Now I am quite an old-fashioned, traditional woman as some of you might have noticed. I am also partial to using some out-dated words or phrases as we have such a rich and beautiful language. It is a shame to let them disappear into the mists of time, shrivelling up with lack of use.

I have noticed something disturbing over the years however, that has become more prevalent as technology advances and the world becomes smaller. The fact that I have a young daughter who likes to keep up with the latest fads and trends, also brings this home to me, and I don’t like it one bit.

I may not be the best at writing, I understand that my grammar leaves a lot to be desired at times, and I am careless and shoddy with my proofreading (I know, being the Typo Queen is not something to be proud of). However I do try to make sure that I at least make some use of the language that I was brought up with. I am proud of being English and as such become very annoyed that my mother-tongue is being messed about with, chopped up and put in a blender, and coming out with chunks in it that I am unfamiliar with!

Now, I do not wish to offend anyone at all, this is my opinion, and being a bit of an old ‘stick in the mud’ I like the language just the way it is, thank you very much.

To illustrate my point, here are a few examples

Text Talk WTF??? (See, I can do some of the trendy abbreviations). You will probably not be surprised to know that when I text someone, I write the whole lot out in full, complete with punctuation. I know, I am extremely uncool. (but I do love a smiley face) but I hate all of this cul8tr stuff. I mean, what the hell is that? The first time I saw it I tired to read it as a word, thinking it was ‘culture’ and that someone has pressed the 8 by mistake and did it in a hurry, (Something I am always guilty of).

All these abbreviations are fine,(if you can understand them), but I do worry that our kids are losing the art of writing. I remember when I was at school we had to learn how to write all the different types of letters, using the appropriate greeting and how to sign off, which I am not sure they still teach, despite the fact that letters do still need to be written on occasion.

The other thing I get annoyed about, is nicking words from other languages when we have perfectly good ones of our own! Miss Hap does it all the time (she knows it annoys me)

“Mum, have you got any Bobby pins?”

“What? Oh, you mean hair grips”!

Grrrrr.

Trash/garbage- rubbish

Cotton candy – candy floss

Gotten – got

You get the idea. Or calling each other ‘bruv!’ I am not your bloody bruv, nor am I your ‘mate!’

I know I am getting to be an ‘Old Codger’ but I can’t help it. Is it just me or does it wind you up that written language is becoming so informal and casual?

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