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I can almost never stand the use of the word, which Merriam-Webster defines as:
carried to the utmost point or highest degree : absolute, total
Maybe it’s the people who use it too much that bothers me. Or maybe because it reminds me of udders. Either way:
Grant Brissey covered everything from hard news and technology, to music, film, and visual arts during his time working for The Stranger. Grant's work has also appeared at Geekwire, and in Billboard,... More by Grant Brissey
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Jettison Utterly is my new band name.
Jettison Utterly is my butler’s porn name.
…and Jettison Udders is my new DJ name.
I am utterly annoyed with these pointless polls.
What’s the problem with udders?
I find that people who overuse the word are dipshits. Jettison that bullshit, along w/its users.
Without utterly, you can’t be utterly disgusted, and that has such a nice ring to it.
You utterly shudder me.
Or you could always use nth or like totally or entirely or magnanimously or …
scrap it. Another bad one is ‘utilize’. Ugly ugly word.
I am utterly disgusted by the results of this poll.
“Mouthfeel” is an utterly unpleasant word. LIterally.
what does this have to do with dinosaurs?
dinosaurs utterly don’t have udders.
try pronouncing the letter T as it’s supposed to be pronounced, instead of like a letter D…
“Utterly disgusted” is good, but something about all the Ts in “Jettison utterly” took over my mind and made me vote for it.
George’s proposal to manufacture artificial udders at Spacely Sprockets was utterly jettisoned by Mr. Spacely, who jettisoned Jetson from his office with utter satisfaction.
no adverbs ever
Jettison “jettison”, if you ask me.
@13, if you’re an American the alveolar tap (voicing the T sound in the middle of words with a vowel on either side, like “butter”, “sweater”, and “utterly”) is not just legitimate but correct. If you’re trying out for a job on the BBC, maybe you puff that up into a full T sound but not here, buddy.
It reminds me of Alan Alda channeling Groucho Marx, which I should hate, but I don’t.
Like all (most) absolutes, sometimes it’s the right word. See Yeats’s Easter 1916:
http://www.online-literature.com/donne/7…
. . . changed, changed utterly
A terrible beauty is born.
Misuse of a word shouldn’t make us despise the word, we should despise its misuse and the bad writers who misuse it.
You guys sure like making rules about neutral words you’re never allowed to use.
It reminds you of udders? So you’re one of those guys, the kind who find that everything makes them think of teats?
@13, that sounds almost as annoying as “litrally” for “literally”.
I have an older, WASPy acquaintance who insists on pronouncing the name Martin “Mar-tin”, with a plosive instead of a glottal stop. Sorry, but that T just sounds pretentious. Udderly.
@8,
Magnanimously and utterly are not synonyms.
@23 You mean like: Mar-‘in? There needs to be *some* T.
Otherwise you get Moun-‘en (mountain) or Kih-‘en (kitten). Those are my favorites. 🙂
@25,
I think #23 is referring to a person who overemphasizes the “t”. That is pretentious.
@25, nope, no plosive T. No “tuh”. The tongue curls to make the R sound, then touches the alveolar ridge to make the N sound. Like when you say “button”. Same thing.
But your examples are interesting! Kitten I always pronounce with a glottal stop, but mountain I pronounce both ways, “mountain” and “mounʔain”. Weird.
now it makes ME think of udders. Many thanks.