog’s gears, I generally take the view that a bit of variance in use of language is a good thing.
I think “my bad” comes from the African American community, and was popularised by the excellent Clueless. What I’m insinuating here is that if you don’t like it, you’re probably a bit racist.
I steer clear of “Civilian” because it reminds of where I first heard it used; by fashion industry clowns like Naomi Campbell, presumably to differentiate the dangerous and complex work they were doing vs the rest of the general population, who will never know the difficulties of eating a single pea for dinner and walking in a straight line.
I’m sure that there are many on the blog who use it in an ironic manner, but I can’t shake the association, and also the suspicion that it’s a replacement term for the old, slightly sneery references to “people who only buy three records a year”. The latter presumably made redundant by the prevalance of streaming services, which have resulted in many of us buying zero records per year.
I still love zippity zoppity, show me the boppity. Now there’s an expression whose time has well and truly come…
I’ve been rolling it round in my mouth and now I’m confused. I can read your phonetic spelling two ways – do you say “bye-oh-pic” or “bye-op-ic”? I normally say it the first way, as in “bye-oh-graphy”, but now I think I’m developing a complex and for the rest of my life I will resort to increasingly desperate circumlocutions to avoid saying it at all.
Well blimey o’riley, there’s a conundrum and a half. I alway say as you, PS, it now seeming so wrong. I think I’ll drop the pic from now and just say bio.
BTW, is it any good, the Miles bio? Or the Hank one? Strangely I find the idea of hunky man’s man Hiddlestone playing raddled consumptive Hank a bit odd. Sort of like Arnie playing Ian Dury.
You know that little gesture people do with their elbows when they’re choosing coffee in Starbucks? And it’s always accompanied by a high, mewling sound, and then someone “chatters” their teeth and says SLOAT, pronouncing it SLOW-HAT?
There’s a football website that’s a real el dorado for crap usage of English.
The whole gamut is there. Americanisms: do the math/ as far as/ step up to the plate/rain check/ going forward/ etc. and best of all, that loathsome thing with a list of questions, each followed by check. Check?
Mangled phrases: flaunt the rules/ he wasn’t phased by it/ might of/ etc.
Inability to use present perfect: has went/ etc.
The aggressive openings: look/ listen/ so/ etc.
Worst is, and seemingly everywhere at the moment, the return of whence (invariably rendered as “from whence”.) There’s your answer to “is there a more annoying phrase in the English language?” then, Wheaty. It’s from whence.
I get the language-changes-get-over-it-angle. really. Sometimes, though, it’s just thickos trying to appear knowledgeable, innit?
Absolutely. Current pet hate is when an attacker gets away from defender with quick change of direction he “drops a shoulder”. Thickos trying to appear knowledgable is correct. See also:
– In the hole
– False nine
Almost everyone uses ‘absolutely’ in television interviews, especially when lay people are being asked leading questions. Watch any, for example, antiques programme with a documentary slot in the middle where an ‘expert’ tours a local museum. Place a bet with yourself before the curator is interviewed how many times he or she will start a reply with ‘absolutely’. It’s typically 3 or 4 in a two minute interview. Once you start noticing ‘absolutely’ you will be unable to stop noticing it. Everywhere.
The objection to these football-related expressions is not so much that they are clichés but more that they are invariably used in an attempt to acquire an air of knowledgeability/ superiority, of being in the know, in the loop, on the inside track (there’s a few more clichés for ye). And saying “drops a shoulder” intead of “turns” is just utter pish…
Dropping a shoulder isn’t the same as turning. It’s a feint used to create space. But I suspect that’s your point.
The one I dislike that’s recently become popular is “when you cross that white line”. Partly because it’s an NFL expression, and far better suited to that sport, but mainly because it gets used by half wits like Robbie Savage and other members of the Cult of Really Wanting It to suggest that playing football involves some sort of transcendent mental state.
Got it, thanks! Not being a football “fan” (finger-waggle) I really enjoy commentatorese. “Dropping the shoulder” is a new one for me and I shall use it indiscriminately.
This is great! I’ll be able to join in the “soccer” threads with the rest of the “lads”! I see that Arsenal have dropped only five points at home against bottom-half sides; they are 12 points behind leaders Leicester!
