One of the things raising our two children did for me was keep me (relatively) young. Not that I, as a seventy-year-old man walk around in FUBU jeans and I-have-no-idea-what-for-a-shirt.
As they grew up and I grew old, I discovered more and more we shared less and less of a common vocabulary but that was sort of okay since I can dimly remember doing the very same thing to my parents (I can see my old man grinning as I type that, not so much because it's humorous but because one or both of is an asshole).
I knew I had reached codger when 'you're welcome' was replaced by 'no problem;' actually when I became angry (not annoyed) that mostly young people responded with that when I did say 'thank you,' somehow curdling the milk of human kindness in my veins when so doing.
The youngsters have continued to take over and makeover the language and all we geezers can do is become apoplectic at its applications and outcomes I guess. Between spluttering and muttering, I don't know what other courses of action we have. I read with equal parts sorrow and disappointment, not that long ago a paragraph in, of all places, the New York Times about a celestial event of some kind with the phrase, 'and here are the deets.'
Yeah, that one really pisses me off. As do folks who say 'totes' for 'totally,' because perhaps it's faster? Seriously? We have a marvelous and complex language and we use such a pathetically small percentage of it. And a percentage of what we do use isn't even real.
But you know that expression, 'cheer up, things could be worse,' they are, it seems.
I'm starting to think The Loon and The Ox got the better part of the deal by exiting early. K?
-bill kenny
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