Thoughts on cooking and grammar

I am trying to be more vegetarian. No clue why, except that I have never seen a fat vegetarian. That would be a benefit. I know people who won't eat anything with a face. Now that would be too tough for me. But the internet is a goldmine of recipes. Tonight I made vegetarian pie and it was wonderful. I have worked my way through vegetarian cabbage rolls, vegetarian stew, vegetarian lasagna and lots of vegetarian soups. But biting the bullet and giving up steak tartar would be just too tough.

I have been noticing people's speech habits. Listen and you will hear everyone saying, "the thing is is..." They repeat the word "is" for some reason??!! Worse is, "the thing was is..." It's everywhere and I hate it. Lots of people muck up idiom -- like saying they were going to "home in" on something, instead of "hone in". Or, something is a tough "road" to hoe, instead of a tough "row" to hoe. I guess hoeing rows is a thing of the past, but who hoes roads? I was talking to someone the other day and she ended every sentence with....."type of thing". Either that or..."and that". It was painful. A typical sentence would be, "I was coming in to work, and that, and I decided to buy a coffee, type of thing." Seriously. All I listened to were the "type of thing's" and the "and that's". I didn't retain a word she said. I kept waiting for her not to do it, but she didn't relent once!

Trouble is, I have always been a speech and grammar snob. I judge people by how they speak. Shoot me, but it's true.