Sequester In Other Words

On the February 17^th Face the Nation, Bob Schieffer suggested that we find another word for “sequester,” the mandatory cuts to the federal budget that are set to go into effect the first of March. He recalled that President Carter was once told he shouldn’t use the word “inflation,” to which he supposedly replied: “OK. I’ll just call it a banana.” (The banana has alternately been credited to Carter’s “inflation czar,” Alfred Kahn, as an alternative to “depression.”)

I took Schieffer up on his suggestion and I’ve been exploring some other terms for “sequester.” First I needed to determine what that word really means. Microsoft Word’s reference tool provided some interesting information, along with quite a few alternatives.

The dictionary options were enlightening. I immediately ruled out the first: put somebody into isolation. The second probably best describes the original intent of the sequester: take property to cover obligation. But the third was the eye opener: take enemy’s property.

“Aha!” said I. “I think I’m on to something here.” If this election taught us nothing else, it was that many Democrats and Republicans perceive one another as the enemy. It was no doubt with that in mind that the notion of the sequester came into being in the first place. This did not immediately send a replacement term hurtling into my cerebral cortex, but I filed the notion away for reference later in this process.

In political terms, most of the alternatives proposed by the thesaurus sound even worse than the word “sequester” itself. Take for instance “confiscate.” That’s pretty much what Congress will be doing with the money that’s automatically cut from all the federal budget items. “Impound” doesn’t sound much better. It conjures up cars abandoned on city streets and towed off to some fenced in, godforsaken lot that no proper cab driver would take you to.

The variations on “isolate” (a secondary meaning per the thesaurus) seemed more palatable at first. But scrolling down, I found “quarantine,” and that made me itch. I drilled down on “separate,” hoping for something useful. That turned up “ghettoize.” Not a word any politician would choose instead of “sequester,” and perhaps a tad too close to the truth.

It was clear that the thesaurus would be no help to me in this quest for a euphemism for “sequester.” I’d have to go rogue on this one. I can hear my loyal followers raising a cheer at this prospect, thinking: “Elaine going rogue is bound to be more entertaining than Elaine plowing through a thesaurus.”

I shifted my focus from left brain to right brain. No longer would I proceed in terms of words, but rather in terms of images. First I pictured the members of the various budget committees with brooms in hand, sweeping the outlying crumbs of department allocations into neat little piles. Piles that could either be picked up and disposed of, or set aside in a corner, just in case there came a reprieve and they could be spread around again later in the fiscal year. This led me to “Swiffer” as my first alternative.

Next I envisioned functionaries with green eyeshades and electric pencil sharpeners, poring over pages of expenses, ticking off the ones they felt were discretionary. This conjured up the image of Scrooge’s beleaguered clerk, which provided the option “cratchit,” or “cratchitize.” I’m not sure that’s an improvement over sequester, but at least it’s more colorful.

Back to the notion of taking the enemy’s property, I zeroed in on "spoils of war." I Googled this phrase and uncovered a website that gives English first names with that meaning. The very idea was so bizarre that I was compelled to visit babynames.merchat.com to learn what those names are. Turns out there are just four of them, and two of those are variations of the others. What caught my eye was "Edelina," which just happens to be an anagram of my first name and the first initial of my last name.

This discovery was beyond strange; it was a karmic sign. I became enamored with the idea of replacing “sequester” with an anagram of my own name. From now on, I shall use “edelina” whenever I refer to the sequester. I’ll sound positively erudite as I discuss political euphemisms and nuances of speech. I might even be invited to appear on Face the Nation.

In the meantime, I’m going to open a nice bottle of vino and savor my propitious discovery. Because sure as God made green apples, Congress will pass another continuing resolution, and the risk of an edelina will be put off another six months, removing it from talk show topics and my name from the shows' guest lists.

Retirees’ Potpourri Quiz — What the What?

This week I’m giving retirees a Potpourri Quiz to see how much you pay attention to the tidbits in the media. Actually, it’s mostly the tidbits I gleaned from recent issues of Time magazine. I guarantee that some of these will have you scratching your head and saying: “What the what?” Don’t scroll down to the answers until you’ve made your best attempt at all the questions.

1.     Allergy sufferers were warned to take along extra Claritin when visiting the MOMA this month because of which of the following:

a.     Renovations to the education center that unexpectedly stirred up tremendous amounts of plaster dust.

b.     A concept art exhibit featuring live, long-haired felines; white cats lounging on black velvet; black cats on white.

c.      An installation in the atrium that consists of nothing but pollen, collected in Germany over two decades.

