Sometimes I have no way of knowing which items here strike a chord with readers and which ones don't. Other times, they let me know by writing to comment or to agree or disagree with something I have written.
Occasionally I run into readers who comment in person. That happened on several occasions last week after the appearance of an item here about the expression "having said that."
I wrote that the phrase sometimes has a purpose, as when someone wants to signal a change in direction from something just said. Many times, however, speakers throw it in when it has no relevance. They have heard others use it, and they like the impressive sound of it.
Two readers told me with a hint of whispered glee that they were so glad that I wrote what I did because they had supervisors or associates who could not get through a presentation without throwing in "having said that" several times.
A friend greeted me by saying, "I hope you had a merry Christmas, and having said that, happy New Year." Another friend said, "I liked your column, and having said that, I didn't care for the one the week before."
Fred Lewis of Mount Airy wrote: "‘Having said that,' or ‘that being said,' is running neck-and-neck (cliché alert) with ‘begs the question' for rampant misuse and overuse. As you imply, it's not that they are always inappropriate, but they are scattered here and there excessively by commentators or broadcasters because they are the connecting expressions du jour.
"No need to lament this excess, however: Another newly hackneyed expression will come along shortly."
Recent items here were about the use of friend and unfriend as verbs. To friend means to add someone as a correspondent on such social networking sites as Facebook. To unfriend means to remove someone with whom you no longer wish to correspond. The New Oxford American Dictionary has named unfriend the Word of the Year for 2009.
Several commentators have said that unfriending is a rude thing to do. Among them is Ananda Mitra, the head of the department of communications at Wake Forest University. A news release from the university quoted him as saying:
"The process of unfriending someone has transcended some of the traditional barriers of interaction. For instance, the notion of geography has been transformed and spatial location is certainly no impediment to maintaining a friendship on Facebook. In fact, that would be considered the strength of Facebook."
The news release said that Mitra compares unfriending someone to refusing to shake someone's hand. "Unfriending is more of a deliberate act than simply ignoring someone. It is basically pushing back and deleting a relationship with a keystroke."
Since the advent of friending and unfriending, I have been wondering: Suppose someone wants to friend you and invites you to become a Facebook correspondent. Suppose, for whatever reason, you openly decline the invitation actively or decline it passively by not responding.
Would declining to be friended be a form of unfriending in reverse? Would it also be the equivalent of refusing to shake someone's hand?
The homophones principal and principle frequently trip up writers who confuse one for the other. Reba Whittington of Wilkesboro came across an example in the Winston-Salem Journal. Because of the subject matter, the misuse results in a pun. Whittington wrote:
"Quoting from a story about the unified school schedule in Forsyth County (Dec. 20): ‘Puryear said that school officials think that there are some sound principals behind the schedule and are committed to making adjustments…."
It would be pleasing to know that school principals backing the plan are sound, but the word needed here is principles.
Richard Creed is a retired Journal editor. He can be reached at richcreed@triad.rr.com
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