I can’t tell you when it started, but some genius decided “surreal” was the sexiest word in the English language, and everyone lined up to mangle it. Back in the day, we actually looked words up in a dictionary, underlined them, wrote them down, and tested them in sentences to see if we were using them right. Madness, right? Now it’s easier to grab a word and make shit up. Surreal used to mean dream-logic and fever visions—like stepping into a Dalí canvas where clocks melt and eyes bloom into roses. Now it’s slapped on oat milk shortages or spotting a C-list celebrity in baggage claim. “It was surreal,” they sigh, like they just returned from some cosmic vision quest. No—it was Thursday. And I still had one more load of laundry left. Do I have enough quarters?
And if “surreal” has been abused to the point of boredom, “unprecedented” is its overachieving twin. Unprecedented was used to pack heat, carry weight, and demand attention. Now it’s what people whine about while waiting for a latte—right before bragging about a thrift store “treasure” that’s just a busted lamp with a missing cord. These days, it’s duct-taped onto headlines, CEO pep talks, and press releases written by people who wouldn’t buy their own pitch. “We live in unprecedented times,” they chant, like the words alone could cover the rent or clean up the wreckage they helped cause. People actually know what the hell they’re talking about. Now that would be unprecedented.
These two words have become the lazy twins of public speech, tag teaming their way through news broadcasts, political soundbites, and influencer captions. Surreal and unprecedented. Say them together enough, and they dissolve into flavorless mush, like a stick of gum chewed until it’s nothing but rubber and spit. That’s the real surreal moment—watching language bleed out in the gutter while everyone nods along like it’s still breathing.
Author’s Note:
This one started as a gripe about “surreal” and snowballed into a two-word autopsy. I don’t expect people to stop using them—they’ve already been beaten into cliché—but maybe we could save them for moments that actually deserve them. Until then, I’ll be over here, counting quarters and waiting for the day “unprecedented” gets the dictionary funeral it deserves.
Memoirs of Madness 