2.     Tennis star Novak Djokovic is buying up all the available cheese made from the following for his new restaurant chain:

a.     Milk from yaks raised by Buddhist monks

b.     Donkey milk

c.      Serbian tofu

d.     Kashmiri goat testicles

3.     The window in a store in a luxury mall in Egypt displayed boxer shorts with the following message printed on them:

a.     Eighth Wonder of the Modern World

b.     I’m the Sheik of Araby (and this is not a tent pole)

c.      Don’t be the Queen of de Nile

d.     Nibble My Nuts

4.     TRUE or FALSE: When the Dalai Lama spoke recently at Brown University, urging students to share their peaceful thoughts or “forget it,” the stenographer heard it wrong and projected the F-bomb onto a giant overhead screen.

5.     TRUE or FALSE: One of the losing entries submitted in a contest for interesting structures to span the Seine was a trampoline bridge.

6.     Australia recently added the colors pink and deep purple to their weather maps. The new colors signify:

a.     Temperatures above 122 degrees F (50 degrees C)

b.     Severe drought warnings and potential fire hazards

c.      Areas where campers should be on heightened alert for attacks by dingoes (wild dogs)

d.     Counties where there are shortages of Foster’s beer.

7.     Which of the following are not strains of medical marijuana (now legalized in Washington and several other states)?

a.     Black Widow

b.     Blue Dream

c.      Golden Kush

d.     Cat Piss

e.     Maui Wowie

8.     Häagen-Dazs created a special ice cream cake shaped like which of the following, as a marketing stunt?

a.     Kim Kardashian’s butt, complete with dimples

b.     Sophia Vergara’s breasts, complete with nipples

c.      The moon, complete with craters

d.     Wrigley Field, complete with bases

9.     Pranksters recently hacked the Minnesota Public Radio alert system and broadcast a warning for which of the following?

a.     Outbreak of “mad cow” disease

b.     Severe flooding around Lake Wobegon

c.      Bomb threats at the Mall of America

d.     The zombie apocalypse

e.     Jesse Ventura is considering another run for governor

10. Which of the following were not offered to passengers aboard the Carnival cruise ship Triumph that was stranded at sea for days without AC, water or functioning toilets?

a.     Full refund for the cost of the cruise

b.     Complimentary photo album of their cruise experience

c.      Plastic bags for disposal of their number two waste

d.     A credit toward a future Carnival cruise

e.     $500 stack of Carnival casino chips

The answers (I swear, I swear):

1. c                  2. b                  3. d                  

4. True            5. True           6. a

7. All are strains of medical marijuana      

 8. c                  9. d                  10. b and e

Retirement Snow Day

Taking a pass on posting today.
We have at least 18 inches of snow here in Providence.
At least we still have electricity.

The person who usually shovels for us is still snowed in. His street hasn't been plowed yet.
I spent about two hours shoveling (in two shifts) and only cleared a path from our back door to the garage and from our front door to the street.
The driveway has drifts of at least three feet, so we're housebound.

I'm way too exhausted to write coherently, and the planned post was only half done before I went out to shovel.
I guess I'm entitled to collapse.

Save the Penny

Be still my heart. There’s a proposal afoot to get rid of the penny. Speaking of a foot, the first thought that came to my mind when I heard this was: “Where would that leave penny loafers?” I suppose they’d have to become dime loafers; a nickel wouldn’t fit in the slot. Besides, at least one economist is advocating that the government also stop minting the nickel.

“Why?” (You may be wondering.) Simple economics. It now costs about two cents to make a penny (which contains mostly zinc today, not copper). The nickel costs ten cents to produce, so it’s hardly a cost-effective substitute for the penny. That’s why some folks feel it makes sense to kill two coins at the same time. And since we’re talking twos, two days after I post this, Canada will discontinue its penny. The U.S. will be watching what happens up north very closely. Then we’ll probably ignore it.

The plans to jettison the penny generally propose rounding sales up or down to the nearest nickel. People are calling it a ‘rounding tax,’ since so many prices end in 99 cents. If we also drop the nickel, we’ll need to round up or down to the nearest dime. If the potential financial costs to consumers aren’t enough disincentive for these proposals, here are some emotional ones to consider if we remove ‘penny’ from our collective conscience.

Getting rid of the penny would be the death knell for the penny ante. Not to get too maudlin here, but I still have the tin full of pennies that my late mother used when she played poker with her lady friends. The last member of her card group died last year at age 103.

