If there is one thing guaranteed to get my goat (and there are many), it is people on news/current affairs programs answering every question with " So........" there's a guy on Newsnight doing it RIGHT NOW! Aaaaaargh, why did this start about a year ago? It drives me up the wall: I recently watched a meteorologist being interviewed about weather patterns, and he answered 5 out of 7 questions in that way. Other fav bugbears are: pronouncing SIXTH as SIKTH (step forward Jeremy Paxman), pronouncing the letter H as 'haich', pronouncing mischievous as MISCHEEVIOUS, calling the supermarket TESCO'S.....I'd better stop now!
Well, I know where you're coming from, but I ran it up the flagpole and nobody saluted. So, you get your girl to call my girl and we'll do lunch...Twenty-three skidoo. By the way, Kilroy was here.
I have noticed it, particularly when people are interviewed on Radio 4. It has become the norm over the last six months or so to start an answer with So. I can understand it- I think when I was asked a difficult question in business meetings I used to start my reply with "well...". I think it gives thinking time, it tries to give the impression the person speaking is in control and about to explain, and more importantly, it means the sentence gets off to a good start as the word 'so' can't really be messed up. It will be replaced by something else in time.
Yes, the "so" is annoying. Apparently it started in Silicon Valley. Does anyone know how the peculiar practice of using "Me" as the subject of a sentence started, as in "Me and Mum went shopping"? It is becoming very widespread.
It's just a verbal tic, and it both directs attention to the speaker, and gives them time to think. Season 7 episode 24 (I think) of the Simpsons - Lisa and the Cool Kids - gives an excellent example of this, and also it's intended effect, ie to fit in, get your point across, and not be dismissed immediately as being posh / a dork / unspeakably common (take your pick).
Like, errr, yeah.
I have opined many times in this section that when someone starts a post with the word "So ..." it flags up that they are about to demonstrate that they have utterly failed to grasp the point to which they are replying, and that they are simultaneously going to say something which the original poster to which they are responding has clearly not said, or inferred.
Usual suspects - you know who you are!!
I also find the BBC pronunciation of the word 'secretary' as 'sec-a-tary' to be really irritating. Steve Wright was once listing a cabinet reshuffle on his show, and must have said the word about twenty times in one minute - it's a wonder the car radio was not torn out of its mountings and jettisoned into the road!