If you are a linguistics nerd like me I highly recommend the book “Because Internet: Understanding the New Rules of Language” by Gretchen McCulloch.
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Oh yes, I have read reviews of it, and I do realize language changes.
I just figure an advantage of getting old is that I don’t have to like it!
Seriously though, that book is on my list to read for after we move again even though I have read some essays that give the gist of it.
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Funny story, I described someone as a “gym rat” yesterday and my 15 year old said, “you know that phrase?” And I’m like, “Yes, I was alive in the 80s when it entered the lexicon.”
Low key. I can’t quite grasp its usage with the kids these days.
Muffin top/cankles/buccal fat/whatever the next area of women’s bodies we’re supposed to micro-analyze, hate, and medically intervene in. Like, barf.
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Well the meaning of “low key” hasn’t changed. But before one would have said “I know you wouldn’t expect it but she’s super smart even though shes not a show off”. Or “She really so pretty but she doesn’t wear a lot of make up or clothing that makes it obvious or act like she know it”
And now it’s “She’s low key smart/pretty”
Has anyone mentioned, “Mama Bear” yet? I was just reading an article where someone called herself a Mama Bear, and realized how tired I am of the term.
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I kinda like Mama Bear only because I got free Mama Bear slippers from Target one year. They just showed up in a box of stuff I ordered and were my size. I didn’t order them. On another order that same year I tried to return some sweats I accidentally ordered two pairs of and they refunded my money, but told me to keep the extra sweats, so I kept the bonus Mama Bear slippers too.
Pedigree when describing human beings.
Also means secretly. That’s how one of my kids used it. “I low key would love to go to a Justin Bieber concert.” When embarrassed to admit that.
I thought of another one…
“BREAKING NEWS”
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Meaning “something happened, we don’t know the full story (or maybe even 1% of the story), but we’ll speculate and incite political anger over it anyway”?
Have you noticed that EVERY storm in the country is now gauged by the number, in millions, of Americans that it will surely pummel. Obviously the coverage of the west coast is warranted, but these east coast storms have been much ado about nothing. I remember the blizzard of 93 here in Massachusetts. I watched the news the night before and there was a passing mention of snow. I woke up the next morning and was like ■■■!?!?!? Hype is a drug in the news world.
A.I.
This year, it seems to have become a synonym for anything “computerized”.
And even in the cases where it’s (slightly) more fitting, it’s still a huge misnomer. If anything, “Simulated Intelligence” might be more descriptive what truly happens. Sure, it might feel like these systems produce intelligent/creative responses, but ultimately, there is no actual “understanding” of the content they spew out, or its validity.
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For now, maybe. If you ever get the chance, have a discussion about intelligence and sentience with a group of machine learning experts - fun times.
My favorite point of discussion: “ I know I am a sentient, thinking, feeling human, but I cannot prove that anyone else truly is.”
Here in California, people are mocking the media’s addiction to the term, “atmospheric river”.
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Add to that - Bomb Cyclone, and all the different “moons” - never had that when I was young.
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“Bombogenesis”…ugh
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“I was today years old when I learned…”
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Washingtonians are laughing with them. What the hey? Did “pineapple express” offend someone?! 
Headline in today’s paper:
State Battered by 11th Atmospheric River Storm
Further down in the article,
The atmospheric river storm, which is drawing moisture from Hawaii in a phenomenon sometimes referred to as a “pineapple express”…
Sometimes? 
it has been known as a Pineapple Express since we moved here more than three decades to go! The atmospheric river nonsense is a recent fad. 
Laughing at the wording in that article, not the flooding and devastation.