Buffy?
Certainly that is where I got used to it. But I have no idea whether they originated it.
If that is the source then fair enough.
Language should develop through mass appeal programmes like that which are watched by a particular age group (obviously not me).
Isn’t that just a translation of Mea Culpa? Bloody Latins, coming over here with their new-tangled txtspk.
I too was told it came from Buffy.
Similarly I hate it.
If anyone ever says it to me now, I always reply “Your bad what?”
Stupid conversation then ensues explaining bad is an adjective not a noun. What the difference is between adjective and noun. Wondering what these people were taught when they were six.
There has been the odd occasion when I have used ‘my bad’, usually ironically to demonstrate the yawning chasm between me and the kids of today.
I was once asked your question, “Your bad what?” I glowered and growled, “My bad self.” The discussion ended right there.
It’s changed. As things often do. It’s now a noun -or- an adjective. There are other words that have done so in the past, no doubt.
You’re welcome to decline to use it as a noun, if that is your preference.
It’s just a bit of verbal shorthand to cover a number of circumstances where the speaker is admitting fault. It may be replaced by something more to your liking or even more annoying at some future point.
These words and phrases go in and out of fashion as time progresses. I mean nobody says “forsooth” any more because the usage changed. Or “fab” “groovy” and “gear”. It’s no biggie, dude.
Oh good. Can we do the “I hate modern language” thing again? It’s always a tonic.
If you don’t want to join in, you don’t have to.
You modernist, you.
Can’t you even, Bob?
I simply cannot.
I don’t mind the AW doing its Grumpy Old Men routine but seriously, we must’ve had this exact thread about 4 times since the relaunch.
But never mind. Maybe we could just turn it into a massive list of YouTube videos and order will be restored.
well jackson
How nice of you to even take the time to bother to patronise us, Bob.
I for one am flattered.
You’re quite welcome. I can do it some more if you’re up for it?
Patronise away, old bean.
Just because it is modern does not make it right.
Just because it’s modern doesn’t make it wrong.
Did someone mention a lengthy list of totally irrelevant YT videos? My pleasure!
Rayvon from Barbados with My bad, He was a mate of Shaggy’s and the song is a tad better than one might have expected.
It is from 2002, so the phrase has been around for quite a while.
I don’t mind it. Similarly I refuse to believe that the phrase ‘Can I get….’ is anything other than a perfectly polite, non-irritating and lucid request. As you were.
“Can I get” is also nasty IMHO
“I would like” takes no more effort.
But *I would like* makes no sense – how do you know you ll like it until you’ve eaten drunk whatever it? What you mean is I would like you to give me – which is longer. Can I buy… is is accurate and the same length but no-one says it.
This reminds me that, when learning French at school, we were told that in a shop you said, “Give me.” Which seemed, at best, direct and possibly a little rude.
“Can I have?” sounds better, surely?
Can I get a witness?
Oops – I meant to post that beneath Tigger’s post – can I get an edit function?
“Can I” would invariably evoke a “yes, you can, but I don’t know whether you will” from my mother. May I is the phrase you seek.
Marvin was being grammatically correct, @badartdog. He was asking if he was capable of getting a witness. In other words, is there a witness available. He wasn’t asking permission.
Similarly, I suspect you aren’t actually capable of creating an edit function. You are making a plea to the mods to put one in place, not asking to make one yourself.
The appropriate reply here would surely be “My Badartdog”
I have never understood why “Can I get….” induces apoplexy in a certain constituency of the AW. Utterly bafflingly. And I’ve understood (most of) Pale Fire.
Of course you are capable of getting something (except under exceptional circumstances). You are asking for permission, “may I…?”
You’re my brother?
If one can’t grump pointlessly about “kids today” here, where can we grump? My simile collection (Keef or iggy for drugs, ELP for pretense, Mahavishnu for complexity, Status Quo for idiot simplicity) is now beyond repair, but who are the modern equivalents so i can show myself down with the kids, of exquisite taste, and still, in my own way, hip?
Not saying “hip” for a start…
Why not use coxa?
Am I the only one who really dislikes GLW and FPO?
No – it reeks of the golf club.
It reeks of Partridge, ironically.
