Pet Peeve: Guess What

I'm just going to take a quick moment to address a stupidity of the English language. Yes, I too am guilty (as always). But it's a problem, and we need to talk about it.

The phrase "guess what" has got to go.

Let's just start with the first annoying part: How the heck are you supposed to punctuate that?? I mean, technically it's a question ... but you aren't usually expecting people to guess because the whole point of saying that is that they probably won't guess it, right? But when you say it and you know it's only a pseudo-question, so basically there are three options:

1. "Guess what?" which conveys nothing but b-o-r-i-n-g and makes people feel like they have to answer a question, and what are they even supposed to say? (This will be addressed shortly. Never you fear!)
2. "Guess what!" which doesn't acknowledge the fact that it's technically a question and sound stupid
3. "Guess what?!" which is just too much emotion, and you don't want to overwhelm people or over excite them for something that just ain't that great (and it's usually not, because life ain't that exciting, folks)

All in all, not a good choice among them. Lame, eh?

Now let's say you're on the receiving end of said question. This is how it usually goes:

Person 1: Guess what[? and/or !]

Person 2: What?

** PAUSE **

Me: Okay, now let's examine this response. "What?" Since when is "What?" the appropriate answer to that question? It's not. It's just what we say because we don't want to get into a situation like Person 1 is about to create ...

** PLAY **

Person 1: No! I said for you to guess!

Person 2: (Doesn't want to guess. What kind of stupid game is this?) Ummm ... I don't know ...

Person 1: Come on! It doesn't matter! Just guess!

Person 2: (The stink eye is about to come out. Super doesn't want to guess, because no matter what they say, it's going to be wrong and they're going to look stupid.) Uhhhh ... you're pregnant. (Hint: Not an appropriate guess, usually.)

Person 1: No! I *blah blah blah something about how great their life is blah blah blah* ...

Person 2: (Doesn't care. Still feels stupid about the pregnancy comment, and wants to unleash the stink eye on Person 1 for putting them into that position.)

Person 1: (Selfish snot.)

The end.

As you can see, "Guess what?/!" is a stupid question, and it needs to not be a part of our speaking anymore. Because it's mean, and confusing, and just a big lie all around. Boo on GUESS WHAT!!!!

:)