Phrases we don't need anymore, Part 1

    

    Did you ever hear a popular phrase, let it really sink in, and realize that it makes absolutely no sense? Did it ever piss you off that you can't be the only one it doesn't make sense to, yet it remains in the common vernacular and has for generations? Well it does for us, so we here at PFTS have decided to make a list of those phrases or sayings that should be raised to the rafters...or buried face-down and micturated upon in as disrespectful a way as possible. 

1.) "Slow and steady wins the race."

         Does it? Tell that to anyone who put up a bad 40-time at the NFL Combine. Two tenths of a second drops them three rounds and costs them about a million dollars in guaranteed money. I've also never seen a person power-walk and win a marathon, either. Not even a Kenyan.

2.) "He/she/we gave 110%"
         How does this one work exactly? How can there be more than the whole of something? If you gave "110%", that is literally you and a clone of yourself that you cut into 10 equal parts and brought one along with you. I guess wrapped in newspaper. Remember newspapers? Remember when the Sunday Sports section was shitter-worthy and not 3.5 pages of AP filler? But I digress. Where were we? Ah yes, giving 110%.
       It's the same thing for people who rate items or experiences on a scale of 1 to 10 as being an emphatic "20!" Clearly you don't know how the scale system functions. It really reflects poorly on your ability to exist in the realm of logic and absolutes. It also makes me want to play you in Trivial Pursuit. It'd be a rare opportunity to use the word 'drubbing'.


3.) "Really?"
           This one is just about ready for the bin. The sarcastic reply to a somewhat surprising statement or action. "Really?" 
        I admit that I was on board with this from Jump Street, thinking it as clever or well-placed as anyone else did at the time. Then the last eighteen months it spread like Mutaba in Cedar Creek(Yep, Outbreak reference). Now its the Soccer Mom's go-to RE her son's muddy cleats on the kitchen tile, the office tech guy's smug muttering to your inability to follow his Beautiful Mind-like scribbles on connecting to and running a video conference, or a girl (who's not as hot as she thinks. Not by a mile.) castrating your notions to buy her a drink.
    The last straw has come as one of the only decent sitcom on network television, ABC's Modern Family, now counts the dickish use of the word "really" as approximately 47% of each episode's dialogue.

    ....this has been a taste of a list that has no end in sight, unless I keel over from another massive coronary tonight. One cold day already has me wanting to say "if only..."