They're just three little words, but oh how I hate them.

You know which words I mean. That cute little phrase bandied about every day by English-speakers around the world. Usually said in a slightly higher-pitched voice and almost always accompanied by a too-wide smile, these words leave me pulsating with what can only be described as white fury.

I'd strike the question "how are you?" from the lexicon with an atomic missile if I had the opportunity.

(For those of you who thought I was talking about those other three little words, I apologize. In fact, I love you.)

It's a scientifically-proven statistic that in 95 percent of all situations in which the dread phrase is uttered, neither party gives a hoot how the other person is. And if you actually told them, it would be incredibly awkward.

Think about it: Party A asks Party B "How are you?" Party B responds "Fine. How are you?" Party A replies "Just fine, thanks for asking." Both parties walk away and within 20 seconds, neither remembers the social interaction.

Back in reality, Party A's wife just left him for a sailor and Party B is worried sick that he is going bald. Neither feels so hot about life at the moment, but they aren't about to share that with the world at large.

What exactly have we accomplished here except one more dishonest transaction between two human beings?

The only time this blasphemy is socially legitimate, is in hospitals or upon seeing someone for the first time after they have been in a hospital. In which case, the question is clearly directed at your overall physical health. But even then nobody really wants a straight answer.

"Well thanks for asking, Sam. My colonoscopy went fabulously. Let me tell you all about it." Nope, certainly not the vanilla answer society pressures us to give when asked how we are.

The irony is that the one person who asks this question with an actual desire to learn the truth is your doctor. And to him or her, we universally lie like crazy.

My biggest problem is the nature of the question itself. "Are" is - at least to my muddled, often incorrect, understanding of grammar - a form of the verb "to be." And the question of "being" is at the very root of human existence. "To be, or not to be" and all that jazz.

So not only are you asking an empty question for which you want no honest answer, but you're making light of a person's right to exist. Humanity itself is degraded when that blasted question is so naively asked and we're all worse off for it.

It's not that I am against greeting people as a rule. "Hello" is just a dandy social construction that works perfectly as both an acknowledgment and as a showing of concern. And questions like "How's it going?" or "What's up?" allow for such common, honest answers as "it's going" and "the sky." Acknowledgment without the falsity.

Although on the other hand, I can't say I'd be a happy camper if everyone went around discussing how they truly felt about life, the universe and everything. Not that I'm unconcerned about your lives and all, I just don't want to hear about them. I prefer to silently radiate thoughtful concern of a general nature.

Unless of course you ask me that short, stupid question I detest so much. In which case, my response should be totally obvious and expected: "I love you."