Thursday, February 10, 2011

Buzzwords (phrases): At the end of the day



 Next time you watch a city council meeting or the Webb county commissioners in action, count the number of times they say "at the end of the day".  It may not be the latest catch phrase but it sure is pervasive. Let me suggest some alternatives. For example, instead of saying "at the end of the day, the bloggers are geniuses", why not try "When all is said and done, the bloggers are geniuses"?. Another good one would be "after considering all the evidence, the bloggers are geniuses". You get the picture.

 Not since our elected officials took to using the word entities as if they were tyring to rack up frequent-user miles, has a buzzword (buzzphrase) gotten so much mileage. Before that, the term monies instead of simply "money" or "funds" was also a favorite with local politicos. The trend of turning nouns into verbs also continues. It's no longer "the city will be our partner in this", now, it's "we'll partner with the city on this". Also, instead of the noun growth, we now use it as a verb: we're hoping to grow our business 10 percent".

Incidentally, I decided to do a quick check to see if there was a list of the most overused words or phrases. Sure enough, the one I chose to write about topped the list. The following list was put together by Oxford University. Take a look and see if you are using any of the following buzzwords. At the end of the day, you might just improve your writing and speaking skills.

The top ten most irritating phrases:
1 - At the end of the day
2 - Fairly unique
3 - I personally
4 - At this moment in time
5 - With all due respect
6 - Absolutely
7 - It's a nightmare
8 - Shouldn't of
9 - 24/7
10 - It's not rocket science

4 comments:

  1. The phrases (over)used doesn't bother me as much as a speaker's hand gestures.

    There's this thing that politicians do: they try to highlight a talking point by extending their thumb and index fingers, in a somewhat curved position. That irks me like you wouldn't believe.

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  2. I get what you mean. I think Raymond does the old Clinton hand gesture where he bends his index finger and rests his thumb on it. It's like he's holding an invisible magnifying glass.

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