'Tis the season for non-stop football viewing and, once again, something there is that grates. A small thing; but aren't those the most effective at annoying?When did "of" and "in" get replaced with "on?" That was his fifth interception on the year. He now has a hundred rushing yards on the game. Nor is it limited to football: the word is u-fricking-biquitous. I'm pretty sure it got started less than ten years ago, didn't it? And now they all (high-paid pros and local high school pronouncers alike) use it as if it's always been the way.
Stop it. Just stop it. And that's the one and only time I'll say it on the year.
.
I think it must be fairly recent as it hasn't appeared on my Early Warning Screen of Annoying Phrases...My Top 5...
ReplyDelete1: "It is What it is"
2: "Back in the Day"
3: "Nome Sane"
4: "Dawg"
5: "The Ball will be placed on the ONE FOOT LINE" THERE IS NO EFFIN ONE FOOT LINE!!!!!
"Waiting on line" always grated when I lived in and around NYC. "*In* line," please. (Now I live with someone who "queues.")
ReplyDeleteLanguage Arts teachers across the globe are having panic attacks hearing the incorrect prepositions being used, I'm certain.
ReplyDeleteI've given up completely complaining about the butchery of our native tongue. It's so u-frigging-biquitous that one simply cannot spare the energy it takes to be outraged. I need that energy for other things.
ReplyDeleteBaysage: which explains the "sage" in your moniker.
ReplyDeleteAs a guy who spent a year in VietNam, I enjoy the sports similies to war escapades, such as:
ReplyDeleteBlitz
Defender
Obliterated him
He threw a bomb
He exploded through that tackle
We're in sudden death now
Oh-oh, looks like a Saint is
wounded down there
They've had lots of casualties this
season on the O line
He's a real field general, that Eli
They're digging in for allout war
There's no more ammunition left for
the Jets
This is just plain slaughter
The guys won it in the trenches
That QB gives them real firepower!
He (like I) was drafted in round 1
Time to bury this entire season
and many, many more...gotta love
your NFL. National Felon League
Do they do it "on accident"? Argh.
ReplyDeleteInterestingly the same move has been happening in Danish for the last 15 odd years (recency illusion! frequency illusion!).
ReplyDeleteThere's an old saw: "When God had invented languages, along came the Devil and tossed in prepostions."
Little logic to the idioms so they're ripe for variation. Wailing against inevitable change is a fruitless.
I used to be a prescriptivist, but I'm feeling much better now.