Monday, August 24, 2009

A quick pET peeve

It's ET cetera. Not "EX cetera" or "ICK cetera". ET. Rhymes with pet, set, and let. Et, latin, meaning "and". "ET CETERA" means "and so forth", or "and the rest". It is a latin phrase used in all the latin-based or -influenced languages (including ours) and means the same in all of them, since it is unaltered from the original latin.

My boss does this one all the time and it drives me insane. "ickcetera, ickcetera". Or even, "And ickcetera." This morning, the Sirius traffic announcer used, "EX cetera".

Arrrrggghhhh.

(see also "EXpecially" or "ICKspecially").

Rant over, please resume normal blog.

3 comments:

  1. Yul Brynner knew how to say it. 8-)

    Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera (flourish).

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  2. Mine is folks who spell "y'all" as "ya'll." It is a contraction for "you all." The apostrophe stands in place of the "ou."

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  3. well, if we're listing pet peeves...people who don't return their shopping carts...my market here is the worst!

    It is probably best I not start in on all my grammar pet peeves.

    ReplyDelete