Ramblings

Over the last 2 years, I've been using "-ness" less and less. It may or may not have started with the dialogue from Arrested Development where G.O.B. asks Michael to "Taste the happy," which apparently "tastes kinda like sad."


Taste The Happy - The best bloopers are here

I don't know. But I gradually stopped using "craziness," "happiness," "funniness,"and a few others in conversation, opting instead for "crazy," "happy," "funny," etc. For example, "There's way too much crazy in their marriage" or "Where's the funny in that?"

The weird thing is that even though I tend to use it for adjectives that end in "-y," I've extended it to adjectives like "stupid," "bright," and "tired," some of which don't even ordinarily get the "-ness" suffix when nouned.

I didn't really notice it until this Nike "My better is better than your better" commercial started airing recently:



It seemed so normal to use "strong," "fast," and "quick" in this fashion, but "better" doesn't seem to work quite as well. Probably because it's comparative. And most of the words used in the commercial are actual normal nouns, like "agility" and "power."

I love watching language evolve. Some prescriptivists might beg to differ, but those guys are probably no fun to be around anyway.