Rant 1 Contined - Nicknames and Misused Words

One thing that really bothers me is something I hear often, especially in the sports world. It is the use of the word "The" in the making of a shortened nickname for a sports venue. The Cleveland Indians, for example, do not play home gsmes at Jacobs Field. They play at "The Jake". The Tampa Bay Rays no longer use Tropicana Field. They use "The Trop". Even the University of Connecticut sports announcers have fallen into the pit. What was built as Rentschler Field has come to be called "The Rent". Aaarrrggghhh!


I long for the day when a venue is purchased by a shittake mushroom conglomerate. Can you hear it now? "Welcome fans to todays game from the...well...you know...


Here are a few other words that are consistently misused by people and by a media that should be better educated on meaning and usage. I give thanks to George Carlin for some of the following.


The English word forte, meaning "specialty" or "strong point," is not pronounced "for-tay." Got that? It is pronounced "fort." The Italian word forte, used in music notation, is pronounced "for-tay," and it instructs the musician to play loud: "She plays the flute, and her forte [fort] is playing forte [for-tay]." Look it up. And don’t give me that stuff "For-tay is listed as the second preference." There’s a reason it’s second: because it’s not first!


Irony deals with opposites; it has nothing to do with coincidence. If two baseball palyers from the same hometown, on different teams, receive the same uniform number, it is not ironic. It is a coincidence. If Barry Bonds attains lifetime statistics identical to his father’s it will not be ironic. It will be a coincidence. Irony is "a state of affairs that is the reverse of what was to be expected; a result opposite to and in mockery of the appropriate result." For instance:


If a diabetic, on his way to buy insulin, is killed by a runaway truck, he is the victim of an accident. If the truck was delivering sugar, he is the victim of an oddly poetic coincidence. But if the truck was delivering insulin, ah! Then he is the victim of an irony.


Darryl Stingley, the pro football player, was paralyzed after a brutal hit by Jack Tatum. Now Darryl Stingley’s son plays football, and if the son should become paralyzed while playing, it will not be ironic. It will be coincidental. If Darryl Stingley’s son paralyzes someone else, that will be closer to ironic. If he paralyzes Jack Tatum’s son that will be precisely ironic.


I’m tired of hearing prodigal being used to mean "wandering, given to running away or leaving and returning." The parable in the Book of Luke tells of a son who squanders his father’s money. Prodigal means "recklessly wasteful or extravagant." And if you say popular usage has changed that, I say, popular usage is not always correct usage!


The phrase sour grapes does not refer to jealousy or envy. Nor is it related to being a sore loser. It deals with the rationalization of failure to attain a desired end. In the original fable by Aesop, "The Fox and the Grapes," when the fox realizes he cannot leap high enough to reach the grapes, he rationalizes that even if he had gotten them, they would probably have been sour anyway. Rationalization, that’s all sour grapes means. It doesn’t mean deal with jealousy or sore losing.


Proverbial is now being used to describe things that don’t appear in proverbs. For instance, "the proverbial drop in the bucket" is incorrect because "a drop in the bucket" is not a proverb, it’s a metaphor. You wouldn’t say, "as welcome as a fly in the proverbial punchbowl," or "as cold as the proverbial well-digger's ankles," because neither refers to a proverb. The former is a metaphor, the latter is a simile.


Momentarily means for a moment, not in a moment. The word for "in a moment" is presently "I will be there presently and then, after pausing momentarily, I will offer you an English usage book."


No other option and no other alternative are redundant. The words option and alternative already imply otherness. "I had no option, Mom, I got this F in English because there was no alternative." This rule is not optional; the alternative is to be wrong.


A light-year is a measurement of distance, not time. "It will take light years for young basketball players to catch up with the skills of Michael Jordan,"is a scientific impossibility. Probably in more ways than one.


An acronym is not just any set of initials. It applies only to those that are pronounced as words. MADD, DARE, NATO, and UNICEF are acronyms. FBI, CIA, and KGB are not. They’re just paranoid organizations.


I am probably I’m fighting a losing battle with this one, but I refuse to surrender:
Collapsing a building with explosives is NOT an implosion. An implosion is a very specific scientific phenomenon. The collapsing of a building with explosives is the collapsing of a building with explosives. The explosives explode, and the building collapses inwardly. That is not an implosion. It is an inward collapsing of a building, following a series of smaller explosions designed to make it collapse inwardly. Period.


A cop out is not an excuse, not even a weak one; it is an admission of guilt. When someone "cops a plea," he admits guilt to some charge, in exchange for better treatment. He has "copped out." When a guy says, "I didn’t get a date with her because I reminded her of her little brother," he is making an excuse. If he says, "I didn’t get a date with her because I’m an unattractive twit," he is copping out. The trouble arises when an excuse contains a small amount of self-incriminating truth.


This one is directed to the sports people: You are destroying a perfectly good figure of speech: "Getting the monkey off one’s back" does not mean breaking a losing streak. It refers only to ending a dependency. That’s all. The monkey represents a strong yen. A loosing streak does not compare even remotely. Not in a literary sense and not in real life.


Here’s one you hear far too often: "The proof is in the pudding." Well, the proof is not in the pudding; the rice and raisins are in the pudding. The proof of the pudding is in the eating. In this case, proof means "test." The same is true of "the exception that proves (tests) the rule."


Don’t make the same mistake twice seems to indicate three mistakes, doesn’t it? First you make the mistake. Then you make the same mistake. Then you make the same mistake twice. If you simply say, "Don’t make the same mistake", you’ll avoid the first mistake.


Unique needs no modifier. Very unique, quite unique, more unique, real unique, fairly unique, and extremely unique are wrong and they mark you as dumb, although certainly not unique.


Healthy does not mean "healthful." Healthy is a condition, healthful is a property. Vegetable aren’t healthy, they’re dead. No food is healthy. Unlesss you have an eggplant that’s doing push-ups. Push-ups are healthful.


There is no such thing or word as kudo. Kudos is a singular noun meaning praise, and it is pronounced kyoo-dose. There is also a plural form, spelled the same, but pronounced kyoo-doze. Please stop telling me, "So-and-so picked up another kudo today."


Race, creed, or color is wrong. Race and color, as used in this phrase, describe the same property. And "creed" is a stilted, outmoded way of saying "religion." Leave this tired phrase alone; it has lost its usefulness. Besides, it reeks of insincerity no matter who uses it.


As of yet is simply stupid. As yet, I’ve seen no progress on this one, but of course I’m speaking as of now.


Are you speechless yet?