Hey, maybe there's a term for that!

One of the joys to be found in the dynamic of the English language is that it is ever-changing, especially in the realm of popular parlance. If you are a parent you are fully cognizant of the fact that to stay current with the lingo of your kids, you have to be a few steps ahead, otherwise you’ll sound like an antediluvian goof who may as well be uttering such quaint archaisms as “Far out, daddy,” or “hepcat.”

But, even when dealing with colleagues and older family members, it can be prudent, not to mention trendy, to recognize what is happening with the world around us by being aware that there are some contemporary phenomena that warrant linguistic terms of their own.

If you want to try to ‘get with it,’ or to ‘get hep, daddio,’ consider the following expressions that have very recently entered the lexicon as nouveau insults and wow the youngsters and some of your more square friends. They will all be dazzled.

Consider:

Band-aid Baby – this is a new child produced for the sole purpose of attempting to save a shabby marriage. My caveat: this never works.

Barbecue Stopper – A statement or assertion that creates a hush amongst those gathered at a social occasion. Such a thing as, “Did I tell you people, my Harold here is having a sex change?” Sort of on a par with those distasteful TV commercials where a so-called buddy asks the guy who is chatting up someone beautiful: “So, Fred, how’s the diarrhea?”

Beigism -- A scathing indictment of the banalities of suburbia and the values held by most of the older generation in the eyes of the younger generation. And, you thought your were a vestige of “flower-power”, right? If so, why are you driving a Hyundai four-dour and living in a split-level? You, my friends, are guilty of beigism.

Celebutard – a brainless celebrity (see photo above). A noun that seems to apply to about half of the fledgling generation of so-called performers. That is, they don’t really sing, don’t really act, don’t really speak coherently, are filthy rich, rude, dysfunctional, and seem to screw any equally vacuous opposite-sex (or sometimes same sex) member of that same club.

Ladults – Men over 30 who are trying desperately to appear as cool and current as males who haven’t seen the far side of 20. Intention is often to screw assorted celebutards. Rarely successful. Always pathetic.

Muffin top – a roll of flesh spilling over the top of a bare-midriff low-slung skirt or pair of jeans. Not always a sight for the faint-of-heart.

Pram face – a young woman sporting that bleak and desolate expression of the sort you see on the faces of far-too-young girls pushing tiny babies around supermarkets.

Sadfab – a single woman who is desperate to have a baby before her biological clock catches up with her. Sometimes the impulse strikes her as early as her late 20s, and this leads to some intolerable pairings of the sort that bring huge smiles to the faces of divorce lawyers.

Tanorexics – People obsessed with always sporting an ideal tan regardless of the time of year or the climate in which they live, as in a ‘Full-Maui’ in the midst of a Minnesota or Manitoba winter. See George Hamilton as a kind of icon-figure.

Drunk dialling -- Calling loved ones, and especially your ex at 3 a.m. when you are completely loaded and feeling melancholy. You think you will evoke sympathy and even pity. Unfortunately you will be more inclined to produce a sense of relief that he/she is finally rid of such a jerk/jerkette.