The title (and lyrics) of the Beatles’ song Penny Lane would have to be changed. Somehow Two-Bit Alley just doesn’t have the same ring to it.

The expression: “I’m like a bad penny; I keep turning up” would lose its meaning. There would be no good pennies, and pennies in general would no longer keep turning up. I’m not sure how we’d replace this, but: “I’m like a discontinued penny; I keep rounding up” comes to mind.

Then there’s the adage: “A penny saved is a penny earned.” Not true. A penny saved would be a penny wasted. You’d need to turn them in at a bank to get anything for them, and eventually even Uncle Sam wouldn’t want them.

How about the question: “A penny for your thoughts?” Would that become “A silver dollar for your thoughts?” It’s bad enough the Tooth Fairy has suffered severe inflation over our lifetimes, but the Thought Inquirer? I shudder to think about it.

Continuing with thoughts and inflation, consider: “For what it’s worth, that’s my two cents.” Turns out your two cents has actually been worth four cents, but what would it be worth now? A quarter? Or would you be dropping a dime?

Let’s not forget “penny-wise and pound-foolish.” Seems like a penny hasn’t been wise for quite some time now, so perhaps we could just go with “pound-wise and penny-foolish.” Of course, we’re not Brits, so I guess we’d have to say “dollar-wise and penny-foolish.”

How about your Penny Valentine? If you sent her roses on February 14, would she become your Dime A Dozen Valentine? Whatever you called her and whatever you sent her, what used to cost a pretty penny would now cost an arm and a leg.

Most other ‘penny’ expressions have survived out of nostalgia, so we could keep them. Penny postcards are long gone; eventually, postcards in general will be, too. Do you know what a two-cents plain is (or was)? Think soda fountains and the depression. Penny stocks have always been a euphemism and the penny arcade morphed into the video arcade over thirty years ago. One exception is Pennysaver newspapers; I’d like to see those be pro-active on this issue and become Save-the-Penny papers.

My favorite of all these expressions is one that I hadn’t heard until I was getting fodder for this post. “I felt like a penny waiting for change.” It means you felt helpless or worthless. If the penny and the nickel were taken out of circulation, this phrase would become: “I felt like a dime waiting for change.” I think we should keep “penny” for this one and make it more existential: “I felt like a penny waiting for Godot.” Or perhaps just: “I felt like a penny waiting.” And waiting. And waiting. And nobody came.

Sniff. It’s just too sad to contemplate. Sorry. I need to go get a tissue.

Retirement Nicknames

Nine-year-old Samantha Gordon weighs roughly 62 pounds and plays football in an otherwise all-boys league in Utah. In 2012 (her first year playing), she racked up 1,911 yards and 35 touchdowns, earning her the nickname 'Sweet Feet.' It’s an endearing term, in part because the juxtaposition of ‘sweet’ with ‘feet’ is so unexpected. You’d expect feet to be described as ‘smelly,’ or maybe ‘stinky,’ but not ‘sweet.” We’ve all heard ‘sweet cheeks’ before. But ‘sweet feet’? I don’t think so.

You just know where this is headed. My mind is rushing headlong down the track marked: unexpected nicknames for retirees. Let’s begin with feet, those overburdened extremities that bear the brunt of our weight gains (along with our knees). Those appendages prone to bunions and corns and hammertoes. All of which can lead to ‘orthopedic feet.’ As the saying goes (or not): If the shoe doesn’t fit, wear it. (The moniker, that is.)

Moving on to other appendages, the retired ballroom dancer who refuses to give up competitions is no longer known as ‘twinkle toes.’ She’s grown her toenails long and filed them into weaponry that peeks out of her dancing sandals. Most weeks, her nails are actually longer than her heels are high. This has earned her a new title: ‘stiletto toes.’

And while we’re on the subject of digits, most of you will have heard the phrase ‘dowager’s hump.’ Our list includes ‘dowager’s pinky.’ That’s what we’ve dubbed the bent over old lady with the crooked fingers, especially the little one that she sticks out when she’s having her afternoon tea. I am too cruel today.

Another unexpected name tied to physical attributes is the retiree’s equivalent of ‘freckle face.’ We’re now dealing with liver spots, not freckles and we’ve christened her ‘Pleiades.’ That’s the seven sisters constellation (like the seven spectacular age spots on her left cheek), and the website earthsky.org tells us it’s “visible from virtually every place that humanity inhabits Earth’s globe.” That’s pretty much true of her liver spots, too.