IIRC, FPO came about from a podcast where Mark Ellen remembered a friend using it. GLW makes me think of Reggie Perrin for some reason.
Coogan and Iannuci recall while doing location scouting for 2nd series of Partridge Coogan wearing a flat cap into the golf club bar, ordering a drink and being huffily scolded by a member “Hats off at the bar”
FPO n GLW is very 70’s BBC light entertainment – and nobody wants that these days
Whenever I hear those terms, I’m always reminded of this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjaMs_ioJPA
or their bastard offspring
Thanks DFB. Not seen or heard of that before and have just been watching the whole episode on YT.
No.
Rarely used these days.
FPO was a funny non gender based acronym IMHO!
No.
No.
Ono.
You don’t love me and I know now.
Nope.
I also dislike “civilian”.
That too. It’s the sort of thing wanky actors say to set themselves apart from the common herd. Twats.
I think it was Liz Hurley who popularised the term ‘civilian’ in an interview.
I like “civilian” and use it at every opportunity.
It perfectly describes your in-laws, your workmates and all those you encounter who don’t inhabit your world of music or share your intimate knowledge and burning passion.
Why, I bet they couldn’t even reel off all the Beatles B-Sides without resorting to Google. Huh, civilians!
Yes, I dislike civilian as well. There’s nothing worse than someone who thinks an interest in music makes them superior. It’s the sort of thing most of us grow out of in our teens.
I thought it was a term used by actors, more especially celebrity actors, to distinguish themselves from the common herd.
Fair comment @jimCain. But has anyone a synonym that refers to members of the public who do not have a fanatical and embarassingly obsessive interest in popular culture?
I don’t know about you, but I find it a wonderful thing to be able to refer to the lyrics of a rather obscure Mothers of Invention song or a fast Show sketch in an OP and know that someone will know what I’m talking about.
The esteemed (in my collection) mr. Zappa has in fact used the term “Civilian” in a song lyric. “In France”.
“We’re playin’ in a tent.
It’s payin’ the rent.
Pooch a civilian, it’s a major event.
In France
Waaaay down in France.”
(featuring guest artist Johnny ‘guitar’ Watson)
“Not Suitable For Work.”
Somewhat insulting to people of the French disposition.
He’s right about the bogs though.
Yeccchhh.
Ha ha, and I’ll tell you summat else, an’ all. I don’t know how many “hole in the ground” khazis there still are in the gay city of Paris, but when I lived there there were still quite a few, and they were known as “Turkish” toilets. This is brilliant, isn’t it? When I pointed out that they in all probability hadn’t been made in and imported from Turkey for the use of Turks (who were presumably throwing the hated pedestal WCs out of the window), the French used to get rather grumpy about it. I pointed out further that the French were globally famed for these toilets and soap-dodging generally, before going on to say that Joan of Arc was asking for it. I don’t live there any more.
We had them too. This one stood in the middle of the road near where I grew up in Sheffield until the slum clearance of the early 60s.
http://i.imgur.com/rPJflQJ.jpg
“There’s nothing worse than someone who thinks an interest in music makes them superior. It’s the sort of thing most of us grow out of in our teens.”
Fuck, I thought it was our zeitgeist, Jim
I don’t think I’ve used civilian but I’ve always assumed it to be self deprecating when used here by others.
Me too. How wrong I was to use what I innocently thought was a little self mockery on a site that no one who isn’t thoroughly music-obsessed has even heard of.
Mea culpa, brother eyestrain. There I was finding some of these terms mildy amusing, and yet it seems I’ve been guilty of using all sorts of non-U expressions, without even realising it. I’m off to grow out of my teens, amongst other forms of penitence, before I dare put digit to keyboard again.
You’re bad.
You’re nationwide.
I use “civilian” in the sense of “normal, well-adjusted”. I am the one with the problem. Like when I was at a course and the facilitator put on relaxing music while we were doing our work. Of course I concentrate totally on the music – I wanted (needed) know who it was. When I asked, the guy doing the course shrugged in a slightly amused way. He didn’t know. Correctly, he deemed it to be irrelevant. He’s a civilian.
Great anecdote BC. That’s the way we are. Magnificently obsessed.
But with sufficient self-distance to realise, I hope, to understand we are a little bonkers to take joy in such things.
