Chopping Off Words To Make Them Taste Good

I’m fascinated with the fluidity of language and how every day it seems words come and go around us. Think how over time we have dropped the last letter or two off certain nouns—perhaps just out of carelessness or due to our verbally dropping them (and just not hearing them in speech) such that over time the acceptable spelling of these words changed. Here are some words as they were originally penned:

• panned cakes (pancakes)
• iced tea (that’s the correct form but we say “ice tea” much of the time)
• powered steering
• linked sausages (makes more sense, doesn’t it?)
• creamed cheese (same here)
• roasted beef

Maybe over time some of these ( and  many other) words will be shortened even further, as we continue to chop up our language via text messaging. Now even phrases are shortened into acronyms to save time typing (like ROFL and LOL, which I use a lot. If you don’t know what these mean, ask someone who texts a lot!). We now put chops on the barbie and drink (soda) pop and eat dogs. Seems like this is really all about food, hmmm.

Maybe we’re in such a rush to eat, we don’t want to take the time to complete our sentences. Or we’re talking with our mouths full and drop a few letters inadvertently. Something to chew on, eh?