Moving ever so slightly away from cheeks, we come to our next nickname. You’ve probably heard of the ‘fuzzy navel,’ my late mother’s favorite cocktail. Well, we have a retired gentlemen whose ear hair has grown so long that he’s known affectionately as ‘fuzzy earlobes.’ I bet you’re tickled to read this one.

Staying in this general vicinity, and keeping in mind that U.S. Marines are called ‘leathernecks,’ let me introduce you to ‘jello neck.’ I don’t think I have to tell you how that sobriquet came about. (Lexicography buffs: there’s a double entendre in that last sentence.)

This option fits into no particular category. Can you guess the origin of the endearing label ‘Rice Krispies’? It’s how we describe the retiree whose bodily noises have now reached the point where he goes snap, crackle and pop, even when he’s sitting still. My bad. Forgive me.

Moving on to some names that came about because of certain clothing. First we have ‘shiny butt.’ He insists on wearing the same corduroy pants even when the behind has been worn down to zero nap. Then there’s the retired gentleman who never leaves his house without some dapper hat covering his bald spot. It’s usually a fedora, so a tip of the lid to ‘beau brimmel.’

We can’t leave this group without mentioning the older women who let their hosiery (especially trouser socks) collapse onto their ankles in nylon puddles. I’m labeling them ‘ankle rolls,’ but I just know there’s a cleverer pet name for them if we noodle it for awhile. And speaking of older women, let’s not forget the nosey rumor mongers in our neighborhoods. We’ll refer to them as ‘gossip laureates’ and hope the sarcasm doesn’t elude them.

Finally, we have a nickname many of us can claim. It’s for those who have not one, not two, but at least three (and maybe four) different prescriptions for various eyeglass needs. When they’re merged into one pair of glasses (avoiding the entanglement of multiple leashes), they yield lenses that give the wearer a most peculiar appearance. Ever wonder what happened to the “girl with kaleidoscope eyes” in the Beatle’s song, Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds? Well, she retired and became ‘prism eyes.’

There you have it. A basketful of nicknames, pet names, monikers, sobriquets, roses by a lot of other names, for the retirees in your life. I fully expect to have several of them leveled at my husband and me when we walk together. I can hear people whispering: “There go shiny butt and ankle rolls.” At least they didn’t mention my jello neck.

Retirement Updates — Congress More Disliked Than…

Last week’s Time magazine cited voter polls that showed that the 112^th Congress was “less popular than cockroaches, colonoscopies and communism.” That’s a pretty serious state of dislike. I found it curious that all the items mentioned began with the same letter. That of course set me to thinking about the polling methodology, which wasn’t disclosed. (It appears the data sources are Gallup and Rasmussen.)

The Time write-up mentioned ranking, so it’s unlikely that voters were asked an open-ended question (e.g. name some things you dislike that begin with the letter ‘C’). If they had been, you know that constipation would have shown up ahead of cockroaches, especially among seniors. For us women, chin bristles would surely have been disliked more than communism; it’s the new millennium, for heaven’s sake.

More likely, voters were given groups of items that began with the same letter and asked to do rankings within each group. Or maybe not. In any case, I began to wonder: What other government institutions and programs, and which political nuisances, might be embedded in various letters of the alphabet to be scrutinized? And how would retirees rank them?

Certainly if those surveyed were asked about the letter ‘S’, Social Security means-testing would be less popular than skin tags and static electricity and would probably also edge out soft money, even in an election year.

Similarly, under ‘M,’ we’d see Medicare revisions faring worse than Metamucil and missing socks. It might even get a colder shoulder than Mitt Romney from Tea Partyers post-election.

Speaking of Medicare revisions, I’ll bet the prospect of grandma being rolled off a cliff means that eugenics would be disliked more than those dastardly earmarks, which in turn would be far less acceptable than earwax or ex-spouses, except perhaps in the Kardashian household.

Chances are the deficit and the debt ceiling would be in a dead heat for least popular, even when stacked up against dust mites and dry heaves.

Given the performance of this Congress, can there be any doubt that filibuster would be intensely disliked, easily beating out flatulence, fibroids and finger pointing?

As for the letter “I”, the IRS would be the perennial popularity contest loser. But for those with IPhones, the iOS6 maps app would have a stranglehold on second place this year. Not even indigestion or ingrown toenails would be in the running.

Undoubtedly, polling for ‘L’ would tell us that, after this election, lobbyists are reviled far more than liver spots and lollygaggers, but only marginally more so than Libertarians.

