Express Yourself, Again.

While I have previously discussed the idea of awesome expressions that disappear (see: Express Yourself), I don’t feel like I have even scratched the surface of the world of slang, be it good or bad.  Please follow along with me, as I list some more words and expressions and explain why we need to work together to bring them back into circulation.

!) Bad.

I miss being able to say something is bad, to mean that it is good.  At some point someone thought bad-ass just made more sense, I guess.  Instead of “that’s a bad skateboard you got” it became “that’s a bad-ass skateboard you got”. Why?  What is this need to add 'ass' to everything.  Don’t we have enough 'ass' as it is (feel free to add whatever mental picture you want, whether it’s some Kardashian, a parade of Biggest Loser contestants, or some reality show about sexy people)?  Bad was doing just fine on its own, sans 'ass'.  This tends to happen with lots of words though.  Cheap becomes cheap-ass, lame is lame-ass and so on and so forth.  Drop the 'ass' act people. 

On a side note, do you think it was Michael Jackson that made everyone uncomfortable and in turn made it no longer cool to call something bad?  Too soon?

@) Bumblast.

On the topic of ass, we used to often employ the term bumblast.  Now it was generally used in derogatory schoolyard conversations attached to a lot of the other homophobic insults hat were thrown about so hastily back then and perhaps that was why it disappeared.  The homophobia needs to stay gone, but it is a shame, really, that we weren't able to hold on to 'bumblast'.  Because, rather than use this in a way like “oh yeah, well you and Max like to bumblast each other all night long” we could simply use it in a more adult conversation.

“I’m into anal.”

That doesn’t sound too appealing at all.  It sounds all icky and scientific.

“I’m into BUMBLASTING.”

Hell yes – sign me up, like a rocket to the moon! Now that sounds like fun.

#) Sucks the bag.

When something really sucks, we used to say that it 'sucks the bag'.  It’s brilliant because it leaves it up to you the listener to decide what kind of bag it actually is, what is contained within the bag, and how you would go about successfully sucking on it.  Is it the bag itself, or what is contained within the bag?  So many questions... If you have ever heard Louis CK’s routine about sucking a bag of dicks, you’ll understand the gist of what I am saying here.

How could we have let this one fade away? 

$) Poser.

I think poser died along with the grunge movement and the word ‘shaft’.  Essentially it means the same thing as phoney, but it just feels more insulting, doesn’t it?  I understood why ‘whigger’ died, because frankly, it is offensive on numerous levels, but poser is so wholesome and real.  There is something to be said about an insult that sounds so gentle and yet calls to question a person’s entire existence.

“Nice hat, poser.”

It’s like weenie (see: Weenie Roast) or party pooper.  It may sound wholesome, but no one wants to be one.

%) Japanimation.

At some point this became Anime, and personally I don’t think that it has the same ring to it, at all.  Japanimation doesn’t sound nerdy or dorky, it just sounds like exactly what it is.  It's fun to say, unlike Anime (pronounced like a Spanish word or something... what the fuck) or Manga or stupid words like that sound like something off of the periodic table of the elements, which in turn, makes them sound even nerdier and thus even lamer.  Maybe I just exposed my nerdiness by referring to the elements, but whatever.  At least I don’t watch Anime.  I watch Japanimation.

There are tons more trash talking words that I can think of that don’t get the airtime that they used to, like dickwad, shit for brains or numbnuts.  While I won’t get into every one of them here, do your best to revive cool old insults, expressions and slang.  Start with the ones I have discussed, but then, come up with your own list of forgotten gems that we can all work on together as one harmonious society.

That’s it.  I’ve got a big-ass headache.