Another pet peeve: "real-a-tor." Um, no. REALTOR!

At least half of my co-workers can't pronounce chipotle. Sure, it's a weird word, but now that it's a chain restaurant, with a location 2 minutes from our office from which we order at least twice a month, wouldn't you think that sooner or later, people would notice the goddamn "T" comes before the "L"? (It's NOT "chi-pol-tee.")

I have this theory that people's brains get hardwired to recognize letter combinations, and when they read a word similar to one they already know, they bastardize the new word to sound like the old word.

Exhibit A: my father, who refers to Ambien as "ambience," and had a longer-than-necessary hospital stay when he told a doctor he was allergic to "Bextrim." There is a drug named "bactrim," which is an antibiotic. There is a drug called "bextra," which is, IIRC a COX-2 inhibitor (although it may have been pulled by the FDA).

Dad is allergic to bactrim. The doctor thought Dad meant bextra. So Dad was prescribed bactrim and the resulting abdominal bleeding almost killed him.

Not the doctor's fault, when your patient mangles the drug name and you double-check, "You're allergic to bextra?" "Yes, bextrim."

It annoys me when people get words wrong (young girls, they do get wooly), but Jesus, it can fucking KILL you.

(Although pharmaceutical companies should not be allowed to register a drug name that's too similar -- spelling-wise and phonetically -- to an already-registered drug. There are WAY too many horror stories of patients who literally did die because a pharmacist confused 2 drugs.)

I always get Zyrtec and Zantac confused. One's an antihistamine, the other an antacid. I don't know which is which.

I don't know which is which.

I know you know how to text me. (Zyrtec -- which I just misspelled twice -- is the antihistamine.)

Lipitor sounds like a cartoon villain, like Skeletor. Only with really huge lips.

Zantac is the antacid.

Along the same lines as "chipoltee" is "foilage".

I always mix up Celexa and Celebrex. I've heard doctors mix those up at least twice, too.

"foilage".

I fully admit that I love to mispronounce this.

It's something one can only do in carefully selected company, though; otherwise, people within earshot tend to think you're an idiot (even though you're a goddamn editor who knows full well how to pronounce "foliage").

Wow, I'm ranty. I think I'll go wash some dishes and lecture the pets about language.

I know you know how to text me.

The next time I'm in a life-or-death antacid situation, I will.

The next time I'm in a life-or-death antacid situation, I will.

Good. I don't want your heartburn hanging over my head.

For years, my sister would say "verity" when she meant to say "variety." Also, she couldn't say "specific"--it came out "sus-pific." I'd give her hell for these two until she practiced until she had them both memorized perfectly.