In a related matchup, I don’t presume to know how PACs would fare against pork barrel spending, but I’m sure they would both be less welcome than presbyopia and pollen explosions.

And speaking of Libertarians, the NRA post-Newtown might well go toe-to-toe with Neo-Nazis on the ‘hate to even hear that’ scale. There would certainly be miles of daylight between those two and whatever is third on the list for ‘N.’

No assessment of the relative likeability of government-related terms would be complete without assessing Washington itself. Let’s assume it would be pitted against whooping cough, werewolves and whiners. Is there anyone who doubts that, in the current climate, Washington would be less popular than any of those ‘Ws’?

No matter how disliked all the other letter losers would be, you just know that in any head-to-head, the 112^th Congress would be the most-reviled of the bunch. And we didn’t need Gallup or Rasmussen to tell us that.

Retirement Heads-Ups — Misleading Advertising

Lately more advertising has me saying: “What the what?” I’m talking TV commercials, magazine ads and even those coupon fliers that come in the mail. The headlines don’t seem well-matched to the products they’re pushing. To prove my point, I’ve put together a quiz using actual tag lines and real items. See if you can identify the products from the copy provided. I’m giving you a list with all the answers and then some. Promise you won’t scroll to the bottom to see the correct ones.

TAG LINES:

1.        Less jiggle. More wiggle.

2.        It’s the only one that can go in that far and stay there.

3.        Slather. Pour.

4.        I heard sounds I hadn’t heard in years.

5.        For the epic adventures of everyday life.

6.        It’s like nothing ever changed.

PRODUCT CATEGORIES OR BRANDS:

a.     Suppositories

b.     Quaker Oats

c.     Treadmills

d.     Sex lotions and toys

e.     Spanx shapewear

f.      Log Cabin syrup

g.     Special K 100 calorie snacks

h.     Testicular implants

i.      Pedigree dog food

j.      Cialis ED medication

k.     Hearing aids

l.      IHOP restaurants

m.   Clear cuticle cream

Stumped on a few of these and need some hints? Here’s additional info or another copy line for some of them.

2 and 4. These are actually trick questions; they’re for the same product. (“It’s the only one that can go in that far and stay there” and “I heard sounds I hadn’t heard in years”.)

3. Slather. Pour. Eat. Repeat.

6. Neuticles. It’s like nothing ever changed.

That’s extra clues for at least half of them, giving you a 50-50 chance at sorting out the rest. At least I think it’s 50-50. Give up? Here are the answers, with my commentary.

1.     Less jiggle. More wiggle.
No, this is not the copy line for Spanx, a treadmill or even for Special K snacks, though you would be forgiven for guessing any of those. It’s for letter i—Pedigree dog food.

2.     It’s the only one that can go in that far and stay there. (See #4.)

3.     Slather. Pour.
You would have been forgiven for guessing sex lotions and toys before I gave you the extra hint “Eat. Repeat.” If you still guessed that after my hint, you’ve been reading too much “Fifty Shades of Grey.” (Forgive me for using a 2013 banned phrase; it won’t happen again.) Log Cabin Syrup falls into a gray area—oops! I mean less clear. If you planned to put that syrup on food, good job, but no cigar. If you were putting it on your partner, see my comment about your reading material. The correct answer here is: letter l—IHOP.

4.     I heard sounds I hadn’t heard in years and It’s the only one that can go in that far and stay there.
Either of these clues (number 2 or 4) probably had several of you thinking sex toys, or maybe even testicular implants. Once again, you need to clean up your bookshelves. If you guessed suppositories, you should add more fiber to your diet. These copy lines belong to letter k—hearing aids.

5.     For the epic adventures of everyday life.
You would be forgiven for thinking this might be treadmill copy. Or even for Cialis, what with their TV commercials with the bathtubs in exotic places. Some of you might even have considered suppositories; once again, two words: “more fiber.” Actually, this is the new “Quaker Up” campaign from letter b—Quaker Oats (speaking of fiber).
“Quaker up” was surely inspired by “cowboy up,” but their Ben-Franklin-type icon would look silly in a Stetson. Their premise is that oatmeal prepares you for life’s everyday epic adventures (and no, they’re not referring to your morning constitutional). Newsflash: “everyday epic” is an oxymoron. The Odyssey is epic; Hercules’ labors are epic. Riding a bike is not an epic adventure and you don’t cowboy up to a bowl of oatmeal. That said, “Quaker Up” sure beats “Fiber Up.”

