What are you most excited about in 2010?
There are several things I am excited about in the coming year.
I am most excited about traveling. I have a trip to Costa Rica planned with my best friend (and possibly my kids, not sure yet) and a family trip to Florida planned.I love traveling and depending on how much I get back from my settlement for my car accident I might do more than just those two trip this year.
I am also excited about the fact that I found a special job training program for my son who has Aspergers Syndrome. He will go spend a couple weeks away this summer and he will be paid for the training. It gives me hope that he won't be stuck in some menial retail job his whole life. He is honor roll in school so he has no intellectual problems, his problems are all in how he relates to other people.
Also exciting is that fact that my son will be driving soon. He was old enough to drive a year ago, but I never got the money together for him to take the classes, but soon I will have the money so soon he will be driving. One more step toward being a normal teenager.
I am excited about the fact that I plan to get my website back up and running. I took it down about seven years ago. The one I am putting back up is about a third the size of my old one, but I figure you have to start somewhere.
I think this is the last one. I am excited that I am finally going to get my basement remodeled so the master bedroom will finally be able to be moved into. Right now it is just framed in and has no walls, same with the family room down stairs. Finally my house will be complete....hmmm...now if I could do something about my dinky kitchen.
Lake Superior State University has released its annual list of "banished words"; words they consider trite, overused, annoying, or a combination of all three. Following below is the list, with my comments in italics:
SHOVEL-READY
"Apparently, the generally accepted definition of this phrase is to imply that a project has been completely designed and all that is left to do is to implement it...however, when something dies, it, too, is shovel-ready for burial and so I get confused about the meaning. I would suggest that we just say the project is ready to implement.” – Jerry Redington, Keosauqua, Iowa.
"Stick a shovel in it. It's done." – Joe Grimm, Bloomfield Hills, Mich.
I'd like to take a shovel upside the head of the person who coined this obnoxious phrase.
TRANSPARENT/TRANSPARENCY
"In the lexicon of the political arena, this word is supposed to mean obvious or easily understood. In reality, political transparency is more invisible than obvious!" -- Deb Larson, Bellaire, Mich.
Someone throw a blanket over "transparent".
CZAR
Long used by the media as a metaphor for positions of high authority, including “baseball czar” Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis, appointed by team owners as commissioner-for-life in 1919. U.S. president Woodrow Wilson had an “industry czar” during World War I. Lesser-known “czar” roles in government during the last 100 years include: censorship, housing and oil czars in 1941; rubber czar in 1942; patronage czar (1945); clean-up (1952); missile (1954); inflation (1971); e-commerce (1998); bioethics, faith-based and reading czars (2001); bird flu (2004); democracy (2005); abstinence and birth control czars (2006); and weatherization czar (2008).
I thought the Russians took care of "czars" in 1917.
TWEET
And all of its variations…tweetaholic, retweet, twitterhea, twitterature, twittersphere….
Jay Brazier of Williamston, Mich. says she supposes that tweeters might be "twits."
Personally, I'd go for "twats", myself.
APP
"Must we b sbjct to yt another abrv? Why does the English language have to fit on a two-inch screen? I hate the sound of it. I think I'll listen to a symph on the rad." -- Edward R. Bolt, Grand Rapids, Mich.
Put "cr" in front of "app" and you get crapp!
SEXTING
Sending sexually explicit pictures and text messages through the cell phone.
"Any dangerous new trend that also happens to have a clever mash-up of words, involves teens, and gets television talk show hosts interested must be banished." – Ishmael Daro, Saskatoon, Sask., Canada.
A "word" spoken by those who aren't getting the real thing.
FRIEND AS A VERB
Came into popularity through social networking websites. You add someone to your network by "friending" them, or remove them by "unfriending" them.
"'Befriend' is much more pleasant to the human ear and a perfectly useful word in the dictionary." – Kevin K., Morris, Okla.
I pretty much hate any noun that is made into a verb and vice versa.
TEACHABLE MOMENT
What might otherwise be known as 'a lesson.'
"It's a condescending substitute for 'opportunity to make a point,'" says Eric Rosenquist of College Station, Tex.
So, portions of time are now capable of being taught, hmm?
IN THESE ECONOMIC TIMES….
"Overused and redundant. Aren't ALL times 'these economic times'?" -- Barb Stutesman, Three Rivers, Mich.
I think this stuffy phrase has outlived its fifteen minutes of overuse.
STIMULUS
"Everything in the news is about the stimulus packages...it is no longer a grant, it's stimulus money, stimulus checks, etc. I think it is just being over-used." Teri Heikkila, Rudyard, Mich.
I've got your "stimulus package" right here!
TOXIC ASSETS
"Whatever happened to simply 'bad stocks,' 'debts,' or 'loans'?" -- Monty Heidenreich, Homewood, Ill.
This list wouldn't be complete without an oxymoron.
TOO BIG TO FAIL
"Just for the record, nothing's too big to fail unless the government lets it." Claire Shefchik, Brooklyn, NY.
Tell this to the owners of the Titanic!.
BROMANCE
"I am sick of combined words the media creates to make them sound catchier. Frenemies? Bromances? Blogorrhea? I'm going to scream!" – Kaylynn, Alberta, Canada.
I've been lucky to have never heard this one before.
CHILLAXIN'
"Heard everywhere from MTV to ESPN to CNN. A bothersome term that seeks to combine chillin' with relaxin' makes me want to be 'axin' this word." – Tammy, Sault Ste. Marie, Mich.
