Heinously Butchered Word of the Week

Today starts a new feature that may or may not become a regularly occurring item; it just depends on how often I hear people- especially the self-appointed wordsmiths in the broadcast and print media- absolutely sodomize the English language.

I realize English is a difficult language to comprehend, trust me. Mother Johann being a teacher and all, we pretty much had to learn grammar and spelling, or else. That’s not to say I completely did (”where’s the remote at?”), but I sure tried.

All those rules and their accompanying exceptions (house –> houses, but mouse –> mice), bizarre little devils that make things twelve times more difficult than they should be (homophones, homonyms, that whole “I before E” bullshit), things like that. But come on, people- especially if you work in a field in which proper, lucid expression of your thoughts is paramount, could you at least try a little harder?! It amazes me how many times I hear on the radio and TV, or read in print, the reporter or broadcaster completely demolish English within a 20-second story or 150-word column.

Thus, I shall launch the Heinously Butchered Work of the Week (or HBWW, for short), at least in an attempt to enlighten all 4 of you, my loyal readers- if not also to publicly humiliate the imbecile reporters and broadcasters that can’t speak or spell their way out of a wet paper bag. I’ll start with one of my biggest pet peeves. Enjoy.

SUPPOSABLY (adv) meaning: there isn’t one, because this is NOT a word, people. I honestly cannot count the number of times a day I hear supposedly (big clue…) educated people say “supposably”. I heard it so confidently uttered by a newscaster on the radio just this morning on my way back from Lucky Larry’s.

The friggin’ word is S-U-P-P-O-S-E-D-L-Y, not “supposably”!!!

Thank you and have a gosh-darned swell weekend. But stay dry; supposably, it’s going to rain some more later tonight.