Abbreviations? ELI5 (Explain Like I’m 5)

I am indebted to my blogging friend Darla for reminding me of how tortuous some modern abbreviations are. (Read her blog HERE.)

A while ago I wrote a column about this for Devon Life and I'm sharing it below:

HDLR.

Sorry, am I confusing you? That stands for Hello Devon Life Readers. I could have written it out in full in the first place but it seems mandatory these days to pepper all articles, social media posts and correspondence with abbreviations.

I made that one up but there are thousands of internet abbreviations that all young people appear to have learned without even trying. If only subjects like French, algebra and English grammar could be assimilated so easily.

This need to reduce everything to its smallest possible form first came to my attention when one of my Twitter follower's profiles included a plea to potential followers, NRWNJ. I had to look it up and found out it meant No Right Wing Nut Jobs. How effective that plea has been I’m not sure. Are right wing nut jobs any more familiar with abbreviations than left wing nut jobs? Probably not.

Then I had a message which included IYKWIM (If You Know What I Mean), which is ironic as I had to look it up.

I logged on to a local sales page on Facebook and the very first post included the letters sfs. I didn’t have a clue what this meant - Sausages For Sunday? Sales Frustration Syndrome? - so I had to look it up. Apparently it means "still for sale", which makes sense. The next post included sstc which I worked out for myself as "sold subject to contract". I'm presuming that was correct but as I didn't want a beige Dralon sofa I didn't bother to check if I were right.

I can understand why there are a lot of abbreviations on Twitter as you are limited to 140 characters, although there is a trial on at the moment and some users are allowed 280. In my opinion 140 characters is 140 too many for some people, but that's another story.  But I don't see the point in confusing someone (i.e. me) with impenetrable abbreviations when the character count is unlimited.

So it was that one commenter on a website story I read gave some frankly ludicrous medical advice to a poor man suffering from frequent headaches.  At least the commenter had the grace to add IANAD on the bottom. IANAD? That stands for I Am Not A Doctor. This, apparently, is quite a common rider on the internet but if you don't know what it means and can't be bothered to look it up, you could end up following some very strange medical procedures. If you have advised someone that the topical application of boiled cow dung, raisins and cottonwool will cure a particularly nasty boil, you should maybe add IANAD and pray to God the sufferer knows what it means.

After coming across these abbreviations I thought I'd better drag myself into 2018 and see what other tortuous short forms Devon's young whippersnappers were using to communicate.

While perusing the millions of internet articles that read as if they have been written by a semi-literate child, I'm going to start asking WDYMBT (What Do You Mean By That?).

Another one that might be quite handy for all you Percy Pedantics is FTFY (Fixed That For You). This is routinely used in internet comments to correct the grammar of the writer. Umph, not sure about that one. Seems a sure-fire way to lose friends, if you ask me.

Miss Knowall here could write AMA - Ask Me Anything. I'm fairly easy-going so when I have imparted my words of wisdom I can respond HTH (Happy To Help).

If I agree with an article and want to give the writer a little bit of positive reinforcement I can tell them MTFBWY (May The Force Be With You). Then there’s TL;DR (Too Long;Didn’t Read). This is written if a person doesn't want to read an entire article but has something to say anyway.

I certainly will not be using DFTBA, even to my family and closest friends. I'm sure all of them would think my body had been taken over by aliens if I ever told them Don't Forget To Be Awesome. And it could be dangerous to add CCW (Comments and Criticism Welcome) to any of my online witterings.

But when it comes to complicated articles, here’s one I really need: ELI5 (Explain Like I’m 5).

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When I Am An Old Woman

My 35-year-old neighbour popped in for a cup of tea and chat. The conversation turned to "women of a certain age". My friend believes she is now "of that certain age" and has officially lost it. "It" being that certain something that young women have - that makes men want to help them and impress them without them doing anything. The more unscrupulous may be all too well aware of this power and use it to their advantage - manipulative, yes, sexist, of course, but useful nevertheless.

After oversleeping she'd had a mad scramble to get out of the house and get to work on time and had forgotten to put on her seat-belt. She was flagged down by a policeman who she swears wasn't a day over 14. She said she shamelessly fluttered her eyelashes and apologised in a girly, breathy voice .

Instead of rising to the occasion like Sir Lancelot coming to the aid of a damsel in distress, he looked as uncomfortable as if he were being propositioned by his maiden aunt. The final nail in the coffin was when he produced a fixed penalty ticket and called her madam. Not "miss" or "honey" but, horror of horrors, MADAM. She has felt depressed ever since.

I can't remember the day I lost it, "it" being so far back in the mists of time, but I remember the day I realised I was getting old. I walked into a shoe shop and rejected a pair of the most beautiful high-heeled strappy sandals in favour of a comfy pair of shoes.

At least, I consoled myself, I hadn't bought slip-ons on the grounds that they were easier to put on than strappy sandals.

