Electron-ic
I was on the verge of posting a complaint about the misuse of the phrase "quantum leap" to mean a large change in a state of affairs, when a genuine quantum leap is anything but a large change.

But then it occurred to me that, most of the time, the change being (mis)described is anything but large - so the perpetrator of this linguistic crime invariable outs himself as being more concerned with presentation than substance anyway.

So I don't know whether to be angered by the scientific illiteracy, or smug about the unwitting honesty.
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 10:33, 3 replies)

Mangling the English language
My charming wife, The Fragrant Mrs Scaryduck, bless her, has a dreadful habit of getting certain words wrong.

* Liable: "How dare she say that! Couldn't we sue her for liable?"

* Lozenger: "Suck on this lozenger, and your sore throat will get better."

* Dribble: "Stop talking dribble, you're making no sense at all."

* Consummated: "Those houses next to the church, do you reckon they're built on consummated ground?"

And the clincher:

* Tubberware: "Don't touch that Tubberware container - it's got the dog's dinner inside."

Being a complete and utter pedant, I have only had my head stoved in with a frying pan six or seven times. Eight at most.
( Scaryduck LIKES EGG, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 10:30, 9 replies)

Oi You
When I used to work in shops I lost count of how many people used this to attract my attention.
Clearly the cretins have never heard of "Excuse me"
(FootOfTim, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 10:30, 2 replies)

People who claim to be random.
You're not random, you're doing everything you want to do to look cool. If you were truly being "random" why hasn't your skin fallen off you fucking r-tard.
(Maccy Divided by 0 on, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 10:28, 1 reply)

mea culpa, mea maxima culpa
Brilliant phrase from a former senior boss who was a bit of a stern headmaster type, but an all-round good egg:

"We don't want Ad Hockery to become the Modus Operandi"
( The Vomiting Hitchhiker Mephistopheles is such a mouthful in Manhattan, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 10:23, 1 reply)

Idea not Ideal
My ex (from Bristol) would say "Good ideal" instead of "Good idea". Fucking idiot.
(spazmataz mong-a-long-a-ding-dong, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 10:22, 7 replies)

Call centre monkey - "could you confirm your address?"
Larry -"No: I can tell you my address, and you can confirm it." Every time. I used to give a little lecture on transitive/intransitive verbs, too.
( Larry Vest One day at a time, sweet Jesus, FFS., Fri 9 Apr 2010, 10:20, 5 replies)

"Can I ask you a question?"
You just have! Why bother asking permission to ask a second one when you presumed it would be fine to ask me the first? While we're about it, how the hell am I supposed to know whether I will be happy for you to ask me this second question without knowing what it is?
( Draconacticus Reject shampoo. Demand real poo!, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 10:12, 2 replies)

Sorry
The future Mrs Claude Speed hates it when i say "sorry"

Mrs: "Stop saying Sorry"
Mr: "Sorry"
Mrs: *smacks Mr Speed in the head*

sorry babe
(Claude Speed was a Roman called Claudius Speedicus, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 10:09, 3 replies)

Only once will I say this...
"Action" is NOT a verb.

I will quite happily do something or, sometimes, get something done. I will not action something.

Say it again and I may action a punch to your face.
(MrOli is ugly, but in the morning you will be sober, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 10:07, 1 reply)

Tonight
all those Leinster twats will be going for a Heino at Keilo's

Hope Clermont Auvergne stuff their cunty faces.
( The Scrunt Wants a Dozen Pints, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 10:06, Reply)

banal...
being pronounced like a popular bumsexualist bedroom sport.
(hotpiss is very much liking your popping musics, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 10:03, 2 replies)

Should of
"I should of gone to the pub."
NO NO NO - it's:
"I should have gone to the pub"
I blame the apostophe for that - "should've" sounds like "should of"
(FUXTIX Not my words, Carol, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 9:59, 4 replies)

Waiters and waitress...
Hey Guys
What can I do you for guys?
Table for two? certainly guys.
What would you like to drink guys? May I recommend the Merlot Savginon.
Real ales?? Well guys, we have Deuchars ale, its a real creamy, dark sweet ale.

Here are your drinks guys?
Are you ready to order yet guys?
Kippers and cheese tart? Good choice, good choice.

Any starders guys?
No starders? No sweat guys.

Here are your meals guys, just let me know if you need anything else guys. ENJOY!

Hey guys are you finished? Was everything fine for you guys?

