A Sleepy Girl's Thoughts on Life

So many ways to say g'bye

I often have pseudo-interesting thoughts as I sit at work listening to the drone of office noise. And I often think, I should really write this down! Had I done so, by now I would have a whole book of useless thoughts. But anyway, my point is, I'm writing one down now. Here goes...

Did you ever notice that every person has a different way of saying goodbye on the phone? And some of these forms are more annoying than others? For example, a certain person in my office always puts the emphasis on BUH in buh-bye. So it takes on this sing-song tone...BUH!bye. She does this with other phrases too, like YOU'RE WEL!come. Then we've got another individual, who uses the phrase "bah" in lieu of the regular goodbye. It's not "bye." It's BAH, like a sheep. But she says it really fast, so that it is barely even a syllable. I tend to use the "k-bye" sort of thing...or simply just "bye." Or even "thanksbye" as one long word.

My question is this: How do these different forms evolve? How do they come to be? Why do certain people have certain ways of saying goodbye? And what happened to the good old "good. bye." Two words. Two syllables. Pronounced with no upward inflections. A linguist should study this phenomenon. Come to think of it, one already may have. Must research. Good bye.

posted by Sleepy Girl @ 4:35 PM