That I would fee compelled to throw up a post like this is a prime symptom of what I’m talkin’ ’bout.
Namely: There are, it seems to me, lots of little bad ideas or commonplaces or, well, canards that live happy, comfortable lives, lolling around in public, catching rays – that ought to die. Right. Now.
My response to this overpowering urge to abbreviate the lives of certain ideas is to drag out some heavy artillery and start blasting, going after the mouse with an elephant gun, blowing holes in the walls, etc – generally, making a fool of myself.
Good thing I really need to be made foolish, for the salvation of my soul.
Then – here’s where this post comes in – I then feel compelled to explain and defend whatever odd position I’ve taken today. And then apologize, hope that I haven’t hurt anybody’s feelings, and say I’m not really an ogre, I’m polite and housebroken and everything. Small children and dogs like me! No, really!
I call this Channeling My Inner Pedant. Probably half the posts here are nothing more than that. In my heart of hearts, I really believe that the world would be a better place if we never heard the term ‘paradigm shift’ again; if people got a clue about what science can and cannot tell us, if no one ever again uttered the phrase (or entertained the notion for more than 2 seconds) that ‘the government is us’; and a million other little tiny crawly creepy vague and/or dumb ideas. Ya know?
Of course, I could be wrong – but if I didn’t think I was right, I’d, like, change my mind.
But way more than enough about me.
Yard Sale of the Mind 
Heh, we all deal with that… and with blogs, it’s out there for the world to see, which creates the illusion that blogs cause pedantry — even though they don’t, they just expose the inner pedant in all of us.
Thank, right. I’m really trying not to add to the unpleasantness that tends to haunt the web. But you’re right, it’s on the blog out there, and nobody can hear your tone…