What? Does this mean to put an axe into the refrigerator?
OBAMA-prefix or roots?
The LSSU Word Banishment Committee held out hope that folks would want to
Obama-ban Obama-structions, but were surprised that no one
Obama-nominated any, such as these compiled by the Oxford Dictionary in
2009: Obamanomics, Obamanation, Obamafication, Obamacare, Obamalicious,
Obamaland….We say Obamanough already.
Let's bomb all the Obama coinages.
My personal contribution to this year's list would be:
FAIL used as a noun.
For example, a football team loses big in a game and it's dubbed "an epic fail". This one made me grind my teeth the first time I heard it. It may be an "epic failure", but it's NOT an "epic fail".
What's your New Year's resolution for 2010?
I don't make resolutions other than the one I make every year and have no trouble in fulfilling: to get laid as often as possible!
2009 hasn't been one of my better years. My finances have become increasingly tighter this year -- I'm nearly as broke now as I was in college -- and I remain underemployed in a state with a high unemployment rate. I've spent much of the year robbing Peter to pay Paul just to barely make minimum payments on my bills. My son also lost a good job this year, and he has yet to find permanent employment.
I ended an important relationship this year out of necessity, yet I still miss her to this day. Intellectually, I know it was for the best, but my body tells me differently.
I also lost one of my cats this year and I likewise mourn his loss.
On the plus side, I remain healthy, and no one has died in my family or among my friends this year. That's always something to celebrate.
I finally paid off my car loan, so that should help to ease my finances a bit in the new year.
Plus, my "social life" is still as active as ever which is, again, always a reason to celebrate.
But I can safely say I'll be glad to bid 2009 good riddance and I look forward to see what 2010 will have to offer. I offer no resolutions, as it's not in my nature to do so, except to say that I will be alert to whatever opportunities present themselves in the new year.
So I've been meaning to do a post on Ms. Fiona for a while now but due to other happenings (read: life) I haven't quite found the time. So see as thought I have a few minutes (lucky you) I decided to do a little write up.
In all truth, I was playing in Twitter land earlier today and noticed one of my followers complaining about her song "And It Kills Me". Now, quite frankly that song is the best one off of her effort "The Bridge". I'll explain what I mean by this as I get further along.
For those of you that are unfamiliar with her work, you may want to start with the "Anti-Mixtape" she did with Questlove. This was recorded at Questlove's personal studio I do believe. The recording contains minimal production (live band...and a damn good one at that) and is very much focused on Melanie's vocals. The second I heard this recording I was in love. Quote me on this Melanie Fiona's vocals are SICK. The combination of her vocals backed by Quest and the gang was definietly a treat to listen to. As a matter of fact, I prefer her mixtape with Questlove over her album. Yes you read that right. Her album...well...no bueno. I feel where she was trying to go, I just think her team didn't get the vision. As with many artist, she was a victim of over-production (ask Sade about this...Soldier of Love ring a bell?). She has a voice that doesn't need to hide behind tracks that were treated with a heavy hand in the production department. But hey...
Enough talking...on to the sounds. If you follow the link below, it will take you to her Anti-Mixtape she did with Questlove. You. Will. Not. Be. Disappointed.
http://www.honeysoul.com/wp/2009/07/melanie-fiona-mixtape-preview-and-download/
The above video is her preforming a quick verse from "Somebody Come Get Me".
This video is her cover of India.Arie's "Ready for Love".
Enjoy!
While reading a message board the other day, I saw a thread about New Year's resolutions and rolled my eyes. My first thought was that nearly everyone would resolve to "lose weight" in 2010, as that particular resolution is typical and ubiquitous. There's absolutely no originality about it at all.
Sure enough, I was right. Every person who had posted on the thread put weight loss on their list. I seriously doubt that every person who posts on that large message board is in need of weight loss, hence my rolling of eyes. But no one ever wants to gain weight or just doesn't care one way (weigh?) or the other how much they weigh. No,everyone resolved to lose weight, even if they were underweight.
And what annoyed me most about this is not so much the desire to lose weight, but rather the ubiquity of this resolution and the total lack of originality in coming up with a list of resolutions, not to mention the ubiquity of New Years' resolutions themselves.
I got to thinking and I realized that it was ubiquity in general -- the ever-present, the predictable, and the typical -- that is at the heart of my annoyance. It connotes a lack of original or creative thinking and reeks of a lemming-like ordinariness. Thinking further, I thought of other examples of ubiquity that irritate me.
One example is the fact that nearly every rock band, without question, contains only two types of instruments: guitars and drums. Why do we not see wind instruments on a more regular basis? Why not pianos? There's nothing wrong with guitars and drums, per se, but the ubiquity of the guitar-and-drums-only bands annoys the crap out of me. I can't help but think of how much more opportunity for creative music is lost because most rock musicians just stick to the same ol' thing, instrument wise.
One petty example of ubiquity is that whenever you see a couple sharing a motorcycle, the woman is always the one on the back. What? Is this a freaking law or something? You think they'd want to switch up now and then for a little variety. A funny example of ubiquity is that whenever you are driving behind construction workers in a pickup, they always have a yellow plastic water dispenser with a red lid on top. Never any other colors.
Feel free to list other example of ubiquity in the comment box, particularly the kinds that irritate you..