There’s nothing magnificent about it.
At last! A moan I can join I with! Mildly amusing once, about ten years ago, pretty unpleasant used repeatedly. If that’s how you really feel about your significant other I believe divorce forms you can fill In yourself are available online.
No
This thread is on fleek.
I let most of this stuff go, it doesn’t really bother me but I do like to tease my son when he says “sick” meaning good. It just seems wrong.
My other pet hate is garage pronounced “garridge” but I would never comment on it in company.
Serious question: how do you pronounce garage? Your phonetic description sounds like the usual Scottish pronunciation.
Oh dear. This is why I wouldn’t normally comment as I don’t mean to offend and I know garridge is a common pronnounciation. Ahem, the closest I can get would be “garraahj” if that makes sense.
In the Simpsons, Moe says garage and pronounces it “ga-raj”.
Homer mocks him, putting on a posh voice saying “oh hallo I’m Moe, I have a ga-raj.”
Moe asks – “well what do you call it?”
Homer’s eyes dart in panic and says “er, the car hole”.
Brilliantly (and this is why The Simpsons rules) someone later on in an entirely unrelated scene uses “car hole” instead of “garage”.
“Adopts Monty Burns voice” Excellent.
Not sure if this vindicates me or makes me a ponce.*
*Dont answer that……
Well, David Cameron would call you ‘poncey’, but then again that’s nothing compared to some of the adjectives I would apply to him. http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/apr/27/david-cameron-mocks-nigel-farage-over-poncey-foreign-sounding-name
Standing in a garage doesn’t make you a Christian.
You’re a bit posher than people round my way, obviously, Dave. Which is nothing against you. One speaks as one is taught, generally.
It’s universally Garridge around here (Watford). You do occasionally hear it as Ga-Raj when luvvies are being interviewed on the telly. Or on Radio Four.
I grew up in North Harrow, not that far from Watford.
Not far from the sadly-no-more (demolished and redeveloped) Rayners Hotel in Rayners Lane, then. I went to many a good gig there.
I used to go out with a lovely girl from North Harrow. Sadly, her parents didn’t take to me at all and the romance was therefore doomed. Ah well.
Rayners Lane! Living between Pinner and Eastcote, I knew it well @Mike_H. I frequently went to the cinema there on Saturday afternoons. It’s now a temple or church of some kind.
I once saw my great idol, Viv Stanshall, at that pub which is on the way to South Harrow.
Mention of South Harrow reminds me of the now sadly defunct record store Sellanby on the High Street. It was a good shop.
http://i.imgur.com/43nAwOc.jpg
I used to go into Sellanbys on a Saturday afternoon pre CD. Very smoky and dark with ashtrays on the racks. They always had multiple copies of Ogdens Nut Gone Flake in the round sleeve, Blind Faith and the Average White Band album.
The amazing thing was that “Sellanby” was the owner’s real name! Keith Sellanby, pronounced Sell-un-bee.
If he’d been selling bees instead of records he’d probably still be in business today.
Well, it was always a hive of activity in the shop.
Were you droning on about The Beano album ?
People were swarming to hear what I had to say!
You’re a proper buzzkill.
Are you taking apis?
Possibly The Tithe Farm? It had a night club next door called Bogarts in the 80s. Also demolished now.
Bullseye! Thanks @davebigpicture. The very one.
How Viv came to have a gig there, I’ll never know. I’m just very glad that he did. Probably not his finest hour, but I’m glad to have seen him once.
@Martin Hairnet – he’d probably still BEE in BUZZYNESS now.
Excellent work BC! Let this be a lesson to all Keiths who don’t pay their rent.
Actually, you’re joking about this, but the Sellanby’s (Keith and Maureen) first business venture was bee-related! “Sellanby’s Home-Made Honey” was run from their farmhouse home in Iver, Bucks. for many years.
Sweet!
This seems relevant…
http://youtu.be/e1YKFV45M18
Nothing wrong with My Bad (language evolves, get over yourself) , everything wrong with GLW and FPO.
I’m with Kaisfatdad – civilian used in context within this forum is perfectly acceptable.
Thanks for the support @Lodestone of Wrongness.
But it does look as though the term “civilian” is used by golf-playing thespians, and if we use it we may be branded as Friends of Liz Hurley. Or have our names linked with some other sizzling siren of the silver screen.