Can I tempt you with our sweets guys?
No? No sweat guys.

The bill? Sure thing guys, sure thing.

I hope everything was sadifagtory for you guys. Catch you layder guys.

[No tip for that fud.]
( The Duke of Prunes, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 9:52, 4 replies)

Words for the vadge
Mrs Biscuit has got a right thing about having to call her ladybits "pretty" names.

She dislikes hairy clam and ladycave, but she has an allergic reaction to clunge and mimsy. I have no idea why, but when I try and be romantic and utter things like "Mmm, can I play in your mimsy" I don't get anything but a stony-faced grump-monster. I'm also forbidden from speaking of the fabled game of hiding the sausage in the nipsy, but that's for different reasons.

Needless to say, she does not like b3ta.

Perhaps I need a new Mrs. Biscuit.
(airbiscuit last dropped a meaty one in the lift on, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 9:45, 16 replies)

Can we sit down on...
This is not to be followed by a chair, the floor or anything physical that you could actually park your posterior on but by some abstract concept.

E.g. could we sit down on the Fosters project?

No, because a) it doesn't exist in a real world sense and is therefore unable to provide a reaction equal to the mass of my body, b) You have breath that always smells of dog biscuits and c) I've not done any work on it as I've been too busy reading b3ta.
(bigjonnydynamite, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 9:44, 2 replies)

Due to the internet, the symbol @ having become shorthand for the word at
when it really means "at a rate of". Do you need to abbreviate a two letter word?
(Cave Duck, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 9:42, 5 replies)

alot, abit, infact, in tact
what were you people DOING in primary school?

(because i, with my irrational use of the shift key and full stop, am any better? hmm. good point)
( spacefish bong!, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 9:40, 5 replies)

Reprise on the "4" theme.
There's a post down there about the misuse of the figure "4" to stand for "for". It's a horrible trend.

But I've seen worse. In Stoke, there's a cheap'n'nasty cosmetics shop called "Parfums 4 Vous". It's possibly the most imbecilic thing in England.
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 9:38, 11 replies)

OK, OK
OK

I realise this is slightly off topic but this needs to be said.
And I'm only going to say it once.

It's
Nu-cle-ar

and it's
Es-press-o

Must try harder, Britain.
(LeSingeVert : left handed since slightly before, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 9:37, 1 reply)

Fingered
My girlfriend hates the word 'fingered'. Personally, I think it's great. Anyone else think that fingering is going out of fashion nowadays? Bring back fingering, I say. It would help reduce teenage pregnancies.
(Monkey the Chicken Twitter: death_stairs, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 9:35, 5 replies)

Jamie Oliver young and trendy types
"Can I get a Bud?"
No!!! You can have one. Actually, not you can't - drink something better than weak yank pish instead.
(finbarr, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 9:32, 3 replies)

The two most annoying words in the world:
"Sarah" and "Palin".
(WillF http://www.flickr.com/photos/silverfischdotnet/, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 9:30, Reply)

Whoop whoop *shudder*
I fucking hate buzzy bollocks talk. Here are my favourites.

Clapped out old junk on eBay being described as "Vintage".

Any Caucasian teenager using a West Indian accent; especially funny in a rural hostelry in Cornwall the other day "Do you mind if I arx you for some ID?" asked the ruddy faced landlord.

My boss urging us all to "monetise" everything.

How can educated people pronounce perhaps as prehaps?

Old people that decide to pronounce words with their own unique pronunciation. My mum calls Paedos ped-a-files for fucking crying out loud. An Audi is an awe-dee and Richard Madely is mad-leee. In her defence though, she shouts "FUCKING CUNTS AND ARSEHOLES!" and not fudge when she spills a glass of white cider.

My dad calling his mobile his portable. Why is it that my dad is the only man in the Milky Way to do this?

Steve Shite on Radio 2 and his bald twat mate talking over every record that they play and then giving themselves a round of applause at the end.

Gormless wankers who will always be astonished and can't believe that the day after a bank holiday monday is a tuesday, that the middle of the week has come so quickly and on thursday that tomorrow is friday.

"Hey" instead of hi or hello.

Whoop Whoop!!!! On Facebook status updates.
(Croque Monsieur, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 9:29, Reply)

Random.... Are you sure ??
Don’t you hate it when people use the word ‘random’ inappropriately? People sometimes say, “I had quite a random night last night.”

