Let me also point out an issue I have with the word blog. Blog is obviously a contraction and elision of web log. I have to admit to not really liking this, although I should also say that I am not a big fan of contractions, abbreviations or anything of that sort. I dislike the word combo compared to the majestic glory of combination. I have found that it is pretty easy to cut out of the vocabulary except in two instances. If you walk into a Subway and order a Cold Cut Combination, they won't know what you are talking about (true story and it happened at the Subway at the corner of Greenwood and Glenview Rds in Glenview, Illinois) and you simply sound foolish referring to the Combos (the snack treat) as Combinations. I am hoping for the day when I can be an uptight curmudgeon stuck in his ways, when I can refer to those new fangled snack treats as Combinations and get away with it because I'll be dead soon and its just not worth the effort to laugh at me.

I also dislike it when people refer to Commonwealth Avenue in Boston as Comm Ave. Again, what is really the point of picking a fight with people who refer to a street in a city in which I have never lived? We all have standards and I can't stand -- nay, I won't stand -- for the relaxing of verbal attitudes anywhere.