Age has also precluded me from buying other desirable objects of apparel. The thought of wearing a thong makes my cheeks red - and not the ones on my face. The bolero is another garment I have caressed longingly in the shops. I even slipped one on but decided a little bolero top that stopped short of my nipples was not a good look. I am aware, before you remind me, that a bolero isn't supposed to stop short of your nipples, but look, I'm no longer a perky young thing so my nipples aren't quite as high-riding as they once were.

Ugg boots made me look like Big Foot on the rampage and in skinny jeans my legs looked like two over-stuffed salamis. Last year the ethnic peasant look was everywhere. In mine, instead of looking like a skittish gipsy girl I more closely resembled, well, a peasant. And one of those short stocky Eastern European peasants who's been eating too much borscht and dumplings.

So I've given up trying to look fashionable and have settled for looking Bohemian instead - a bit like the woman in Jenny Joseph's Warning poem: "When I am an old woman I shall wear purple and a red hat which doesn't go and which doesn't suit me."

I don't yet have a red hat but I do have a purple cardigan. I will reject beige in favour of clashing colours, book a safari rather than a week in Cleethorpes and drink tequila rather than sherry.
I intend to grow old disgracefully.


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Camera Phone Cat Snaps

You call it medicine, I call it a gross invasion of privacy.

I’m looking for a new phone. I don’t require much from a phone - I’m not a teenager with one welded to my hand, living my whole life in cyberspace. I’m a grumpy old woman who wants to phone firms to harangue them for their laxity of service and to send sarcastic messages to my friends and family. That’s all.

A good camera would be nice. My current phone takes pictures but by the time I've got on to the right programme and clicked all the right buttons it’s another time of day. Sometimes the subject matter has emigrated to Australia or grown into an adult before I can select the right button.

The other day, though, I actually managed to take a good photo. The cat was ill. To spare her blushes, I won’t tell you her symptoms. Suffice it to say the cure involved liquid paraffin and an indoor litterbox.

The better half helped me administer the medicine which was quite a success... for after wrapping her in a towel, I only had three deep scratches and a tetanus jab to show for it. He then went to work.

A couple of hours later, she had used her litterbox. I was so pleased I phoned the other half to tell him.

“Do you want me to take a picture to send you?” I asked excitedly.

A big sigh wafted across the airwaves. “No, you’re all right,” he replied drily.

I took one anyway and despite its pin sharpness, depth of colour and novel theme, I don’t think it’s going to win any photographic awards.

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Learning From Dr Mark Sloan

Dr Mark Sloan, a role model for wannabe multi-taskers

I am a big believer in carpe diem (seize the day, as I’m sure you all know). Unfortunately, belief doesn’t always translate to action. There are times when very little diem gets carped and I drift through the day doing minimal housework, maximum reading, minimal freelance work and maximum faffing about thinking about what I should be doing.

But I always get up in the morning full of good intentions with all kinds of worked planned, including industrial-strength cleaning, getting to grips with the jungle that is my garden and writing a best-seller before the sun is over the yard arm

I always write a list but occasionally writing the list takes longer than doing the work. So my guest bedroom remains a dumping ground for anything in the house that doesn’t have a natural home, the garden could still have undiscovered species of animals in it, hiding in the undergrowth, for all I know and the novel remains a concept rather than a reality.

So it was I found myself trying to fill in some gaps in my education by catching up on Charles Dickens. He knew how to tell a good tale, that one. Unfortunately he never quite learned to tell a good tale succinctly. You can’t finish one of his novels in one sitting.

It doesn’t help that I have developed the old lady habit of falling asleep in the chair after lunch. One minute I am watching News At One and the next Dr Mark Sloan is half way through solving a grisly mystery in Diagnosis Murder. He’s a full time doctor in a busy hospital and still finds time for some very successful sleuthing.

There’s him tackling a triple heart bypass before breakfast, dealing with the victims of a head-on train crash before lunch, tracking down a vicious drugs baron in the afternoon and still finding time in the evening for a great social life with his fellow doctors and that dopey policeman son of his who doesn’t seem able to wipe his backside without his dad's help.

But I intend to turn over a new leaf and tomorrow I plan to solve global warming and put an end to war, pestilence and famine before I lay my head on the pillow in the evening. 

So that’s Wednesday taken care off but what am I going to do on Thursday?

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Why Dogs Bite People

Biggles? Really?

And you call ME a bitch...

Oh the indignity...

I'm feeling sheepish and I just want everybody to buzz off, permanently.

Before you leave:

You can follow me on: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest. As you can see, I have far too much to say for myself.

• Please feel free to leave a comment. I love to hear from you and will reply and visit your blog, if you have one, if I can. 
• You really don't want to miss my next post. It could be my best one ever (or not... who knows)! Enter your email address top right and FeedBurner will tell you every time there's an update.