Words From the Top

A Tad Bit Stupid

There’s something a lot of you are doing wrong, and it’s time you all know about it before your ignorance embarrasses me any further. Let’s start with the basics, with some friendly excerpts from Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary.

tad Function: noun 2: a small or insignificant amount or degree : BIT [might give him some water and a tad_to eat — C. T. Walker]- a tad: SOMEWHAT, RATHER [looked _a tad bigger than me]

bit Function: noun – a bit: SOMEWHAT, RATHER [the play was a bit dull]

Now that we all know that the word “tad” does not act as any kind of modifier for the word “bit,” meaning as it does exactly the same thing, can we all agree to stop using them next to each other? That’s right, they’re absolute synonyms, there’s no need to use both. You wouldn’t say I’m a “bit bit” late, would you, retard? I know adding the word “tad” lends your speech an oh-so-clever touch of mock sophistication, but here’s a newsflash, pea-brain: you get that effect with just the word “tad.” Saying “tad bit” just makes you sound like a moron who doesn’t even understand the strange noises coming out of your own stupid mouth.

Ah ah ah…stop right there. You were going to say that it sounds right, because that’s how everyone says it. Well, everyone’s wrong, dingbat. Just because they all sound like idiots doesn’t excuse you for sounding like one. Sure, you may think you’re very funny when you walk around on cold days telling people it’s a “tit bit nipply” out. Oh, it’s very funny and charming. We all loved National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation just as much as you did (or at least, just as much as the person you heard it from and copied, without knowing you were imitating a movie), which is why we can draw on our memories of Chevy Chase delivering the line correctly, without the word “bit,” and remember how it was once amusing. Why? Because even the once-funny screenwriter John Hughes, in spite of an unhealthy fixation on the supposed comic value of cartoonish blows to the head, at least recognized that only one three letter noun meaning “somewhat, rather” needed to be in the sentence–even if it was going to be humorously replaced with the word “tit.”

Don’t think you sound dumb saying “tad bit”? Great terrific. We’ll talk speak about other things. How about a stroll walk down to the shop store up the street road? We can buy purchase snacks munchies to eat consume. If you want desire to go travel someplace else, we you and me can drive drive in my car automobile.

Starting to get the picture? Smashing. Don’t thank me, dim-bulb, just pass it on to your friends, and we can rid ourselves of this obnoxious redundancy in our conversation. Because saying “tad bit” is just about the dumbest thing you can say. Probably the only thing dumber is setting your girlfriend straight in the above manner when she says “tad bit.” That may have been a tad hasty. I miss kissing.