That Awkward Moment When...

...You realize half the population probably no longer truly understands what “awkward” means anymore.

I’m a big fan of colloquialisms (even if I can’t spell the word). Take that last sentence, for example, or this one. Take it, if you know what’s good for you. But one of their unfortunate byproducts is a devaluation of the words they highlight and in the end we get Alanis Morissette and heaven only knows how many other crucifixions of English.

You can't tell how skinny this famous
Korean rapper's legs are because he's...
in a bunny suit. But...he's in a bunny suit.
So I thought I'd include it. Yep.

Admittedly, our torturings are, much like the infamous crucifixion on Golgotha, necessary steps in our language’s rebirth: once a language stops changing, it is dead. Mortis. So however painful it might be to see your and you’re someday morph into one word, it is necessary for the life of our beloved, bizarre language.

So while I enjoy the Awkward Turtle (caps necessary) or a friend’s bug-eyed mouthing of the word (awk-kward) at the only somewhat appropriate moment, there are times when I’d appreciate it if we could all stop nailing our language to a tree and torturing it. For instance, when I say the skirt I wore to classes on Tuesday awkwardly hikes up as I take the stairs, I want you to understand my full meaning. It has nothing to do with physical discomfort and everything to do with a good half a foot of skirt disappearing to leave heaven only knows how much exposed to the poor innocent Koreans foolish enough to walk behind me.

It’s not awkward when I find out that some of my male students have been talking about the size of my thighs and how I might have more leg muscle than they do. (I do) It is awkward—extremely—when I catch them comparing our quads while I’m doing my sit-ups and they’re doing their intense bicep curls—using the pink two-kilogram weights.

Semantics are important.

And here are the legs, sans bunny.