A lawyer was winding up an estate for a poor widow, and at the end of it all she had left in her purse was a $50 bill.
So he took that.
But as he was walking back to where he had parked his Bentley, stuffing the bill in his wallet, he noticed that there was a second $50 bill stuck to the first one. Now he was faced with an ethical dilemma.
Should he tell his partner?
It’s not switching the two - when people say “literally” in a figurative manner they’re doing it for emphasis, not because they actually mean “figuratively” and are using the wrong word. When you tell someone “you really fucked up” you’re not stressing the literal reality that they fucked the direction of up, you’re just emphasizing how much they fucked up; when you tell someone “you literally fucked up” you mean they really really fucked up.
This is the type of arrant pedantry up with which I will not put.
Depends on where the word is stressed.
Too late! It dove into the lake.
I don’t tell anyone “you literally fucked up” since it’s either a non sequitur or a pretty rude thing to say about up. If I need some rilly rilly awesome intensifier for how much you fucked up, I have plenty of 'em kicking around my vocabulary that are more entertaining and/or impressive than “literally.”
It was the impersonal “you”. Yet another victim of English.
Oh, I know. You did not miscommunicate; I did not misunderstand. I just felt the need to express my own policy when it comes to the (mis)application of “literally” as intensifier. I get what the kids are trying to say, I just think they sound ineloquent when they say it that way.
But they think I’m a stodgy old tool who will never get laid again, so it balances out.
Literally has included figuratively for centuries - much to my surprise.
Bare with the person who made the mug…
No, really. You should all strip together.
I don’t care about the fucking misspelling (which looks to have been fixed on the etsy page, btw). I want one. Figuratively, literally, theoretically, euphemistically, philosophically, artisically, meterologically, metallurgically, overcaffeineatedly, brucelee, leeleesobieskically I want one. Now.
Here, here!
A married couple died and went to heaven.
After Saint Peter welcomed them, he told them, “You vowed to be together until death. You’re both released from your marital vows, and you can enjoy yourselves however you choose.”
The two discuss it, and decide they want to spend eternity together, and to get married again. “You’re sure?” asked Peter, looking a bit distraught. When they said they were sure, he sighed, and walked away.
The two of them enjoyed heaven together for a couple of years, until finally, Peter showed up again, having made all of the arrangements for the wedding. A priest happily married them, there was a huge celebration, and the two went off to enjoy their afterlife as newlyweds.
Unfortunately, they hadn’t realized exactly what “eternity” meant, and after enough time passed, they decided that they wanted to end their eternal marriage. They sought out Saint Peter and asked about divorce.
Peter groaned. “It took me two years to find a priest up here, and now you want me to find a lawyer?”
Yeah, I guess saying “you figuratively fucked up” just doesn’t have the same, shall we say, cachet.
I’d never heard it referred to as Skitt’s law, always as Muphry’s (as a play on Murphy’s Law, which it’s related to).
The important thing with grammar or spelling errors is to point them out in a polite and well meaning way, eg when explaining the difference between lose and loose:
Lose: what you just did
Loose: your mum.
Not “its” but “possession,” which was spelled incorrectly. Unless you meant that you found “it,” in which case, sorry!
I meant to both invoke Skitt’s Law through the “typo,” as well as give a hint for those looking as to where they should be looking (the missing ‘s’ is on the “its” line).
But thanks for catching it. I’ve been waiting for someone to make a remark, one way or the other, on that.
Shorter OED:
Effect (efe·kt), v. 1589. [f. prec. sb.] 1. trans. To bring about; to accomplish.
“Zounds! Thou shalt effect thy busyness transformations by leveraging thy synergies, i’truth!”
—William Shakespeare, Two Management Consultants of Verona.
“Literally” is frequently employed as a hyperbolic technique. If someone says “this is literally the worst thing ever” the word is being used figuratively in order to provide emphasis, as both the speaker and the listener are aware that this is not an actual statement of fact. In this example, saying “this is figuratively the worst thing ever” entirely robs the statement of any value, even though pedants would say it is correct. See also: ALL HYPERBOLE EVER.
Pedants who think they are being clever by pointing out figurative usage of the word “literally” literally make me want to beat them to death with a copy of English Grammar in Use.
…That wasn’t a figurative usage of the word.
Thank you. Language develops (“evolves”) to increase the means of communication. Misusing “affect” and “effect” does the opposite, because the listener has to expend energy to figure out what the speaker meant from context. It’s selfish and obnoxious to put the burden all on the listener out of sheer laziness, and blithely accepting it as the new normal allows language and culture to be pecked to death by ducks.
(See also literally vs. figuratively, “begs the question,” &c.)
