When I moved down south, I immediately adopted “y’all” not because I was trying to trick people into believe my sweaty, summer-hating, uber-liberal, rude, Ivy league, self could be from Virginia, but because it is so much more descriptive. Up North, “you” is singular and plural unless you’re from a New York based mafia movie and can naturally pull off “yous guys.” The pronoun “you” is confusing until we cross the mason-dixon line. These days, when I need my kids to come in, I say, “y’all come inside now, ya hear?” And no one says “I didn’t know you were talking to me!” In fact, sometimes all the neighborhood kids come inside, too.

I love that there are 50 words for snow in the Inuit dialect in Canada, and the Sami people have a 1000+ words for reindeer. Words reflect our needs and desires. They honor and unmask us. I once had a friend who was forever trying to use words no one knew. It betrayed his need to feel smarter than everyone around him. How embarrassing! Of course, as a young girl, I quietly cursed as much as possible. I loved the feeling of breaking the rules as long as I never got caught (hence, the muttering). It took a long time to outgrow this flaw, but my vocabulary revealed me long before my rebellious teen years did.

Although we have to be careful how much we overthink someone’s turn of phrase. I adore the sayings “knee-high to a grasshopper” and “it’s the bee’s knees.” But my thing for insect idioms don’t keep me from screaming when real bugs appear in my home — even grasshoppers. When I was 12, my favorite phrase was “Do these eyes look like they care?” which is maybe less of a phrase and more of a harbinger of the teens years to come. My parents should’ve been better listeners.

But my favorite collection is my word document of quotes that I painstakingly created from a yellow legal pad I began with over two decades ago. As always, famous people have the best sayings on words and their true consequences.

“A thousand words will not leave so deep an impression as one deed.” -Henrik Isben

And on the importance of knowing the significance of a phrase.

“The value of the average conversation could be enormously improved by the constant use of four simple words: I do not know.”  -Andre Maurois

I have learned to choose my words wisely without letting my words mark me as someone desperate to be wise. Well… almost.

1. “-said no one ever:” It’s like the 2013 equivalent of NOT from the 90s. I still feel bad for my parents who had to endure the NOT humor of my middle school years, and for too long, my Twitter stream and even advertisements are full of this “you’re accidentally agreeing with this phrase until I pull this rug out from under you with a SAID NO ONE EVER! PSYCHE! GOTCHA!” How very clever. Not!
2. “amazeballs (in all its variations):” I actually thought this word was dead, but it’s clearly a flesh-eating zombie who can only die when we shoot it in the balls. I’m ready.
3. “fail:” While it does get a lot across in a short period of time, and I know we are all busy, I feel like we should move on from it. Fail is now a fail, which puts us into a dangerous spiral of faildom.
4. “grammar nazi:” I don’t like when “nazi” is thrown around as is, but the whole pride in memorizing 8th grade English and not giving anyone a break if they mix up a posessive pronoun and a contraction once in a while is more annoying than smart. It seems to be more about showing off than encouraging better writing. Maybe Grammar Blowhard would work. Personally, I’d rather be know as a Grammar Nun or Grammar Gently and Privately Mention An Error.
5. “cronut:” I’ve never eat one, but I’ve seen so many photos and articles on them this year that I can’t bring myself to attempt to try one when I’m in New York City in 2014.

The one term I refuse to put on this list is #hashtag. These are useful for following events, topics and finding more than the 200 people you already follow on Twitter and Instagram (and maybe Facebook if it ever catches on there). I even like the Sherlock Holmes quality of #tryingtofigureoutlonghashtagsentences. As long as you haven’t named your kid Hashtag, it gets to stay for 2014.

What words and phrase are you kicking out in the new year?

My list is mostly for fun and to get some much needed anger out, but if you want to see more scientific 2013 lists, Global Language Monitoring mined “the Internet, including social media platforms, the blogosphere, and 275,000 print and electronic global media publications,” and the results are in Business Insider’s piece: Most Used Words And Phrases Of 2013.

Blogger at Late Enough

As a writer, I believe words are powerful. Words and phrases not only explain how we feel about the world but also how we feel about ourselves.

When Kate wrote about how stupid the word stupid is (I’m paraphrasing), I realized that I would love to give out a list of words I’m not okay with as people come within earshot of my children. Of course, when I finished up my list, I realized I’m less the writerly English major and more the fuddy-duddy, but whatever.

Please Don’t Use These Words Around My Children

What did you say?

All curse words. F-bomb, Sh*t, @ss, Yes, even MoFo

I stopped cursing years before I had kids mostly because I cursed so much before the age of 24 that it became boring. However, I don’t find cursing offense among adults. Boring but not offensive. I do find children cursing or swearing around my children offensive. Note: Not cursing means when I do curse EVERYONE PAYS ATTENTION. It’s kinda awesome if you were wondering.

Oh My God. Variation: God Damn It, God (with no lament, prayer or song attached)

I don’t like taking the Lord’s name in vain. Gawd, Goodness, Gosh. Yes, I sound dorky but when oh my god comes out of my kids mouths, I embrace dork. I think it's the same part of my that cringes when an American flag is left out in the rain. I’m a God Patriot, and I think we should be respectful.

Just plain Damn. Variation: Dammit

My daughter asks me: Which one am I allowed to say, Mama? Damn it or darn it? So we’re working on it, and dammit, we’’ll get there soon.

All cutesy names for penises and vaginas including Weewee and Hoohoo and continued ad nauseam. (literally)

My kids are taught proper names for their body parts. We haven’t gone into specifics about vulvas and testes yet but vagina and penis cover it enough. Are the nicknames going to hurt my kids? Probably not. Mostly I don’t want anyone to say them around my kids because I’m embarrassed. For them.

Any potty words such as Pee, Poop, Butt, Penis, Vagina used out of context

I was actually okay with poop and butt giggles for years because they’re funny, dammit (oops), until I heard my kids use them outside of the giggling context. When a kid calls another kid a butt, it’s not cool. And my kids are too young to figure out when a dutch ovens and a good mooning is appropriate.

All words or phrases that belittle: She’s a fatty, He’s stupid, Don’t be retarded, He's a {racial epithet}

My kids don’t know any of these words yet. And I like it that way.

Why yes, I am a 90-year-old lady when it comes to language and my children, but, really? I don't give a God dammit sh*t what stupid buttheads think.

PS. I couldn't bring myself to include a pet name for anyone's private parts in the final sentence. THOSE WORDS ARE THAT TERRIBLE.