Congratulations on Bringing the Word Figurative Back to Prominence!

The word literally is literally misused with great frequency in contemporary language.  People who like precisely constructed language find this uniformly infuriating.  These people, people like you, have simply been sitting back and taking it for ages and ages, but today you’re going to begin the process of taking back literally the only way you know how.

Violent countervailing force.

You’ll begin by walking into a coffee shop and waiting for someone, anyone, to strike up a loud conversation where they use the word “literally” incorrectly.  It won’t take very long.  Less than half an hour will go by before a young woman in a cockney cap talks about how she literally couldn’t even look at a guy’s dick without vomiting the other night.  She’ll follow it up with some bullshit about starsigns and how she literally has never met a Libra she hasn’t loved and she’s literally felt like a billion times better since she started eating vegan.

Roughly halfway through her passionate description of how pooping is now literally the best thing she does with her day you’ll step up from your chair, sending the table you were sitting by cascading forward, spilling drinks cinematically across the room as you rise.  You’ll close the distance between you and the young woman in two quick strides, knuckles white around your wrench.  You’ll strike her twice before her friend seems to know what’s going on, denting her skull with the first blow, splitting it open with the second.  Then, bloody wrench clutched in your hand, you’ll scream at the ceiling of the coffee shop.

“I BELIEVE YOU MEANT FIGURATIVELY!”

The young woman’s friend will begin screaming uncontrollably.  She’ll run for the door, horrified that you’ll pursue her.  But no, you’ll simply sit down next to the corpse of the young woman who misused literally so flagrantly and fold your hands in your lap, awaiting the police.  You’ll confess readily and, during a brief, moderately publicized trial you’ll explain yourself with an air of calm that the judge will, given the violence of the crime you committed, consider a sign of serious mental illness on your part.

You’ll be sentenced to eight years of supervised care at a mental health institute in the country.  You’ll accept your sentence with a smile, and when you’re released within a year based on the judgment of your attending physician, the first thing you’ll do is check the comments section of the Youtube video of your murder.  The vast majority of them will celebrate your actions, and a handful will contain links to websites dedicated to “taking back literally.”  You’ll have built your future kingdom with two sharp blows.

Congratulations on Bringing the Word Figurative Back to Prominence!