You know what irritates me to no end?
The use of the word Appreciate without the preceding pronoun; The assumed “I”.
Person A: “Appreciate your coming in today!”
Person B: “I finished that report for you.”
Person A: “Appreciate it.”
This is not a phrase of thanks, it’s a command. YOU BETTER APPRECIATE THE RIGHT TO COME IN TODAY! YOU BETTER APPRECIATE THIS WORK!
Ugh!
Here’s the kicker: I do this all the time. And EVERY single time I do it, I hate myself.
Anyone else have self-loathing due to a poor grammatical habit?
I’ve picked up the “needs done” construction (omitting ‘to be’). Like “The cat box needs cleaned.”
I hate it, but “The cat box needs to be cleaned” seems to take way too long to say.
I tend to just get rid of all extraneous words when talking.
“I’m going to shove that whole Bacon Chicken Club sandwich in my mouth now”
Becomes…
“Bacon Mouth Now”
K
Just “bacon”, the rest is easily inferred.
I find myself saying all of Corbin’s favorite phrases just like him. I am a grown adult not a two year old, I should not go around talking like a two year old, but it is just somehow enivitable when spending so much time around him. I do feel better that nearly everyone who parents small children ends up doing this a bit.
I have found myself doing this a lot lately, especially with “localisms.” Luckily, I have grammar police in my family, like my sister and my mother, who keep me in line.