THE REASON BEING

I am still trying to break my habit of prefacing conversations with "ANYWAY". Family and friends are gently assisting me. Les reminded me about an episode of How I Met Your Mother, where Robin was overusing "um" and "but" on television and Ted's students had a drinking game whenever Robin used the word, the students would have a drink; Robin got even by continually using the words on television. That trick wouldn't work with my group, because they are mostly non-drinkers.

Since writing my "ANYWAY" article, I've received the following contributions from others who shared "fillers" they hate to hear:

"Otherwise", "For example", "For some reason", "For the most part", "In general", "Something like that", "So", "You know", "Like", and "Whatever."

A person of my acquaintence continually starts sentences with "The reason being...".