DEAR READER,
AYT? And if so, WUZ UP? It's been 4VR since we talked. BYKT.
NEWAY, how are things going with you and your B/F or G/F? Here's the good thing IMHO about being married. You don't have to deal with B/Fs or G/Fs anymore. You don't have to wonder if he's gonna call or if she's still mad at you. You've already BTDT. (The answer is "yes" BTW. She's still mad at you.)
Well, it's getting late so I GTG. I have a truckload of HW to do.
J/K! Here's the good thing IMHO about graduating from school. You don't have a truckload of HW to do anymore. You don't have to write book reports on "The Scarlet Letter" or wonder if your French teacher is going to spring a pop quiz on you tomorrow. You've already BTDT. (The answer is "yes" BTW. Your French teacher is going to spring a pop quiz on you.)
But whatever. I still GTG so I'll TTYL. Hope this finds you ROFL. I always love it when I'm ROFL.
TTFN,
ANN
Confused? Did you wonder if you were reading Pig Latin just now? (The answer is "no." In Pig Latin the greeting would have been "ear-day eader-ray." And in French it would have been "mon cher reader." Just doing my part to help you prepare for your quiz tomorrow.) Instead, you were reading a new universal language (not unlike Esperanto) called "Instant Messaging Shorthand" (or "Instant Messaging Shorthand-o" in Esperanto). People who chat online allegedly use it all the time. Translations follow:
AYT: "Are you there?"
WUZ UP: "What's up?"
4VR: "Forever"
BYKT: "But you knew that"
NEWAY: "Anyway"
B/F, G/F: "Boyfriend, girlfriend"
IMHO: "In my humble opinion"
BTW: "By the way"
GTG: "Got to go"
HW: "Homework"
J/K: "Just kidding"
BTDT: "Been there, done that"
TTYL: "Talk to you later"
ROFL: "Rolling on the floor laughing"
TTFN: "Ta ta for now"
There's more. CU for "see you," CUL8R for "see you later," CUL8RALLIG8R for "see you later, alligator." J/K! I made the "alligator" one up.
I recently became aware of this new language when my son purchased a spiral notebook, which had a list of Instant Messaging Shorthand phrases on the inside cover. To tell you the truth, I was kind of appalled. In my day you would have found a list of state capitals on the inside cover. You know. California/Sacramento, Utah/Salt Lake City, Illinois/Chicago, New York/New York City, Florida/Disneyworld, Delaware/Who Even Thinks of Delaware, Rhode Island/Does Rhode Island Actually Qualify as a State, West Virginia/Are You Kidding Me?
As you can see, I didn't exactly stay up nights studying my state capitals list. But the point is, THOSE LISTS WERE RIGHT THERE IN MY NOTEBOOK, AND THEY WERE TOTALLY EDUCATIONAL. Not like notebooks today that are all about W1M ("Wait one minute"), MYOB ("Mind your own business") and HHOK ("Ha ha only kidding").
So I started lecturing my son (again) about how computers have taken over the world, just like evil Hal in the movie "2001: A Space Odyssey." I told him how people have cyber lives as opposed to real lives where they get together for actual activities like real football games as opposed to fantasy football games, which is why you have Instant Messaging Shorthand phrases like LTNS ("Long time no see").
Of course we don't see each other! We're all stuck behind our laptops!
My son listened politely. When I was finished with my rant, he went off to his computer and I went to mine and before you knew it, I was asking him to help me figure out how to open a file. And suddenly it struck me how incompetent I've allowed myself to remain.
Probably because somewhere along the line I started using phrases like "back in MY day" . . .
E-mail: acannon@desnews.com