Literally, Literally, Literally etc...

It is interesting how the word literally has really got out of hand over the past few years. Before it was the word SURREAL that was the newcomer but now LITERALLY has taken over. This word wouldn't bother me at all if people just used it right. A fine example of correct usage was on the Disney Channel Show, "Suite Life on Deck" (don't ask why I was watching this show) where either Zak or Cody was buried up to his neck in sand and ant were supposedly attacking him. After he was freed from being buried in the sand he said, "I have ants in my pants, literally!" Good job! Correctly used.

But here's a little exaggeration of how most people use literally.

"I literally don't understand why literally so many people literally use the word literally in just about every situation they literally are in. It has literally come to my attention that the overuse of the word literally can literally drive a person up a wall. Why don't people just literally take the word literally, literally out of their vocabulary?" Not once in that obscure paragraph was the word literally used correctly. The only spot that came close was where I said "literally drive a person up a wall" if that's even possible, which I doubt.

The only time the word literally should be used is when you are saying some sort of cliche and it actually happened. For example, if you got up right when the sun started to peak it's head over the horizon you could say, "We literally got up at the crack of dawn." On the other hand, if you got up at 5:30am which may have been the crack of dawn, saying, "We literally got up at 5:30am." it's not correct. Just say, "We got up at 5:30am." Now you could say, "We actually got up at 5:30am." That would be correct, but not literally. Are you following me? I hope so.

So from now on when you use the word literally, make sure you're using it correctly. If your not sure, leave it out. It doesn't make you seem any smarter, especially when it's used wrong. Now I'm finishing my rant on the word literally. It's almost 1:00am and all my dogs are sleeping and even though I'm tempted to wake some of them up I'm literally going to let sleeping dogs lie. Now that wasn't so hard was it?