CITY-SPEAK IS GIVEN A NEW YEAR OVERHAUL

SUCH is the scathing nature of popular Square Mile opinion on the use of jargon in the office that it’s a mystery why any of those hideously twee little phrases have survived at all.

Perhaps it’s like singing in the shower, or munching a sneaky kebab on the way home from a night out, or watching Wife Swap: it’s a guilty pleasure, but one we just can’t seem to shift.

But there must be something to this lingo malarkey, since men’s monthly glossy GQ has managed to compile a minidictionary of new phrases for the business snob: a compilation of all the “rather more cynical buzz-phrases relevant to today’s economic climate” (their words, not mine).

Thus we have, among many others, the “BlackBerry jam” (“BlackBerry users who try to read e-mails while notionally on the move”), “SPAM” (“not the virtual variety, but the pink stuff which has been making a comeback in these cost-conscious times”) and The Capitalist’s personal favourite cringe-worthy verb in the dictionary, to “brown bag”.

Apparently, it means to put back a topic so it can be discussed over lunch, for example: “Let’s brown bag this for now and see if we can’t wrap this meeting by 11 o’clock”.

Cue outward hoots of derision and inward murmurs of appreciation from the rest of the Wife Swap fans on the team, we can only presume.

SLIPPERY SLOPE

Another year starts, and there’s no sign of the ‘elf ‘n’ safety brigade easing up its supreme efforts to keep the nation happy and injury-free.

A spy tells me that a visit to one of the seasonal ice rinks over the festive holidays caused much amusement when a sign was spotted at the edge of the ice which read: “Caution – Slippery Surface”.

It’s a good job, since there wouldn’t have been much skating to be done otherwise. Whatever will they think of next?

FIGHT CLUB

The dreaded New Year’s Resolution curse strikes again. Trotting around the City yesterday, The Capitalist was alarmed to be apprehended by not one, not two, but three sets of neon Lycra-clad bunnies itching to sell membership to various Square Mile gyms.

With all due respect to all the fitness fanatics out there, nothing is going to entice me from under the duvet an hour earlier on these subzero mornings, not even the promise of a honed, toned physique, a la Cheryl Cole.

But one bunny in particular deserves special mention for the most market-savvy advertising flyer spotted for quite a while. “Knock seven shades of shandy out of every Bum, Dick and Scally!” proclaimed the flyer from the newly-opened Bank branch of Gymbox, the gym famed for its innovative fitness classes (boxing, pole dancing, high heel workouts and all).

It’s a catchy idea: honing pummelling skills to use on a selection of credit crunch villains (RBS’s Sir Tom McKillop, Lehman’s Dick Fuld and US treasury secretary Henry Paulson, perhaps?) and is something a fair few City types would be more than happy to learn at the moment.