You know, normally I’m not all that opposed to using nouns as verbs, but it really can get annoying when the appropriate verb already exists. The currently grating example is the word “defense,” which in my dictionary is a noun. This word need not be used as a verb, because there already is a corresponding verb (that would be “defend” for all you idiot football announcers out there who have obviously never heard this word before).

(original date: 1997.10.22)