It's getting old, how I keep taking a few months off from blogging only to come crawling back to you begging for your forgiveness, comments, and blog ideas. And so instead of groveling and pleading for those three things (but mainly the last two, if you wanted to know), I'm just going to forge ahead.
And forging ahead, at the moment, is looking pretty exciting. I've accumulated some potential blog topics, and I'm ready to get back to more frequent Tangential adventures. And I should have plenty to write about, as I'm currently planning my wedding (which is, of course, a nicer-sounding way of saying that my fiancee is planning my wedding). I'll keep you posted soon on whether we plan to commit any of the cardinal sins of lame weddings: parts one two three.
But after such a long break, I think I need to ease back into the blogosphere. So I hope you'll join me as I inspect one of the least helpful phrases ever spoken by human beings since the dawn of verbal communication.
Answer my question!!!
With information that wasn't already implied by the existence of my question, punk
We often speak in pleasantries. "Small talk". I've gone on record that I don't really like this practice to begin with. But let's lay that argument aside. Small talk is a part of life. And occasionally, it's an annoying and baffling part of that life.
One of the most common questions when getting into small talk gear is, "How's it going?" While in this pure form the question is undeniably vapid (sorry, I forgot I was getting off that soapbox), the phrasing is often used for very real moments of inquiry:
How's the new job going?
How's it going living with your in-laws?
How's the crusade against "How's it going?" going?
These are real questions meant to initiate segments of conversation. But one common phrase, somehow only becoming more popular by the minute, stops these blossoming conversations dead in their tracks. In case you haven't Sherlocked it yet, I'm talking about
"Oh, it's going..."
Yeah, I know it's going. That's why I asked how it's going. Like, when you know there's something, but you want to know more about that thing, so you ask a question about it... that's not some secret way of asking if the thing exists.
How was the movie last night?
Oh, it was a movie...
What do you think of DiCarlo's pizza?
Oh, DiCarlo's has pizza...
What time is the baseball game?
Oh, the baseball game occurs at a time...
This is a total non-answer. Yeah yeah, I'll make a few concessions:
- Usually there's a widening of the eyes and a sad nod of the head accompanying this verbal waste of time. This, I think, is meant to imply that the thing in question is progressing in an intense or cumbersome way. But I'm not a mind-reader, people.
- Sometimes people do follow it up with real information. "Oh, it's going... my mother-in-law keeps making pointless small talk with me, so I try to spend a lot of time at the new job or eating DiCarlo's pizza during baseball games." But sometimes people don't even do this; they seriously just say that it's going. And even when they do elaborate, it makes the opening phrase pointless. It becomes just an annoying filler akin to "It is what it is" or "Can I ask you a question?"
"Tell me how you really feel."
Not sure if I stressed this enough: comments and blog ideas
Have you committed the grave error of saying "Oh, it's going..."?
Which everyday phrases bother you?
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| From an ESL website: "People who ask this phrase are usually trying to start a conversation." |
