Language Atrocities: Incorrect Idioms

Want to know how to spot a non-reader?

1) Their TV is tuned to Fox News

2) They use insipid cliches and eye-wateringly commonplace phrases

3) Those very cliches and phrases are misspoken or misspelled on a regular basis

Por exemplo:

"For all intensive purposes, you make a mute point. It's first come, first serve and I could care less if their mother-in-laws hone in on me as an escape goat. To be pacific, supposably, my plan has passed mustard and we're going to get off scotch-free!"

Please excuse me while I scream into the void for a full minute.

Let's forget for a moment that English is a constantly evolving, amorphous ball of loan words, malapropisms, vowel shifts, homonyms, synonyms, contronyms ("WHAT ARE THOSE?!"), and nonsensical grammar rules (BOLDLY GO sounds so much sexier than GO BOLDY, Mr. Spock). I do love a good neologism if it's useful enough, but there's something to be said for at least attempting to participate in the lawful good mechanics of the English idiomatic universe (not as sexy as the Marvel Cinematic Universe, I'll admit, but not much is sexier than Benedict Cumberbatch, amiright?)

Now, I'm not about to list every way people get English turns of phrase wrong and how to mitigate future stumbling blocks. There are plenty of listicles on the intertubes full of them. I invite you to go down that Buzzfeed rabbit hole on your own time. Instead, I am going to propose a radical, holistic approach to make a discerning person such as yourself sound less cornfed: READ. MORE.

Books (fiction, non-fiction, doesn't matter), magazines with a high text-to-photograph ratio, long-form online articles about terrible architecture, Audible novels, science podcasts, pamphlets handed to you by an old-timey town crier. I don't care. As long as it exceeds your current daily consumption of literary material, you might just be alright in the end.

Step away from YouTube. Give Netflix a night to chill. Tell Alexa to play your favorite instrumental Pandora radio station and read something by someone who has an editor. This way, you will encounter exotic specimens in the wild, collect them in the book and volume of your brain, then learn how to properly sprinkle them into your otherwise milquetoast conversations without incurring the wrath of Lt. Data fangirls like me who cringe more at mispronunciations of "aesthetic" than at the sight of myriad autopsies on The X-Files.

Before you roll your eyes at how I just committed a serious pleonasm just now, be aware: at least it was grammatically correct, and I am too proud of my sly Hamlet reference to give it a trim. Cormac McCarthy isn't the only one who can knit a paragraph into a single endless sentence, you know. I'm an ass too.

So, if you're serious about toning your language muscles, may I suggest several episodes of "The Allusionist?" It's my favorite word-nerd podcast in which an honest-to-God dictionary is cracked open on a regular basis. For real, you can hear pages fluttered and the book clapped shut every time. It's really a beautiful thing.

Thank you for your kind attention. Now back to basking in third-season Fox Mulder (possibly the sexiest Fox Mulder, even though fourth-season Mulder had the most perfect hair ever... *girly sigh*). Goodnight. Trust no one.

P.S. I cannot explain the high Ryan-Gosling-to-Fox-Mulder ratio tonight; Ryan Gosling isn't even one of my boyfriends. He's just so meme-able, you know? *shrug*

#LanguageAtrocities #advice