Personally, I do find it rather useful to have a word that refers to those who are not very familiar with Mavis Staples, Megatron, Manfred Mann, Pino Daniele, Young Thug, Lonnie Donnegan, Crowded House, Ice Cube, Roman Polanski, just Cause, Dangermouse, Half Man Half Biscuit, Ron Manager, Elis Regina, Bagpuss, Alizee, the Conchords, Mariza, Göran Kafjes, Dr Strange, Teenage Fanclub, Basil Brush, Bloodborne, Dr John, Sigur Ros, Jack Kirby, Jo Nesbo, Antonello Venditti and Pencilsqueezer.
But I guess that’s just me
I am not familiar with several of those names. I guess that makes me a civilian. Quite frankly, I think I prefer it that way.
Sorry @ruff-diamond and anyone else who baffled by a few names on my list! It was late at night, I was a little BriCameroned and was being deliberately obscure with a couple of them.
Then again, I’m sure we all have bands, writers, films, video games, TV programmes, painters etc that we know very well who are totally unknown to almost everyone else here. Discovering about some of these is one of the pleasures of coming here.
The Afterword civilian test.
I want 60 seconds on each of the names here please, without hesitation, repetition or deviation. Time starts NOW!
Dave Aerni, Joan Baez, John Beck, Molly Bee, Richard Berry, Charles Brown, Clarence “Gatemouth” Brown, Teddy Bunn, Albert Collins, David Crosby, Skip Diamond, Willie Dixon, Eric Dolphy, Don & Dewey, Bob Dylan, Bill Evans, Johnny Franklin, Ernie Freeman, Gene & Eunice, Vernon Greene, Buddy Guy, Slim Harpo, Chuck Higgins, Joe Huston, Bobby Jamieson, Don Julian, Terry Kirkman, Roland Kirk, Chatur Lal, Preston Love, Junior Madeo, Steve Mann, Little Arthur Matthews, Barry McGuire, Big Jay McNeely (“Cecil James McNeely”), Charles Mingus, Vic Mortenson, N.C. Mullick, Johnny Otis, Joe Perrino, Elvis Presley, Bob Reiner, Sabicas, Ravi Shankar, Jim Sherwood, Frankie Lee Simms, Guitar Slim, Lightnin’ Slim, Alice Stewart, Don Vliet, Donald Woods.
Ouch! Time for me to hand in my Afterword uniform and head back to civvy street. I know about half of those names. And could say something interesting about five of them.
Go on then. Say something interesting.
Better still – post a hundred ‘interesting’ YouTube clips and respond enthusiastically to your own posts.
You fucking rotter!
*posts Bill Grundy You tube clip.
*Responds manically to own posts
You would catch me doing that.
Oh no.
I know very few of those names. I think I am a lowly Private in this army.
Bear in mind there are different regiments and different corps with different skills. JC represents, of course, the lowly foot soldiers, integral mules of the military, cannon fodder even, reliant on a limited repertoire of guitars and drums.
(I rely on Corporal Cat of the sappers to tell us of the link between this song and one of his favourite beat combos.)
Wasn’t here a moment in the past when the world got confused and “Bad” meant “Good”?
Language – constantly developing, I’m just an old git that can’t keep up anymore. At least when the lexicon was enhanced by Only Fools & Horses and Allo Allo I could get the reference point.
Deja-Vu
Not keen on CSNY?
For my part I would treat with disdain anyone who said balcony when what they should have said is balcony.
“I could care less” – it doesn’t even make sense you halfwit
An ugly phrase but it does make sense, grammatically. Maybe the speaker -could- care less. How much do they care when uttering the phrase? Not much, one would assume, but who knows? Perhaps there’s yet scope for caring even less than it would appear.
I think it means “I could care less – but I don’t”. Sort of makes sense.
Html fail.
Similarly, that other irritating American habit of starting every sentence with “You know what?” as in “You know what? Just forget it!”
Still on an American – I listen to a lot of podcasts from very smart young Americans and, almost without exception they will always say “anyways” instead of “anyway”. I can’t understand where the stray “s” comes from as it sucks meaning out of the word.