6.     It’s like nothing ever changed.
Several of you will have figured this out from my extra clue, the brand name “Neuticles.” You’re forgiven if you fell for my plant of clear cuticle cream. This is my favorite, and the answer is letter h. Neuticles are testicular implants for pets that have been neutered. They claim to allow your pet to retain his self esteem.  I doubt fake testicles will leave Rover feeling like nothing ever changed. Maybe they’ll leave his owner feeling less guilty. Something tells me this is a guy thing.

How’d you do? Five to six right: you’re a Madison Avenue pro. Three to four: you need to watch more TV. Two or fewer: you didn’t even try, did you?

Retirement Updates — Banned Words for 2013

It’s time for the annual lists that proliferate on the Internet, including banned words and phrases. I put together my own candidates, confident that several entries would be no-brainers on everyone’s list of what we can do without in 2013.

Lake Superior State University, which just issued its 38^th collection, confirmed what I expected. Everyone wants to get rid of ‘fiscal cliff.’ And with good reason. If we’ve learned nothing else from the political talk shows, it’s that it’s not really a cliff; it’s more of a slope. And ‘fiscal slope’ just doesn’t resonate like the cliff does.

We now know that we barely toppled over the cliff and were hauled back up. The most feared part of that plunge, the increase in income taxes, would have been leveled off in January anyway. Once we had gone over the cliff, or down the slope, or into the swamp, Republican Congressmen would have voted for a decrease in the just-raised taxes, instead of having had to vote in December for an increase (to the exact same levels). Maybe now we can get rid of ‘the blame game,’ too, and move forward.

I’m picking up ‘kick the can down the road’ from LSSU’s list, since Congress seems to have done that with the deficit. My list of fiscal culprits also includes ‘short-term fix.’ What we need is a long-term solution, along with a catchy label for it. ‘Durable fix’ sounds like a manufacturing term, while ‘abiding’ sounds archaic, or even religious. Let’s take our cue from the adoption organizations helping to find ‘forever homes’ for animals and find a ‘Forever Fix.’

Getting back to the ‘deficit,’ I’m banning that, too. It has such a negative aura. ‘Shortfall’ sounds better, but it has its own baggage, conjuring up targets not met. Let’s use the simpler word ‘gap;’ it means the same but doesn’t sound as threatening. ‘Gap’ seems less judgmental; it just tells it like it is. The button no longer reaches the buttonhole. Either lose some weight or buy one of those elasticized extenders.

Another word I’m replacing is ‘entitlements.’ Medicare (which I’m on) and Social Security (which I now collect) are, in fact, entitlements, in the sense that I’ve worked my entire life and paid into them and I’m therefore now entitled to collect. But the misapprehension that some lawmakers have created is that they’re somehow gifts. They’re really earned benefits, so I propose we call them ‘Earnefits.’

One of my top candidates that surprisingly doesn’t appear on other lists is ‘Fifty Shades of’ anything. The Grey trilogy, aka the Housewife’s Sex Handbook, has been so hyped and has inspired so much satire, that I think I will gag if I see ‘fifty shades’ again. OK. Maybe ‘gag’is a poor choice of words…

Speaking of housewives: please, Lord, let us be done with ‘The Real Housewives of’ anywhere. Mercifully, ‘Jersey Shore’ will soon be as washed up as love letters in the sand. If only we could say the same for ‘Real Housewives.’ If only.

Another phrase many agree should be shown the door in 2013 (but not LSSU) is ‘Gangnam Style,’ the dance South Korean pop phenom, Psy, does. Most folks think it’s ‘Gangam Style’ (leaving out the second ‘n’). If the dance weren’t ubiquitously annoying enough on its own, its cumbersome spelling would get it banned. Even Psy feels Gangnam Style has run its course. His final performance of it was on New Year’s Eve and he promises (threatens?) to come up with something equally as invasive in 2013.

My final phrase will probably die a natural death, but just in case: fie on ‘Call Me Maybe.’ As with ‘Gangnam Style,’ it’s not just that the song lyric is heard all over. It simply doesn’t make any sense. ‘Call Me Sometime’ makes sense. ‘Maybe I’ll Call You’ makes sense. But ‘Call Me Maybe’? Call me out of touch, I guess.

There you have it: my ten offenders to send to the lexicography locker room for a cold shower in 2013. If you don’t agree with my choices, don’t call me. I’ll call you. Maybe.