Are there words or phrases that annoy you?

I despise business jargon, like “What is our value add?,” “I’ll float that,” “They can’t match our IP.” You know, things that make your colleagues sound like they they are playing office.

Speaking of IP, I find the acronymization of the world annoying. “Let’s put that in the PPT for the RFP for CBT,” someone said to me yesterday. Huh?

Some of you may smile and say, but what about what you did just there, falsely turning a real noun into a made-up noun? Very, very annoying.

Last Saturday afternoon, my loyal spouse asked me what was for dinner. It was an Arsenal game day, the day that I for three weekend matches this season honored the man of the match with a dish of his country at the Gooner Supper Club. I asked him, “Didn’t you read my blog?”

At this point, the man to whom I have been married for 20+ years made a startling admission: He simply cannot read my blog on game day because on that day, I use the word “Supper.” Liberally.

He abhors the word Supper. He cannot make himself look at it.

During that evening’s Gooner S***er Club, which was attended by my sister, we explored why he finds it so offensive. He couldn’t say exactly, but he could remember the first time he found it grating. In the late 90s, Journalist Andrea Mitchell of NBC married Alan Greenspan, then Chair of the Federal Reserve Board. In an interview that appeared within a few years of their marriage, she was quoted as saying that earlier in the day, she’d “had a light supper with Alan.” It grated on my husband’s nerves so much, that he’d even mentioned it to me at the time, I can now recall.

But why it was objectionable I never quite knew. Was it just too colloquial or downhome for a grand man like Alan Greenspan–nearly an economic god at the time–to have such a meal? It was a mystery then, and remains one.

I don’t have so many readers that I can afford to lose a key one, and of husbands, I have only the one.  Not that I fear losing my husband as a husband, but why intentionally annoy the man? I hereby put the Gooner S***er Club on hold until it can be reborn by an alternate name or concept.

I don’t feel so clubby today anyway, as Arsenal not only lost against Chelsea 2-0, but lost two men to red cards, both Gabriel and Santi Cazorla. Gabriel’s was a straight red, so he’ll be out for a few matches. Our Gooner S***er Club honoree of last week, Francis Coquelin, had to leave the game at halftime with a knee injury. So a bad day that will produce residual problems for at least a few more weeks. Arsenal didn’t play so badly and Chelsea didn’t play so well, but Chelsea were helped by the truly horrific antics of Diego Costa, who realistically should have been sent off before any of the others were, and antagonized Gabriel so thoroughly, that my biggest regret for the day is that Gabriel produced such a tame kick on Costa’s leg.

Chelsea have uniquely attracted some of the most horrendous personalities in the sport. But that reminds me of a word I like a lot: karma.

Jose, Diego, you’ve more than earned what’s sure to come.

The rest of us wait patiently. We’ve got nothing but time.