Another pet peeve is people who start a sentence without knowing whether the word they are going to need is “understate” or “overstate”, but when they get there they seem to flip a mental coin and hope for the best. Being kind, they seem to confuse themselves by using the negative word “impossible”, as in: “it’s impossible to overstate/understate the importance of…
Save yourself the grief of saying exactly the opposite of what you mean by just saying the same thing another way..
Another American expression which bothers me no end is the insistence on shortening New Year’s Eve/Day etc to simply “New Year’s”.
It doesn’t make sense – “Are you coming over for New Year’s?”
Don’t think that’s American. “What you doing for new years?” is a perfectly understandable and normal question where I am.
Mind you, I do know a lot of ‘civilians’.
yeah, definitely in common use around these parts as well. In fact, we will sometimes – shock – shorten it even further, to just “new year”.
“what are you doing for new year, KD?”
“I expect I will go to bed about eleven, just out of spite, and then be woken to watch fireworks an hour later. Probably grumpily acquiesce, get up, have a moan to bring everyone else down, and then silently consider mortality, and how, since this exact same thing happened last year, I and everyone I know have moved approximately forty two million heartbeats closer to death.”
“Nice one”
New Year is fine. It’s that apostrophe “s” that turns it into nonsense
I’ll cleave to that.
My Dad’s (and possibly my Grandfather’s, not sure) response to “You know what?”
“Cold potatoes ain’t hot?”
I dunno either, but I’m going to use it with my kids too both to annoy and confuse them. That is part of being a Dad.
‘Could care less.’ The WORST.
That said, I definitely heard the goalie on my footerball team in upstate New York use the term “my bad” – in apologising for a howler- in the summer of 1987. His three Irish defenders fell about laughing, but I have to say I’ve used it non-ironically ever since. (To all intensive purposes.)
I remember hearing ‘my bad’ on an episode of Oprah (I know) WAY before Buffy was around. The exact circumstance was a black guy saying ‘I’m sorry my brother, my bad’ to someone in the audience. It stuck in my memory because I hadn’t heard it before and it sounded rather cool to my Warwickshire ears (TMFTL).
As a child, I was admonished strongly by a friend’s father by saying “ad-ver-tize-ment” instead of “advert-issment”. He may well be right but it was the tone of the admonishment that got me. Delivered as always, as if I was the latest in an irritatingly long line of thickos to darken his door. He never acknowledged me when I greeted him and he commanded his wife to get him things, snapping his fingers. He would often go off on one talking about young people’s lack of standards and moral decline. On reflection he can’t have been much older than 40. I remember thinking that his manners were far worse than any young person that I knew.
He was the dad of a very good friend and I spent a lot of time at their house – usually steering well clear of him. I never saw him smile – but he would start many of his statements “what I find highly amusing is…”.
How very unfortunate for your friend to have to suffer a total cunt for a dad.
I’m pleased to say my dad and all of my friends’ dads were pretty much OK (subject to the usual disclaimers).
Yes, I was lucky to have a nice dad. Some mate of mine might be sprawled on our couch on a Sunday morning after a night out and my dad, who was always up by 7, would not bat and eyelid. I’d come downstairs and a cooked breakfast and tea would be well underway for him.
Late to the debate but I always assumed that “my bad”, derived from some adult delivering “Am I Bad?”, in an infantile manner in an effort to get off the hook by being cute…maybe imagine Sherilyn Fenn circa Twin Peaks saying it. (I’d struggle to find the modern equivalent and I know my audience). In time the conflated version took on a life of its own.
It’s also possible that once upon a time a genuine infant uttered “My Bad”, instead of “Am I Bad?” and the parents found this so impossibly adorable that they told people who told people who started to use it ironically and it went viral, eventually becoming part of the language.
Going back to the original post, there are more annoying phrases in the English language – many more. My most despised phrase seemed to take off among the younger set in that there England a few years ago but thankfully never made it to Ireland – “a bit of me”, as a means of expressing a liking for something eg. “that new Brian Eno album is a massive bit of me”. I’m not making this up. If you’ve never heard it, you’re fortunate and probably less cool and happening than I am.
‘My bad’ is a statement rather than a question, so I think more likely to be a variation on ‘my mistake’ or ‘my fault’.
Stronzo.
