After an unfortunate malfunction in a Manhattan home, the English language has decided to recall the word “literally.” When 17-year-old Madison Blitzberry used the word “literally” to describe getting over 18,000,000 in Temple Run as “literally impossible,” she did not expect her diction to deceive. Unfortunately, the word literally metamorphosed into a cruel bastardization of the word and literally came to mean “figuratively” as Madison broke 18,000,000 this Monday in the middle of history class. The chain reaction set into motion by this linguistic defect tore the Blitzberry family apart, destroying father Rutherford Blitzberry’s trust in his daughter and resulting in her ban from the junior prom as well as the severance of her relationship with well-meaning skateboard enthusiast Matt “the Wrath” McGibbins. As the leaderboard for Temple Run approached 1 million, the English language’s Twitter page was bombarded with scalding 140-character criticisms. In response to this public pressure, the English language has announced a nation-wide recall of “literally.”
Unfortunately, the English language has no plans to compensate literally-owners. As English language chairman and flamboyant cosplayer José Cuervo announced on Wednesday, “Literally is an adverb. You won’t miss it.” But the American public is up in arms, seeing red, and are about to use the last straw to blow a gasket—literally. The English language stock has already fallen 15% in the Communications market, falling behind Spanish, Mandarin Chinese, and interpretive dance. Scrambling to recapture lost market share, the English language has announced an upcoming bonus package, including new phrases like “wet willy,” “butterface,” and “trouser snake.” But the damage seems to be done. As opinion polls reveal, customers prefer Mandarin Chinese, whose 10,000 arbitrary chicken-scratch characters offer a more flexible engine for sexting. In the end, despite having the monopoly over “queef,” the English language finds itself in a pickle of the sort unseen since the “I before E” debacle of ’89.
-KS ’15