Or they watch a film (let’s say Eyes Wide Shut, a film that isn’t straightforward and so could come across as non-sensical and odd) and proclaim, “That was a random film.”

Let’s get one thing straight. The word ‘random’ means to possess a degree of unpredictability or disorder. Let’s be painfully pedantic and examine the two example claims cited above, and apply this definition to them, and see what we may see.

“I had quite a random night last night.”

Did you?

Did you really?

Really? Did you?

In what way was it ‘random’? Hmm? In what way? Did it exhibit a high degree of unpredictability and/or disorder? What exactly was random about it?

I suspect the answer you would get would be along the lines of stating the locations and/or people involved on this night out. Maybe a few friends went to someone’s house, followed by a trip to the pub, perchance a club, then back to someone else’s house.

This isn’t that random. In fact, I would say it’s actually quite predictable. If you have a night out, this is what usually happens. If you never intended to go out, then the fact that you did could be considered randomly unpredictable, but not that unpredictable.

To make it truly random, there would need to be a high amount of disorder or unpredictability. On a night out, for instance, it is very unlikely that a scale model of the Golden Gate bridge would suddenly appear out of thin air, carried aloft by thirteen enormous grey apes, who would rush at you with said bridge in an aggressive manner, trailing brown custard in their enraged simian wake. This is a good example of an unpredictable event.

A good example of a disordered night out (as opposed to unpredictable) would be if there were events that happened in a haphazard way, with no rhyme or reason. For instance, a group of friends go to the pub, then a circus, then have a close encounter of the third kind with boggle-eyed time shrews, then find some pizza in a field, then learn calculus in a barn from an owl, then get a taxi home, and finally build a fire in the lobby of a YMCA. This would be highly disordered.

As for the statement: “That film was random.”

Well if things happened in it that were unexpected, that’s more surprising than random. Random suggests something with no order, but films do have a narrative most of the time, and so they’re ordered.

If a film was a series of unrelated scenes or images one after the other, that would be random.

But even if a film appeared to be a series of unrelated scenes or images, it might not be. They might actually be related, but you haven’t figured out what the relationship is. You might say the film INLAND EMPIRE is random, but I suspect it has an underlying structure that makes sense of the seemingly random content.

What this last point boils down to is if you think a film is random, it may just be because you’re not clever enough to work out what it means.

So, let’s stop saying, “I had a random night” and “That film was random.”

Let’s instead say, “I had a relatively predictable night, and I didn’t really understand that film.”
(20 InTheStink, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 9:27, 3 replies)

Good for the environment
Lets get this straight - 6 billion people in the world, expodential population growth and marketing trying to get them all to buy the lastest piece of usless fucking consumerist shit. Because it uses 12% less packaging you want us to feel good about saving the planet?

Fuck off
(schrodingers cat now you see me, or not, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 9:25, 8 replies)

"borrow me"
Illiterate cunts. "I want to borrow" or "would you lend me".
Fuck off you skank. Aaaaaaghhhhh!
(Mister_E_Meat was caught sniffing bike saddles at, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 9:21, Reply)

"Prosumer"
Gadgets that cost eleventy billion pounds ten years ago when *you* bought them, but are now affordable by every last schmuck in your town, and his brother, and his dog, so the devices are now called "prosumer", meaning "obsolete shit we real professional pro expert pros wouldn't touch with a fifty-foot pole".

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.
(The 2-Belo OH SHI--[Sound of impact][End of recording], Fri 9 Apr 2010, 9:19, 2 replies)

"The English language is constantly evolving"
Specifically, when used to excuse bad grammar and poor spelling. Yes, we're constantly coming up with neologisms and new ways of expressing concepts. Yes, we use drastically different sentence structure than we did a century ago. Writing "your" instead of "you're", "loose" instead of "lose", "it's" instead of "its" (or vice versa) etc. isn't evidence of the language evolving, it's evidence of a lack of understanding of the basics.
(Vice Admiral Sir Charles Cockbrush KCB MBE DSO, who is finding it increasingly difficult to log into b3ta.com wants to duck your aunt and kick your puppy, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 9:18, 3 replies)

I'll take a rain check on that !
What is a "rain" check anyway?

1) Is there water decending from the sky?
2) A means of restraint, check, or guidance?
3) If the monarch in question is still in power?

Makes no blood sense at all, why should any of the above result in you not participating in an event or outing?
(TwinkleFuckingToes Has a ingrown toe nail, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 9:17, 2 replies)