κώλος
Cornuto!
So
So-so.
You so-and-so
It doesn’t “annoy” me when people use what are perfectly well known and widespread expressions. If I don’t like them (eg FPO, GLW), I simply don’t use them myself. As a frequent user of virtually all the modern terms that grind the blog’s gears, I generally take the view that a bit of variance in use of language is a good thing.
I think “my bad” comes from the African American community, and was popularised by the excellent Clueless. What I’m insinuating here is that if you don’t like it, you’re probably a bit racist.
I steer clear of “Civilian” because it reminds of where I first heard it used; by fashion industry clowns like Naomi Campbell, presumably to differentiate the dangerous and complex work they were doing vs the rest of the general population, who will never know the difficulties of eating a single pea for dinner and walking in a straight line.
I’m sure that there are many on the blog who use it in an ironic manner, but I can’t shake the association, and also the suspicion that it’s a replacement term for the old, slightly sneery references to “people who only buy three records a year”. The latter presumably made redundant by the prevalance of streaming services, which have resulted in many of us buying zero records per year.
I still love zippity zoppity, show me the boppity. Now there’s an expression whose time has well and truly come…
‘Probably a bit racist’ ? What a load of Tommy Rot, Bingo.
I don’t like rap. Does that make me racist?
Yes.
I am disappoint.
( deleted )
(I think there’s a chance Bingo was joking, Rob.)
(not being entirely serious myself, Bob )
My bad.
😉
aaaaaaaaaAAAAAAARRRRRGGGGHHHHHH !!!!!!
Well that’ll clear your sinuses
I do hope so. Otherwise his brains have turned to marmalade, what with all this heat.
Bizarre comment regarding racism.
That’s exactly what a massive racist would say.
I am not sure they would so I guess you have a different view of the world to me.
Fair enough. Sarcasm doesn’t really work on here does it.
Here’s one. ‘Biopic’.
As in, ‘the new Miles Davis biopic, Miles Ahead’..
I pronounce it ‘bye-opic’.
Most people, including actors I’ve heard interviewed, pronoun it ‘bio-pic’.
Who is right?
I’ve been rolling it round in my mouth and now I’m confused. I can read your phonetic spelling two ways – do you say “bye-oh-pic” or “bye-op-ic”? I normally say it the first way, as in “bye-oh-graphy”, but now I think I’m developing a complex and for the rest of my life I will resort to increasingly desperate circumlocutions to avoid saying it at all.
I would go with the latter, assuming your own pronunciation sounds like you are bidding farewell to the former MP Lembit Opik (‘Bye Opik’)
I say bio-pic, as in biographical-picture. Bye-opic sounds all wrong to my ears.
I’m with mini.
(If only)
You naughty man.
I actually eschew “biopic” entirely in favour of “Film with Michael Sheen speaking in a silly voice”
*stares around in panic*
How come football people on the radio now promise to ‘keep you across’ all the action?
I preferred it when they just kept us ‘in touch’ with what was going on.
‘Jumpers for goalposts’ etc. contd. p94
Well blimey o’riley, there’s a conundrum and a half. I alway say as you, PS, it now seeming so wrong. I think I’ll drop the pic from now and just say bio.
BTW, is it any good, the Miles bio? Or the Hank one? Strangely I find the idea of hunky man’s man Hiddlestone playing raddled consumptive Hank a bit odd. Sort of like Arnie playing Ian Dury.
Bobbins. Is that good or bad? Sounds good to my ears.
I love bobbins, but it should be used sparingly, and in conjunction with the more sweeping ‘bag of shite’.
Cuh! Kids these days.
Meh
I’m not sure why, but I hate to hear that a certain fact “is key”.
You know that little gesture people do with their elbows when they’re choosing coffee in Starbucks? And it’s always accompanied by a high, mewling sound, and then someone “chatters” their teeth and says SLOAT, pronouncing it SLOW-HAT?
I’ll do time if I see that again.
No, I don’t know it. Tell us about in precise, memory evoking detail.
Tell about what?
Coffee bollocks is rife in the UK.
Bring back Gareth Hunt.
It’s too contagious.
Personally I prefer “I am a cunt’. It means the same thing.
you know steve, you speak an awful lot of sense.
