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Post by Deleted on Oct 10, 2014 20:17:04 GMT
I was wondering today if people in the 21st century still use TGIF as shorthand to celebrate the arrival of the weekend. It seems quite possible that it is now reserved for old fogeys who were already adults in the final decades of the 20th century. But perhaps I am wrong.
As for acronyms of this century, I thought that we could perhaps begin to discuss them. I am incapable of using LOL, perhaps because it is something I almost never do in real life, particularly in the presence of other people. Oddly enough, I can more easily go into fits of laughter when I am all alone.
I am not a great fan of WTF, but I do use it from time to time, particularly on websites that are heavily censored, and it does convey a very specific meaning in excellent shorthand.
Do you have any new favourites?
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Post by mossie on Oct 11, 2014 16:39:26 GMT
The one which amused me was POETS day. Push off early, tomorrow's Saturday.
The other very old fashioned, is the pilots pre flight check list. WET FUR Wings Engine Tail, Fuselage Undercarriage Rudder. In reality every flight was preceded by physically walking round the plane looking at each thing, checking that the controls moved easily tyres good etc etc. As one finished at the rudder then followed the necessary pre flight pee on the tailwheel. ( doesn't that just date me)
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Post by Deleted on Oct 11, 2014 17:38:53 GMT
Considering how 'correct' so many people are, I have always been amazed that 'snafu' entered the dictionary so easily and appeared in Time magazine for the first time in 1942, not to mention the frankly weird Private Snafu cartoons produced to the U.S. Army.
If the meaning of snafu has still eluded anyone, it stands for "Situation Normal: All Fucked Up."
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Post by lagatta on Oct 12, 2014 23:22:47 GMT
That is utterly weird, including the bizarre brothel. I think SOME kinds of puritanical censorship tended to be relaxed in wartime, just to be "one of the guys" and get messages across.
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Post by questa on Oct 13, 2014 1:40:01 GMT
We used it a lot while nursing and to us the FU meant fouled up.
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Post by questa on Oct 13, 2014 1:45:21 GMT
I have collected a list of common acronyms currently used in text messaging. A lot of humour in some.
I saw a personalised number (registration) plate on a posh car recently...DV8
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Post by lagatta on Oct 13, 2014 2:22:36 GMT
Well "fouled" was always the softer version of the FU. And it meant basically the same thing, and is perhaps more literal; as the mess does not always have much to do with sexual intercourse. To foul one's nest is to shit in it; hardly a more genteel thought.
I looked at some of those cartoons, indeed they were a bit "twisted", not just bawdy. The "innocent" is an old figure in such sagas. And he actually dies several times in the stories.
He seems to speak a kind of Brooklynese (perhaps the American anyporters could correct me there) although his family comes from a semi-rural background, however his dad is shown working at a plant (perhaps a motor vehicle plant in the midwest converted to tank production?).
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Post by komsomol on Oct 23, 2014 22:47:00 GMT
ASAP seems to be in decline.
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Post by htmb on Oct 23, 2014 23:20:07 GMT
I have children who are in their twenties and thirties, and most of our non-verbal communication is via text. Rarely do we email each other, except for moments when there's a lot of information to share at one time. Any and every abreviation possible is used when texting, and often words are just shortened/made up on the fly. It's typical for them to send dozens of texts to various people each and every day. One of my more colorful children uses WTF and JFC quite often when overexcited about some wrongful tragedy. All four children use LOL to show they think something is funny. (It's certainky the lazy way to get around expressing oneself.) This is not just the case with me, but texting is how they also communicate with many of their friends and family. It's become much more common than talking on the phone. So, my point would be that acronyms are still around and much used, especially by the younger generations.
My personal favorite, RTFM, goes back to the days when I taught and also worked tech support in an elementary school. All the heavy duty tech guy pros I knew - and they were almost ALL guys back then - moaned and groaned among themselves about how impossible it was to get users to actually read manuals and follow directions. Their acronym standard is one I still laugh about, especially when I've attempted to do something before actually reading the directions (which is almost always the case).
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Post by questa on Oct 29, 2014 0:52:18 GMT
I had to ask for an explanation for YMMV I knew having kids would pay off some day.
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