“OMG,” “LOL” and the symbol for “heart” have all been added to the Oxford English Dictionary Online. It’s true. You can read about it here. Sadly, I’m not surprised at all.
I blame text messaging for the trend of conversing more and more in shorthand. We have “smart” phones now. We are Tweeting and Facebooking and whatever-ing while on the go. We don’t have time for apostrophes. We don’t have time for full words. We only have time for acronyms and abbreviations. I call it “License Plate Lingo.” We use numbers 4 words (see what I did there?) and leave out vowels deemed extraneous. It’s gotten to the point that I actually hear people say “LOL” instead of laugh. Now, if you’re thinking, “You’ve got to be joking,” you need to get with the times: “U got 2 b joking.”
I’m starting to wonder if this new way of writing and talking is going to start showing up in dialogue in books. Once that happens, once we abandon proper grammar in novels, the end is near. A literary apocalypse will be upon us and I, for one, will not be LOL-ing.
I have actually heard people *say* “LOL” out loud to express amusement at something. WTF?
(Irony intended, in case there was any question!!!)
Haha, intended irony received 😉