What are your pet peeves re English usage?

my doctor used to say

"and how are WE?"

It wasnt so much the use of the first person plural that irritated me, it was the fact that he hoped I'd been on the web and could give him a full clinical diagnosis of whatever ailment it was, leaving him just to write out the prescription. Actually he was a really nice bloke.

Currently awaiting replacement. I got in BIG hot water round the pub because I said I hoped I didnt get one of these Islamist doctors specialising in neurosurgery and carbombs.

Do I have the right to express a preference? Supposing I was Jewish, I might feel uncomfortable about seeing a Muslim GP.

Steve 41oo wrote:

my doctor used to say

"and how are WE?"

It wasnt so much the use of the first person plural that irritated me, it was the fact that he hoped I'd been on the web and could give him a full clinical diagnosis of whatever ailment it was, leaving him just to write out the prescription. Actually he was a really nice bloke.

Currently awaiting replacement. I got in BIG hot water round the pub because I said I hoped I didnt get one of these Islamist doctors specialising in neurosurgery and carbombs.

Do I have the right to express a preference? Supposing I was Jewish, I might feel uncomfortable about seeing a Muslim GP.

Funny you should say that Steve, I visited my GP this morning (it's somebody different everytime I go) and he was an Asian man. I don't know of which faith. We were discussing holidays and I said I wanted to visit New York again and that one of the things I wanted to go and see was Ground Zero. He looked at me disapprovingly, shook his head and said "what do you want to go there for?" to which I replied "well, to pay my respects."

I was uncomfortable with his attitude.

I can't understand why anybody wants to go anywhere.

Yes. How about "literally" where "figuratively" is required.

My head literally exploded.

John was literally beside himself with rage.

Yes but since that meaning is plainly bonkers, I ignore it.

And so should you.



I can't good Sir or I'd be denying part of my language, unable to comprehend certain speech or effect certain aspects of meaning.


I do not mean of course (in my previous remark) that "figuratively" should be substituted in such cases, nor can it be. Simply that "literally" means, well just that. So my head did not actually explode.

I think your dictionary writer has gone too far. It's a bit like the modern habit of saying "bad" to mean very good.

Could be.

I say, you shouldn't necessarily be swayed by the latest pronouncements of the trendy online dictionary folks. They are all trying to outdo each other in trendyness and up-to-the-minuteness and are all to willing to fall for the latest jargon and hyperbole, putting it in print before it has passed the McTag test.