Banished words

The educators and PR folks at Lake Superior State University have released their 34th annual List of Words to Be Banished from the Queen's English for Mis-use, Over-use and General Uselessness.

Being from Ohio, I don't pay much attention to the happenings up there in that crazy mitten-shaped state (GO BUCKEYES!), but I like lists, and I like words, so I decided to have a peek at it. Of course, it took me the better part of ten minutes to get their web page to load, which did nothing to reverse my innate bias against all things Michigan. Then after perusing the list, I discovered that it is more a list of phrases (and one emoticon) than a simple list of words. Another point deducted.

Further deductions were given because of the list itself. While many of the entries are indeed annoying, I don't think these really merit banishment:

• Icon/Iconic--what would we call those little pictures all over our computers?
  
• Game Changer--I'd never heard this phrase until I read the list (maybe I don't watch enough CNN)
  
• Staycation--it's not even a real word, so how can you ban it?
  
• Desperate Search--I blame Nancy Grace for this one
• Not So Much--I like this phrase. Period.
  
• Winner of Five Nominations--how is this more annoying than winner of less than or more than five?
  
• It's That Time of Year Again--there are plenty of things that only happen once a year!
  

It also struck me that several of the entries are only part of the lexicon thanks to one of the many gaffes committed by our current Commander in Chief:

• Green--we had to have something to focus on other than the war in Iraq . . .
  
• Carbon Footprint/Carbon Offsetting--see above
  
• Maverick--without this phrase, how would we have been able to distinguish that McCain/Palin were any different from Bush/Cheney? (that's a joke, please no angry tirades)
  
• Bailout--'nuff said
  
• Wall Street/Main Street--see above
  

Some entries were just not worth getting worked up about:

• First Dude--Was there ever any chance that anybody other than Sarah Palin would ever call her husband that (and somebody should explain to the Palins that the spouse of the VP is not the "first" anything)?
  
• <3--Until technology advances to the point where emotion can be conveyed via email, I say leave the poor emoticons alone. ;)
  

This leaves one final entry on the LSSU list: Monkey. I refuse to live in a world without the word "monkey." I love monkeys. Without the word "monkey," my Christmas list would have taken much longer to write, as I would have had to enumerate the various types of monkey that I wanted: pygmy marmoset, capuchin, chimp, macaque . . . in fact, I wouldn't even be able to make my list, because many of my favorite monkeys have the word "monkey" in their name: squirrel monkey, howler monkey, spider monkey, helper monkey, flying monkey . . .

So now you know my opinion of LSSU's little list--what are your thoughts?