Location: 543 miles west of Paradis,1491 miles eas Gender:
Posted:
May 14, 2019 - 9:09am
ScottFromWyoming wrote:
For some reason, the corner of my (admittedly outsized) desk nearest the middle of the room is the de facto "community space" for kleenex, thank-you cards, a candy dish, a pair of pliers, small potted plants, etc.
I take no responsibility for the well-being of any of it and am sometimes chided for the state of things there but I can't seem to find any reason to care.
Put it all in a box and place it on the cowworkers desk.
For some reason, the corner of my (admittedly outsized) desk nearest the middle of the room is the de facto "community space" for kleenex, thank-you cards, a candy dish, a pair of pliers, small potted plants, etc.
I take no responsibility for the well-being of any of it and am sometimes chided for the state of things there but I can't seem to find any reason to care.
So is just the latest in a few hundred years of sentence openers, words that serve little function other than getting the speaker's mouth in gear before throwing out actual words.
The first known written use of so as a sentence opener is in several lines of Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde, published in the mid-1380s, for example:<1><2> So graunte hem sone out of this world to pace (So grant him soon out of this world to pass);
Like, Well, Say, Um, Er, Fuck, Jesus, Okay, Listen, Look,
Getting hung up on that one SO (as I do, too) says little about the speaker, because it's literally nothing, and a lot about the listener. :shrug:
Yes, it is an opening/thinking type word, but old Geoffrey's use seems closer to one synonym of "so", which is "therefore". The beginning of the speaker's piece has a valley-girl-like "so" as a response to a direct question before he goes into that annoying present tense narrative about events of almost 200 years ago. Perhaps I would've begun my sentence with "well", which is an empty, "crutch" word, though one definition is as an exclamation. I know that just the use of "so" at the beginning of a sentence isn't necessarily ungrammatical; sometimes it implies something like "So, what are am supposed to do now?" or "So, as I understand it..." The "so" introduction on NPR is so common that I can almost ignore it, but that "historical present" affectation makes listening almost unlistenable for me. It might have been kind of fun to have been able to start a sentence with the word "say": "Say, have you got a light, mac?" "No, but I've got a dark brown overcoat."
An otherwise interesting story on NPR about recent sales of Hugo's novel in France. What was annoying to me were two things: The guest - film critic Andrew Lapin - beginning his story with the word "so"(he may as well have used the word "like"), then proceeding to speak about Victor Hugo writing the book and events of 1831 entirely in present tense ("historical present"). What purpose is there in speaking of the past in present tense? It almost always comes across as a cheesy gimmick or a set-up to a bad joke ("A priest and a sea turtle walk into a yoga studio...") to me.
I thought it was just me that noticed everyone 30 and under uses "SOOOOOOOOOO" at the beginning of everything that comes out of their mouth. WTF is that about? I hear it in business meetings at the start of just about every explanation or progress report. Overhear it every time my kids have their social media up too loud or are just talking to their friends and even hear it on the news programs I can stomach. It's grammatically improper and annoying. Is this just something we are going to have to deal with from this generation? I am sick of the entire working and professional world rolling over to these CHILDREN! I sound like a bitter old hag but dammit, we had to conform to the working world in my day, not the other way around! They talk about their life/work balance like it matters to me. Do your job or stay home. You have two choices! Sorry to hijack but as you can tell I am truly bugged by this BS everyday.
So is just the latest in a few hundred years of sentence openers, words that serve little function other than getting the speaker's mouth in gear before throwing out actual words.
The first known written use of so as a sentence opener is in several lines of Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde, published in the mid-1380s, for example:<1><2>
So graunte hem sone out of this world to pace (So grant him soon out of this world to pass);
Like, Well, Say, Um, Er, Fuck, Jesus, Okay, Listen, Look,
Getting hung up on that one SO (as I do, too) says little about the speaker, because it's literally nothing, and a lot about the listener. :shrug:
An otherwise interesting story on NPR about recent sales of Hugo's novel in France. What was annoying to me were two things: The guest - film critic Andrew Lapin - beginning his story with the word "so"(he may as well have used the word "like"), then proceeding to speak about Victor Hugo writing the book and events of 1831 entirely in present tense ("historical present"). What purpose is there in speaking of the past in present tense? It almost always comes across as a cheesy gimmick or a set-up to a bad joke ("A priest and a sea turtle walk into a yoga studio...") to me.
I thought it was just me that noticed everyone 30 and under uses "SOOOOOOOOOO" at the beginning of everything that comes out of their mouth. WTF is that about? I hear it in business meetings at the start of just about every explanation or progress report. Overhear it every time my kids have their social media up too loud or are just talking to their friends and even hear it on the news programs I can stomach. It's grammatically improper and annoying. Is this just something we are going to have to deal with from this generation? I am sick of the entire working and professional world rolling over to these CHILDREN! I sound like a bitter old hag but dammit, we had to conform to the working world in my day, not the other way around! They talk about their life/work balance like it matters to me. Do your job or stay home. You have two choices! Sorry to hijack but as you can tell I am truly bugged by this BS everyday.
An otherwise interesting story on NPR about recent sales of Hugo's novel in France. What was annoying to me were two things: The guest - film critic Andrew Lapin - beginning his story with the word "so"(he may as well have used the word "like"), then proceeding to speak about Victor Hugo writing the book and events of 1831 entirely in present tense ("historical present"). What purpose is there in speaking of the past in present tense? It almost always comes across as a cheesy gimmick or a set-up to a bad joke ("A priest and a sea turtle walk into a yoga studio...") to me.
This has been a problem that really pisses me off in the past where I work. Diesel exhaust makes me gag the same way cheap or over done perfume does.
Our building is old and there was a huge draft / air leak in the back, since been sealed up. I would go outside to the truck and reach inside and turn the truck off. Never had a run in with any of the drivers, it was mostly one truck in particular. But the guy got the message. Nowadays, most of the trucks I see running around here are certified California clean idle and they make a difference. And they generally shut them off now, too.
Japanese people have a nasty habit of always driving with the aircon on, even if the weather is great. So my neighbour is about to leave, or has just arrived, and sits outside with her car running, aircon on, and my windows are open. I have to reminder her twice a year not to do that.
She's a baseball mum, so her son's friends' moms turn up and do the same, leaving the car running while they stand outside chatting.
It's such a serious problem here that many convenience stores, located next to apartments, had to put up signs telling people to park forward not backwards (backwards is the norm) due to the fumes from workers sitting inside their company cars with the aircon on continuously.
Memo to the sales staff: If a customer asks for something fancy and I spend 6 hours on it, your job is to sell it. Not tell the customer, "I don't really like it." Because they loved it but you said what you said so they used it once and now I get to spend another 6 hours on another grand idea.
Memo to the sales staff: If a customer asks for something fancy and I spend 6 hours on it, your job is to sell it. Not tell the customer, "I don't really like it." Because they loved it but you said what you said so they used it once and now I get to spend another 6 hours on another grand idea.
Neighbours who leave their vehicles idling for anywhere from 10 minutes to 2 hours. That applies to folks in the downtown village area too.
Bright side? At least nobody steals abandoned idling automobiles in this town.
No roads out of town?
Two highways out of town. 2-lanes each. Most theft in the village centre area appears to result from out-of-towners. Outsiders. I mean, don't outsiders annoy you unless you happen to be an outsider?
why not reach in the window and put the thing in drive and watch it roll away?
White American women might be able to get away with that (and if you can, I encourage you to do so) but old smelly white dude me? I don't think so.......