I like ‘my bad’ being out there so that cunts are out in the open, visible for all to see.
There really are a lot of “cunts” on the AW this weekend. Two of them are mine, I think.
What does FPO stand for? I googled it and it says Fleet Post Office or For Position Only.
Also I thought the phrase was ‘muy bad’ as in ‘very bad’, and so was Hispanic in origin.
FPO = Fun Prevention Officer
I am quite literally the most PC person on this site but I have to say that that is the gayest phrase Ive ever seen.
Gay, gay, gay.
Actually never heard anyone using FPO. Except on here.
It really is a ghastly term, only superseded by the dismal ‘GLW’, which always makes me think of DLT.
There’s a football website that’s a real el dorado for crap usage of English.
The whole gamut is there. Americanisms: do the math/ as far as/ step up to the plate/rain check/ going forward/ etc. and best of all, that loathsome thing with a list of questions, each followed by check. Check?
Mangled phrases: flaunt the rules/ he wasn’t phased by it/ might of/ etc.
Inability to use present perfect: has went/ etc.
The aggressive openings: look/ listen/ so/ etc.
Worst is, and seemingly everywhere at the moment, the return of whence (invariably rendered as “from whence”.) There’s your answer to “is there a more annoying phrase in the English language?” then, Wheaty. It’s from whence.
I get the language-changes-get-over-it-angle. really. Sometimes, though, it’s just thickos trying to appear knowledgeable, innit?
BTW, I’m with Locust on bye-opic.
Absolutely. Current pet hate is when an attacker gets away from defender with quick change of direction he “drops a shoulder”. Thickos trying to appear knowledgable is correct. See also:
– In the hole
– False nine
Absolutely. Not to forget:
– Asking questions of this defence
– Pull the trigger
– Entitled to go down
The problem, Declan, is that it’s almost impossible to avoid clichés that debase the language. In your own comment, for example:
– a real el dorado
– crap usage
– whole gamut
– I get (etc)
Stephen G uses “pet hate” and “absolutely”, a very football commentator term, which you repeat.
That site sounds interesting, though – can you link it?
Almost everyone uses ‘absolutely’ in television interviews, especially when lay people are being asked leading questions. Watch any, for example, antiques programme with a documentary slot in the middle where an ‘expert’ tours a local museum. Place a bet with yourself before the curator is interviewed how many times he or she will start a reply with ‘absolutely’. It’s typically 3 or 4 in a two minute interview. Once you start noticing ‘absolutely’ you will be unable to stop noticing it. Everywhere.
Absolutely.
The objection to these football-related expressions is not so much that they are clichés but more that they are invariably used in an attempt to acquire an air of knowledgeability/ superiority, of being in the know, in the loop, on the inside track (there’s a few more clichés for ye). And saying “drops a shoulder” intead of “turns” is just utter pish…
Dropping a shoulder isn’t the same as turning. It’s a feint used to create space. But I suspect that’s your point.
The one I dislike that’s recently become popular is “when you cross that white line”. Partly because it’s an NFL expression, and far better suited to that sport, but mainly because it gets used by half wits like Robbie Savage and other members of the Cult of Really Wanting It to suggest that playing football involves some sort of transcendent mental state.
That’s exactly what a massive Raceyist would say
http://i1150.photobucket.com/albums/o615/JohnDetail/image_zpsn3skmu4r.jpeg
Always preferred Roy’s more sensible-looking 80s incarnation with the neat side parting, meself.
WTF’s happened to his legs?
I’m sick of the massive raceyists on this site…
The lead singer of Racey looks like John Lydon in this screen grab.
Roy and his rival look like Big Star on a day off.
Any excuse to post this @Bingo Little
Dion Dublin: man of the people.
“Sure thing” HPS, it’s Football365. One of the better ones.
BTW @H.P. Saucecraft
Got it, thanks! Not being a football “fan” (finger-waggle) I really enjoy commentatorese. “Dropping the shoulder” is a new one for me and I shall use it indiscriminately.
A tip. You’re bound to enjoy the mediawatch section.
This is great! I’ll be able to join in the “soccer” threads with the rest of the “lads”! I see that Arsenal have dropped only five points at home against bottom-half sides; they are 12 points behind leaders Leicester!