I recently attended a meeting at which several candidates for our local school board here in Frederick County, VA spoke. All decried the “overcrowded conditions” in our schools. I decry the use of the term “overcrowded.” People use this term without thought and have done so for some time (since 1725 according to one source) but I’m asking YOU to think about it.

Even the dictionary has trouble defining this absurd word. Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary defines the word as “crowded or filled to excess: having too many people or things.” In other words, overcrowded has no meaning beyond the word crowded. And, if something is “filled to excess,” then it is not crowded, it is spilling. It is impossible to “fill to excess” because once a thing is filled, it is filled. If the “excess” is coffee, it has spilled into your saucer; if the excess is people, they have spilled out the door. In fact, I believe the word would be overflowing.

Far more precise—and a word that actually makes sense—would be the phrase over capacity. That could actually be measured and a school board candidate could tell us that, for example, the Samuel Johnson Elementary School is 10% over capacity.

As it is, the intelligent use of language is increasingly decreasing. Words are precious things. Words have meaning. When they cease to, chaos will ensue. Let us not be lax in the use of our language even if that language has a long-standing history.

The difference between the right word and the almost right word is a large difference indeed; it is the difference between the lightning and the lightning bug.~~Mark Twain

The video below illustrates how a room can go from crowded to overflowing:

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Speaking of words, could we as a society quit shortening words? In an article in this month’s Progressive Farmer I recently came across the word preg in reference to cross-breeding in cattle. As in “preg rates stayed pretty good.” Abominable.

And what kind of lazy word-bastard do you have to be that you say or write merch instead of merchandise? It’s a horrible-sounding word; like the nickname of that annoying kid who laughed at in appropriate times back in 9^th grade. I’m surprised some ad agency hasn’t devised the slogan, Purch our merch.

People who do that are ridic. Unstand what I mean?