A brief thought on the abuse of the word 'like'

I'm not entirely sure what happened to make the word like such a valuable stalling phrase, up with the grand company of umm and er, these phrases add nothing to everyday life other than a bit more CO2 into the air that I am attempting to breath.

Somehow this word has made it's way into daily speach quoth its presence as the first item on google when looking up definition of like-

1. informal

   used to convey a person's reported attitude or feelings in the form of direct speech (whether or not representing an actual quotation).

   "so she comes into the room and she's like “Where is everybody?”"

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My only question is why use this word in such a manner, what was wrong with just saying 'and she says...' rather than needing to butcher the meaning of like? As I mentioned above, I find words that are used simply to stall and avoid silence to be so completely unnecessary, unprofessional and truly repulsive for lack of a better word, silence conveys great thought being put into carefully arranging the words as an art form, umm on the other hand conveys a fear that other people will have stopped listening to you and will interrupt if one so much as stops emitting toxic gas for a pause. Now, please do not take this rant as my saying that I am utterly perfect in every way shape and form, removing that tendency to keep talking is not easy to put it mildly, but its good to realize that it is not necessary to punctuate every sentence with one like per every 3 other words, being aware of a problem is at least a step toward fixing it; now some may say that there is no problem with the improper usage of the word like, and perhaps there isn't an issue if one likes the people around him to sound like a broken record. I can think of no other person who illustrates this more than President Obama, Mr. President used to take quite the care in avoiding the usage of stalling words and sounded far better and much more intelligent for the lack of  umms and errss intruding on an otherwise very well thought out speech. long story short the usage of these words to stall for time just seems to lower the iq of the person speaking 30 points, at least to me it does, please do feel free to post dissenting views, you have nothing to fear except for immediate censure. Have a nice day

-Jackson

The life of a bow.

Ahem, thank you, allow me to begin that I am no ordinary bow, I am the magical talking bow of awesome, I granted myself to king thyciulides and am for his and his son's use only. So this king thinks he has royal subjects, well he is not the only one, under my command are a vast array of pointy things for which to be flung into squishy screaming things. People sometimes ask me, well perhaps his majesty, but they should ask me, if I get enjoyment out of this delegation. The king typically answers yes, though the humans don't tend to call him king, they address him as Mr. Ian sane, ohh and how they pay for their disrespect when the bow of magical sparkling vengeance comes for them in the night. Perhaps you think my blood lust unnecessary, well we will see how you think when magical bow of death and despair comes for you in the night :D. Ahem, right where was I? Oh yes, my subjects, they tend to be pretty tall, most of them are pretty smart, the sharper knives of the drawer if you get me,  but they do get rather dumb in their old age so they are replaced and sentenced to being abandoned. CRUEL? YOU THINK ME CRUEL!!!!???11111!!!!! MAGICAL BOW SMITE! Calm, very calm, well most days are pretty dull, I keep my subjects training against some less fun, non-bleeding targets and they seem to more or less get the gist of what their purpose is, a few troublemakers now and again are swiftly dealt with but I keep my men in line.the fun begins on the days when the squishy targets come out oh the men do enjoy those kinda days, to see their training pay off and hear the yelp of agonizing success. ahhh quite a fun time, don't you think? Duty calls, Adios.

A wee lad takes a crash course in public speaking

Lets see, lets see, an event to do with courage? Bah, sensible people who aren't willing to risk their lives don't need courage! Or do they? My first real experience with public speaking came at my aunt's wedding, at which I stood likely only at a meager 5 ft. 2 and was barely in middle school. At this occasion people were standing up and telling stories, amusing tidbits, anecdotes about either bride, yes, my aunt is gay, what of it? I sat down and watched and listened as one by one adults got up and talked, but deep down inside me a thought was forming, I want to be big and brave like them. So I did, I kept waiting for the right moment for a pause in the constant stream of adults, and then I got up, and I told a story my mom had told me, about when she and her now married sister were little girls. Was this story worth standing up and being said by a visibly shaking little boy? Perhaps not to anybody else, but to that little boy, he had been victorious! The grand champion of them all! One to be praised and admired for centuries to come! Statues! Fame! Money! all now easily within his grasp, all because he found the strength inside of him to stand up in front of a group of big people and tell stories like them.
-Jackson.