It's time for another blog, you know!

When listening to people speak, much of what they say passes over us. We tend to pick out the bits we are interested in or that are useful to us. If people have annoying habits within their speech we are all quite good at ignoring them. We are after-all, being polite.

Occasionally we all come across people who use really irritating expressions... you know.

No, I don't know, that's why you're telling me.

We can all put up with the odd 'you know' here or there but when people slip them in at the end of virtually every sentence it becomes really annoying. The point is that the expression indicates two things; firstly that the speaker is insecure and constantly needs re-affirmation of their status and secondly that they are struggling to think of what to say next.

But we are all too nice to people. We just listen and accept it... you know. Then we say... yeah! which is confirming to these lazy speakers that we are quite happy with what they have just said.

Enough is enough!...you know. Next time try this...

Well actually, I don't know, in fact I haven't the foggiest ideal what you're talking about. I'm so mesmerised by you saying 'you know' all the time that I can't focus on the real content of your conversation and I'm simply losing the will to live.

Of course, people will continue to use 'you know' especially on current affairs programmes on both radio and TV. The Jeremy Vine show on Radio 2 at lunchtime during the week is a place where you will find this creature in abundance. This species is called 'a member of the public phoning into a current affairs programme with an opinion'. When listening to these programmes sit and wait for the first 'you know'. Once the first one has tumbled out they start spilling out like a toddler spitting out alphabetti spaghetti. It's wonderful, just sit and count.

This irritating expression has a famous cousin and all of the above comments apply equally to it. It is of course 'Do you know what I mean'. Since all of the above applies equally to this phrase I shall simply say 'please refer to my earlier answer'.