The first time I saw the term cow-orker, I thought it was a funny way of insulting someone you work with. That’s cute, thought I, and moved on.
Then I saw it again. And again. “Oh, it’s been picked up…people like the jibe. It’ll bounce around for a while and go away eventually.”
Well, it’s still here. Only now I think it’s being used to mean co-worker. I’ve come across it several times in the past few days, and it doesn’t seem like the poster is making a dig at their co-worker.
“Item” – you know, that Latin word that means “also”. You use it in making lists and inventories – “Also, a chair. Also, a bed” – you know, like that. Well, the other day, I heard some kid use it as a noun. “Check out these items”, he said, as if he didn’t realize that it wasn’t a noun, and that he was really saying “check out these alsos!” Funny stuff. It’s a catchy bit of slang, but it’ll run its course and be gone in a few years.
Can you imagine someone saying “12 alsos or less?”
I’ve seen cow-orker around these parts since I started coming here (which, admittedly, wasn’t that long ago). I’ve also seen “co-irker” uses specifically, and unsurprisingly, in the context of other staff members one works with, though I mostly see that on the Customers Suck! forums.
Me, I like the best of both worlds: cow-irker. One who annoys bovines.
[Princess Bride ON] I do not think that word means what you think it means! [Princess Bride OFF]
Item
noun [C]
1 something which is part of a list or group of things:
the last item on the list
The restaurant has a long menu of about 50 items.
Several items of clothing (= clothes) lay on the floor.
2 one of several subjects to be considered:
There are three items on the agenda.
I do wish this one would die. It seems to me like a cry of “Look at me, I’m clever too!” Unfortunately, I think it’s here to stay.
Gotta say, though, Cal, I think you’re dignifying it a bit much by comparing it to loan words from other languages. Yeah, I see the analogy, but it’s a bit of a stretch, seems to me.
My point was that just because something looks like a fad to you, it doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s going to go away soon. Vaudeville performers said the same thing about television.
And I don’t think “item” is really a “loan word”. Loan Words are words that we take intact from elsewher and use the same way, like the recently0-discussed schandefreude. But Item is a word used as a completely different part of speech than the original latin word.
“Cow-orker” is neither like that, nor like a loan word. It’s like the word “filk”, which also started life as a typo, and which has now been around for a few decades. I like it, and I’ll continue tou use it where appropriate. And there are places where it’s appropriate.
I certainly remember as being popular on alt.folklore.urban and alt.fan.cecil-adams back in, dunno, '92 or 93. For that matter, I also remember seeing posts from Flodnak back then too, although she didn’t call herself that then.
Here is an earlier thread I started on the same subject. The consensus is that while Scott Adams popularized the phrase, it’s been around longer than that.
