VERBAL TICS EAT LIVING FLESH

EDITORIAL TICS
Why do we have editors? To save us all from those annoying TICS that infect language like ants on birthday cake. Couple years back there was an INFLUENZA of sentences that tried to sound, well, hip, by injecting "well"s into the most obvious places to INFORMALIZE the, well, "tone" of the piece. It always came off, well, forced and made the writing seem intractably unhip as could be, but EVERYBODY was guilty of it. STOP THE MADNESS. You want "um" with that?

These days you can't get through a news interview without hearing "...at the end of the day," as if the speaker is finally going to reveal the ultimate truth about a subject but is really just trying to emphasize how banal their conclusion really is. Usage: "...AT THE END OF THE DAY, this Attorney General nominee is all we've got and we've got to stop the hemorrhaging or we'll lose the patient." Or "We all know the Democrats are against this, but AT THE END OF THE DAY they don't have the votes..." Coming in a strong second would be "bottom line," most execrable when used as a verb, as in "bottom line it for me... what's it going to cost?"

QUOTES FROM HEAVEN
Robert Plant, discussing the forthcoming Led Zeppelin reunion to the New York Times: "It's a one-night stand," Mr. Plant said. "I'm taking emotional condoms." Then he changed the subject.

James Traub, describing Barak Obama's advisors and their attitudes towards The Clintons in the New York Times Magazine: "In the meantime, though, they blame their failure to break through on what they see as a combination of Clinton's inspired cynicism and the myopia of a press corps addled by tactics and poll numbers..."

PRESS RELEASE OF THE YEAR
Dear Tim Riley,

On October 2nd we mailed to you a Mimi Hendrix DVD along with a press release on behalf of Universal Music Enterprises. We omitted to label the disc "DVD" and we also misspelled Jimi Hendrix. This was entirely the error of HazMat Media...

Again, we deeply regret any inconvenience this may have caused you.

Sincerely,

Helen Boswell
VP - Client Services
Hazmat Media Ince
Marketing Logistics & Campaign Fulfillment. Done.