> I just read Sam's latest addition to the Rinkchat archives (Ice Storms) and I *have* to say this.
>
> I *suck*.

Nah, you don't. Environment invariably affects dialect, and nobody is immune to expansion of vocabulary through exposure.

Take my grandmother, for example. Now, she has never been on the Net in her life, and doesn't even know how to turn a computer ON. But she lived around me for all the years I was a teenager, and she spent the last ten years of her long law enforcement career as a jail administrator...I'm not sure which did it to her, but invariably the expression "sucks" was added to her vocabulary as well.

(Odd that I hear her say that and don't even blink, but the other day I nearly fell flat on my face in surprise when I heard a middle-aged woman exclaim "Duh!", but I digress...)

Anyway, the way you speak is not only a reflection on your own mind and intellect, but also on the environment in which you find yourself most frequently. This goes for both online and offline mannerisms, sometimes separately affected and sometimes not. I had a friend once who picked up the expression "LOL" from AOL, and caught himself using it offline. That was...rather amusing, actually.

I myself frequent chats and forums in which, due to mutual interests, members often pepper their dialogue with colloquial Japanese. As a result, it's become more or less ingrained, and I tend to do it without thinking...not that I mind, of course, because I talk that way offline as well. (It also, of course, has evoked the anime emoticon...^_^;;)

But I'm rambling. Bottom line, don't sweat it...just let what will be, be. Nobody will think the less of you just because you think something sucks, so don't let it get to you. :)

-Trunks (who doesn't suck...at least, I don't think I do...)