Banned Words and Phrases

I was watching/listening to/tolerating the fact that it was on in the background while I was working City Line the other day. They were doing one of those designer themed shows and talking about . . . wait for it . . . kitchen benches! Couldn't you just die? Anyway, the designer was talking about this one bench that was from Ikea, and so it was "a good price point." I got a little irritated, as I am wont to do, and thought "price point"? Why not just say "price"? Do you think it makes you sound fancy to say two words when one will suffice? No! It's stupid!

So I got on Twitter and asked my Twitter friends what words/phrases they would like to see banned. I think it's interesting when looking at these words/phrases to see the reason why the words irritate my friends so much. I think some people hated words that were mispronounced or misused while others were sick of hearing over-used and jargony phrases. Here they are:

price-point (Although my husband has pointed out its "business" use, I don't think that's really how they were using it)
In these tough economic times (So sick of this. EVERYTHING can apparently be explained by these tough economic times or can have added weight because of these tough economic times)

My charming and intelligent husband @reed_man would like irregardless banned. I think what makes it all the more annoying is it's a word that is frequently used by people in positions of authority. If my principal uses the word irregardless I will be very uncomfortable. Here's an interesting wikipedia article on this unword.

@Jason_Cobb would like to ban the phrase one stop stop which I have never heard and so can happily promise never to utter. I think it may be a UK thing.

@zollinhoffer added: libary and fustrated because of their non-word status. I think I could also add ambleance instead of ambulance, expresso instead of espresso, and (although it may get me in hot water) axed instead of asked. He also added could care less (because of its misuse).

@cordym would like let's touch base banned. I was probably particularly guilty of using phrases like this over the past year at the board office just because everyone else did. Don't even get me started on the edujargon that spouted from my mouth.

and my friend and font guru @muckapedia would like these banned: metrics, leverage (the dubious verb), and crutches in terms of, as per & worst case scenario. I would like to heartily endorse the banning of in terms of. I worked with a lovely colleague who used that phrase so frequently, I started counting in one meeting and then stopped when I ran out of fingers (because math is not my strong suit).

So there they are folks. These words and phrases are hereby banned. Use them at your peril!!!!

(After reviewing this post I think I should ban the excessive use of parentheses and exclamation marks!!!!! !)