Calvin Trillin on the Scariest Word
*Another way of looking at it, though, is which word is most likely to strike dread in your heart. For me, that word used to be “maintenance.” If a wealthy presidential candidate is revealed to own, say, five residences, the revelation is meant to make voters resent him. My reaction is to pity him. I ponder the horror of having five different roofs that could start leaking at any time. When the Jimmy Carter administration floated, unsuccessfully, the motto a “New Foundation” I admitted publicly that what the phrase brought to my mind was some beady-eyed contractor standing in front of my house and saying, “I’m afraid what you’re going to need here, my friend, is a whole new foundation.” . .
I think I should admit here that I am not the most adroit user of computers and other devices of the digital age. At times, I have thought that I’m suffering from an affliction that might be called Mechanical Dyslexia. Still, I manage, after a time, to get the hang of using my computer or my iPad or my smartphone in a rudimentary fashion. And here we come to the word in the English language that I now most dread: “Upgrade.”'>>>
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/25/books/review/calvin-trillin-on-the-scariest-word.html?