In the previous post I linked to an article that appeals to “Albaholics.”
I have to say that, along with adding “gate” to every political scandal and combining the names of celebrity couples (though I do have to salute Stephen Colbert for the coining of Filliam H. Muffman to refer to William H. Macy and Felicity Huffman), one of the many linguistic gimmicks that people use that irritates me a great deal is adding “oholic” or “holic” to words to indicate an addiction to whatever word it’s being added to.
The thing is, I’m not a recovering alcoholic because I’m addicted to alc, I’m addicted to alcohol. The “ohol” is already in there; all that was added was “ic.”
I mean, there’s no such substance as Albahol (though if there were, I would so be at the liquor store stocking up on it).
Admittedly, Albaic wouldn’t really convey the idea, but adding the hol or ohol as a kludge to make the idea work just grates on my nerves a little.
It’s sort of like when they released that box set of all four Alien movies on DVD and referred to it as a “quadrilogy.” (That one really grated on Scott’s nerves.)
If you can’t see the problem in that construct, I’m not going to point it out to you.
(The best send-up of this tendency that people have, by the way, was on The Simpsons when Homer said, “I’m a rage-aholic! I just can’t live without rage-ahol!”)
All I’m saying is that there has to be a better way of doing things.
I actually ventured out in the world, however briefly, to do a few things. First up was a trip to my dentist’s office to make an appointment. I have about $2,000 in my Flex spending account that I have to use before the end of the year and I still need some crowns, so I figure I might as well get that taken care of now. Next year I’m using my Flex money to get my eyesight fixed.
I was going to do that this year, which is why I have so much left over, but I spent more at the dentist than I’d expected to and didn’t have enough left for the eye work.
When I walked into the dentist’s office the cute girl with the big boobs who can’t say Massachusetts lit up like a Christmas tree. I’ve never seen her that pleased to see anyone, especially me. I’m slightly more accustomed to her looking at me like I’m something she scraped off the bottom of her shoe. Not sure what was up with that. Once I got closer to the desk the Asian girl, who is sort of hidden from view when you first walk in saw me as well and extended a cheery hello, but she’s always really cheery and nice, so that was nothing new.
Big-boobed girl remembered my last name and immediately started looking up my file, but she’d gone with an incorrect spelling and was puzzled because she wasn’t sure what my first name was but was reasonably certain that it’s not Steven.
Eventually she found it, I made my appointment for Monday (I lost part of a filling, which is honestly sort of convenient, as it gave me a reason to set up an appointment which gives me the opportunity to schedule more work before the end of the year.)
From there I went on to get a haircut. I didn’t get it cut quite as short as I’d like, but I didn’t want to ask her to cut it any more, as I was tired of getting jabbed painfully in the head by the clippers as she was cutting it.
After that I headed over to Taco Bell for lunch, deciding I wanted one of those enchilada burritos. Once I got there, though – it’s a combo Taco Bell/KFC – saw the signs for those KFC bowls and decided to finally get around to trying one. It was okay.
After that I stopped to pick up a few groceries and made my way home.
While I was out, particularly as a result of an infuriating attempt at getting some napkins and plasticware at KFC that was thwarted by this tag-team of slow-ass idiots, it occurred to me that, given the apparent degree of difficulty and just how challenging it seems to be, there should be a new competitive sport centered on getting the hell out of my way.
I seriously don’t understand why people find it so difficult. Clearly it takes a lifetime of focus, dedication, and daily conditioning to master the skill, and I think it’s high time that the people who do manage it achieve some sort of recognition – with special recognition for those who manage the even more difficult task of just staying the hell away from me completely – in the hopes that it will inspire others to achieve such lofty heights of athletic perfection.
Maybe it could be an exhibition event at the 2008 Olympics.
I should think it would be at least as interesting to watch as Curling.
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