A colleague of mine at the Amarillo Globe-News used to keep a glossary of what she called “irksome phrases.” She destroyed the lengthy list years ago, but I feel compelled to resurrect some memories of it on this blog.

I’ve got a few rhetorical pet peeves myself.

Here’s one I have heard frequently in just the past few days: it is “working mom.”

OK, I know what it is meant to suggest. It is meant to identify women who work for money outside the home. They get up in the morning, get cleaned up, have some breakfast, serve breakfast for others in the home and then head off to work for the day … or maybe for the night, if she works the late shift somewhere. If a child comes home from school chagrined or saddened because someone bullied him or her and needs a shoulder to cry on. Mom most definitely is working.

Why does the phrase irk me so? Because there is no harder-working individual on Earth than a “working mom.”

If she stays at home and takes care of the house. She is working. If she tends to the kids’ needs. She is working. If she runs errands during the day, trying to juggle multiple balls or spin multiple plates. She is working.

The term “working mom” might be among the most irksome term of them all. I’ll start with that one. There will be others.