Ben Schott’s language blog Schott’s Vocab on the New York Times website held a contest for modern age greeting cards called Get Web Soon. Among the favorites: “Heartfelt condolences on the loss of your data” and “Congratulations on your relationship update.” This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Get Web Soon”
You’re listening to A Way with Words. I’m Martha Barnette.
And I’m Grant Barrett. Martha, one of my favorite blogs, is about new words. Could you have guessed?
Oh, imagine that!
Ben Schott keeps Schott’s vocab at the New York Times website, and it is highly entertaining.
Oh, yeah.
It satisfies both the side of me that wants a few jokes every day, and the side of me that wants a few new words every day, right?
Right.
Good stuff. He’s a British fellow, so it also has that, like, foreign bent, which is kind of cool.
That’s nice.
But he also throws contests for the weekend.
And there was a contest recently that I really enjoyed, and I wanted to share it with you and everyone who’s listening if they missed it.
The weekend competition was Get Web Soon.
And the idea was that the readers of the blog were supposed to come up with greeting cards for the modern age.
Oh, nice.
Right?
Or sympathy cards for the modern age, as the case may be.
Get Web Soon.
The one that I loved the most and was also highly rated by other readers was Heartfelt Condolences on the Loss of Your Data.
I would have a stack of those now if that card actually existed, right?
Except my parents wouldn’t understand what that meant.
They’d be like, data? What data? Who’s that?
That’s terrific.
And there are a few more.
This one is in light of all the new, I guess, revolutions that are happening in the Middle East and North Africa.
Congratulations on the birth of your new democracy.
Let’s hope there’s a big market for that.
And then this one is, this is probably, unfortunately, too common.
Sorry to hear your identity’s been stolen.
Here’s hoping you’ll soon be your old self.
Oh.
These are fantastic.
Oh, that’s terrible.
Oh, I see one I really like.
Congratulations on your relationship update.
That’s right.
Terrific.
You’ve changed your status message and everyone noticed.
We’ll post a link to Ben Schott’s blog and to this contest in particular.
And if you have some greeting cards for the modern age, send them along, words@waywordradio.org, or leave them on our voicemail, 877-929-9673.
