Nip the tuck

Joy Hepp avers:

When I was writing for my college entertainment magazine I started
noticing other writers using “tucked away” to describe restaurants or
clubs that were located in otherwise boring locations. Now I notice it
ALL the time. The Thai restaurant is tucked away in a dusty strip
mall. UGH!

Editor’s note: this is a close relative of “nestled.”

Cut it out

John Sturgill relates:

I find it really insipid when hair salons use a word play based on the word “shear

  • Shear Fantasy
  • Shear and Shear alike
  • Shearly gorgeous
  • Shear Illusions

Normally I wouldn’t post non-media expressions that annoy people, but this goes out to any headline writers hoping to be clever with the next story about hair styles they have to handle: if it’s lame on a shop window, it’ll be lame in your publication.

(Pop) go the weasels

Heidi attests:

My biggest peeve: I get really annoyed when journalists use “(pop. 200)” (or 29, or 400, or whatever) to underscore a town’s smallness. It’s overused like crazy, and vaguely condescending.

Shark attack

Bruce, who guards his last name zealously, suggests:

The phrase “jumped the shark” has just about jumped the shark by now, I think.

And end to All That…

Joaquin Vargas avers,

I’ve hated this over-used phrase since I was editor of my high school paper:

  • “All That Jazz.”

This is used in headlines for articles that have anything remotely to do with jazz, as in “Sacramento festival has All That Jazz,” or “Local Students Play All That Jazz.” I want to punch something whenever its used in this way.

Like when blog is a verb…

Jeremy Egner despises:

“Hearts and minds”
Any lazy use of a noun as a verb. (“Journal” is the most grating. I
blame Oprah for this one, though I’m not sure she’s responsible.)

In music criticism:

  • Get (his/her/their/your) _____ on” (ironic appropriations of hip-hop jargon make me want to bust a cap in hack critics)
  • Kick out the jams
  • Party like its (year reflecting a specific musical era)” (e.g., a retro disco band “parties like it’s 1979.” a tired rip-off of Prince’s “1999”)

and, finally:
decidedly mixed reviews

O, hydrates

Nonchalant Jen requests:

Please banish “low carb.” I am sick of seeing it on every food item and restaurant menu. I am not on the Atkins diet, the Zone diet or any other miserable diet for that matter, so I don’t want to be looked at like some social pariah for eating a carrot or a piece of bread!

And are people so lazy that they cannot say “ohydrate”?

I’ll never give up my “carbs” or my “ohydrates.”

At the movies

James La Croix advises:

As a movie reviewer for a local weekly, I religiously avoid the following:

No comedy is ever “a non-stop laugh riot,” or “side-splitting.”

No thriller renders me “white knuckled,” puts me “on the edge of my seat,” is “spine-tingling,” or a “non-stop thrill ride.”

Even if it did, in print no melodrama “made me laugh and made me cry.”

And I never metaphorically use some meaningless verb to describe an actor’s performance (e.g. “Halle Berry soars…”).

Close the book on closure

From Linda Demaree:

I am sick of any phrases using the word “closure“, i.e.,
“they need closure”, “they finally have closure”,
etc, etc.

Another fun one is “infrastructure“, which seems
to be the popular byword today. The only problem with it is that
everyone is using it, and using it and using it, ad nauseam- and
largely incorrectly.

I am not a member of the media in any way, however, I felt the need
to add a couple of my “pet peeve” phrases to your list of expressions
which should be banned for life!I hope that someone from the media will think to add these to the list, because quite frankly, when I hear them used or see them in print, I have a tendency to shut out the rest.

Thanks for letting me vent.
Signed,
A Consumer Victim Who Has Finally Found Closure By Being Allowed to
Vent About The Sad Media Infrastructure Which Allows Such Expressions
To Be Used To Excess!

Box this up and ship to Siberia

From Don Hewitt:

There are a number of expressions that really annoy me, both in the
media and everyday speech.

  • “Totally”– To add “totally” to something is redundant
    and ignorant. Can something be in worse condition than to be
    “destroyed?” Could someone be more than surprised? “Totally”
    surprised means…….?
  • “Win-Win” situations. What ever happened to “mutually beneficial?
  • “Thinking outside the box”– This has got to be one of the
    most ridiculous sayings ever concocted. Do people go sit in
    boxes to think? Ah, yes, maybe they sit in Kitty Litter Boxes.
    In that case, I would definitely “think outside the box.”
  • “Celebs” and a host of other moronic abbreviations. This
    oh so clever expression makes the user sound like an idiot.
    Trendy abbreviations communicate nothing more than that the
    one using them is so very up to date and clever. Belch.
  • “Goes” — an expression meaning movement away from an object
    or person. But it doesn’t mean “says”, as in “He goes, Well
    I did not know you were in town.” Duh. How about “He SAYS?”