[Magdalen] Like I Was Puzzled.

[Grace Cangialosi]

LOL, Sally!

What I find somewhat puzzling is the way it gets used to describe a conversation. I mean, I kind of get its use to place the speaker somewhere, as in "I was, like, going to the store."

But I don't get
"Well, I was like, 'How was your date last night?' And she was like, 'He's cute, but really boring," and I was like...    Well you get it.

The other usage that intrigues me is the use of "go" instead of "say."

"So I go 'Did you watch the game?' and he goes, 'No, I had to go shopping with my dad.' and I go....

Then there's beginning every question and response with "so."  I hear that all the time in NPR interviews.

Grace, sometime curmudgeon when it comes to language, grammar and punctuation

> On Dec 3, 2014, at 3:56 PM, Sally Davies <sally.davies at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> Pervasive here, too. This habit started, I guess, with kids and teenagers
> but has spread to older generations and from wherever it originated
> (California? London?) to a wide variety of English speaking contexts.
> 
> The usual form here is "I was like...".
> 
> I think that people have taken to this expression because it is somewhat
> distancing and seems not to commit one to a truth position. I was "like
> that" - but I wasn't "that".  Maybe it's too much of a stretch to conclude
> something about the culture in which such tentative self-positioning seems
> to thrive...?
> 
> "After that, I replied...", or "and then, I did X"  sounds not only more
> formal but more documentary! The "I was like" OTOH, avoids the bother of
> finding the right verb. It sets up a sentence (if one could call it that)
> which could go anywhere. I could be, like, saying something, or it's like I
> could have done something, or maybe I could even be, like so wasted I can't
> actually recall what I was like.
> 
> And sad/denialist as it may be, when you hang around with kids enough of
> the time, you do, like, start borrowing their expressions in self-defence...
> 
> Language evolves...or maybe unravels...
> 
> Sally D
> 
> On Wednesday, 3 December 2014, Cantor03--- via Magdalen <
> magdalen at herberthouse.org> wrote:
> 
>> 
>> I've had several people visiting my home recently whose every other
>> sentence
>> begins with "Like I was...." of some such.  These were not teenagers,  but
>> adults in their 40's and 50's.
>> 
>> I've been aware of this rage for describing usually something in the  past
>> with descriptions beginning with "Like", but I wasn't aware such  usage
>> has crept so far into the general USA population.  I have no clue  about
>> this
>> phenomenon in other English speaking areas of the world.
>> 
>> This "like" business has become chronic and pervasive in the USA, and
>> my question is about whether this is a fad, or marks  a chronic change
>> in spoken English.  If it is long term, it demonstrates a  trivialization
>> of
>> the language IMHO.
>> 
>> Anyone have any thoughts about this "like" usage and predictions  about
>> its continued usage?
>> 
>> 
>> David S.
>>