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Trivial Pursuits => Arts & Entertainment => Topic started by: AugustWest on June 10, 2004, 04:35:34 am

Title: Truth is stranger...
Post by: AugustWest on June 10, 2004, 04:35:34 am
Vin Diesel plays D&D. (http://www.darkhorizons.com/news04/riddick1.php)  I'd never have guessed.
Title: Truth is stranger...
Post by: andalucia on June 10, 2004, 11:30:09 am
That is neat in itself, but the article angered me from the very beginning:
"Vin Diesel arrives at the end of a long day of interviews looking as if he had been literally hit by a truck."
Liars... I bet he was not literally neither covered in blood nor trembling with fear from his alleged automobilic close call, and as such, bore little "literal" resemblance to one who had, in fact, recently been menaced by a vehicle of any sort.
Title: Truth is stranger...
Post by: Pedro Picasso on June 10, 2004, 01:39:45 pm
Quote from: "andalucia"
Liars... I bet he was not literally neither covered in blood nor trembling with fear from his alleged automobilic close call, and as such, bore little "literal" resemblance to one who had, in fact, recently been menaced by a vehicle of any sort.


I hate it when people use the word literal when it doesn't apply.  Yesterday, I read an interview where the guy said, 'I tried this new program that my company was making and within minutes I was literally addicted.'  Really?  Literally.  Like you suffer physical ailments when it's taken with you?  Headaches, nausea, irritable bowel syndrome, etc?  Are you shaking?  Do you need another hit right now?  What would you do for it?  Would you kill a man to get a few more precious moments with this program?   Do you think your literal addiction will eventually kill you?  Would you please die right now?  That would really help my career in journalism.

rowr!
Title: Truth is stranger...
Post by: Nabubrush on June 10, 2004, 02:22:10 pm
Word. And yes, it's a tangent, but since you brought it up, what's with people saying 'utilize' all the time, like it's a more important word than use?

"Yeah, I was going to use the TCP matrix, but I decided to utilize it instead, to make my data more important!"
Title: Truth is stranger...
Post by: Pedro Picasso on June 10, 2004, 03:44:03 pm
I hate going down this road, but I hate the phrase 'percentage points' even more.

For heaven's sake.  Percentage points?  What kind of a stupid game is this.  'The President's approval rating dropped by three percentage points today.'  No it didn't.  I dropped by three percent.  PERCENT.  They even have a cool symbol for it.  Statistics isn't some hoops game.  This is serious.  Someone has to do something.

Think of the children.
Title: Truth is stranger...
Post by: jough on June 10, 2004, 03:54:08 pm
My favourite is when people say something is "unique."  No it isn't.

"Unique" means "one of a kind."  Something is either unique or it isn't.  It's like saying someone is "very dead."

Is he dead?  Oh, he's QUITE dead.  VERY dead, not just KINDA dead like that guy over there.
Title: Truth is stranger...
Post by: slink on June 10, 2004, 04:50:24 pm
I can't work out why my shaving gel claims it,

Moisturises
Soothes and
Protects
Anti-Skin Irritation


Why'd I want to do that?
Title: Truth is stranger...
Post by: St_Zartan on June 10, 2004, 05:31:07 pm
(http://www.no-smoking.org/images/ROONY.JPG)
"How come they call it taking a dump and not leaving a dump? I mean, because you're not really taking it anywhere ..." (http://mywebpage.netscape.com/zartan00001/Takedump.wav)- Beavis
Title: Truth is stranger...
Post by: CortJstr on June 10, 2004, 07:23:09 pm
Quote from: "jough"
My favourite is when people say something is "unique."  No it isn't.

"Unique" means "one of a kind."  Something is either unique or it isn't.  It's like saying someone is "very dead."

As opposed to just being mostly dead. It's all dead that's a problem.

I know desperately want to find the MST3K where they have their Rooney-Off.
Title: Truth is stranger...
Post by: arkabee on June 10, 2004, 07:26:04 pm
you all literally make me 110 percentage points happier whenever i frequent this unique site.


incidentally, it's people like you that make people like me develop compulsive childhood habits, including but not limited to over-using the word "like" to verbally[1] establish to the listener that i am a complete and utter buffoon at scrabble and am possibly misusing the word that was preceded by "like".

-
[1] it's like i enjoy your rants.

also,
verily, indeed, what of the children?
Title: Truth is stranger...
Post by: Nabubrush on June 11, 2004, 03:03:41 am
Oh the unique deal. Literally every single person I know . . . ok, that's overdone. When I hear someone modify unique, I want to tell them not to use words they don't know how to use. I want to tell them to stick to using simpler words. I almost always cut slack on the apostrophe deal, but with unique and utilize, I generally ask why those particular words were chosen, and then attempt to explain where they made their mistake.
Title: Truth is stranger...
Post by: arkabee on June 11, 2004, 01:26:31 pm
Quote from: "Nabubrush drinks (a lot)"
, but with unique and utilize, I generally ask why those particular words were chosen,



verily, utilize just rolls of the tounge. 'tis a splendid word.


ps- i don't think that reading a lot of science fiction as a child helped me much.  i speak and write poorly [on the outside], because poorly is what was written and spoken to me [on the inside].
Title: Truth is stranger...
Post by: V-Adore on June 15, 2004, 04:03:36 pm
See, you all think you have it bad in terms of pedantry?

After my last semester in college, I can't use the word "significant" without verifying to myself that the relationship I am describing actually represents one of statistical significance, with p < 0.05.

Admittedly, it probably cuts down on "significant" overuse, but it's still a little irritating.