Every few years or so, folks get inundated with new “buzzwords” to add to our vocabulary.

Not long ago, SUV was added and the acronym has become a speaking staple — sort of like “you know.”

Next time you get bored watching reality television, just for giggles, listen to a reporter interview anyone from a celebrity to an athlete and count how many times the words you know comes into play.

Being a sports editor, quite often I find myself faced with the same circumstances and I have to fight down the urge to say, “No, I don’t know. Why don’t you tell me.”

Vehicle manufacturers and dealerships now talk about “crossovers” as being hot sellers.

Right, crossovers. They’re station wagons for Pete’s sake!

Anybody who grew up in the late 1950s or early 1960s whose family didn’t have one of those Chevy, Buick or Ford land yachts, most of them being nine-passenger models with a rear-facing third seat, missed out on a major part of being a kid. If your family didn’t have one of those gun boats, somebody in your neighborhood did and they were a real kick to sit in.

I was lucky, my folks had a 1958 Buick station wagon that was about as big as a boxcar and got gas mileage to match. Some things never change.

Now you can buy an Infiniti or a BMW crossover. Sure you can, what you’ve purchased is an Infiniti or a BMW station wagon.

Then you have your hybrid vehicles that run on gas, electricity or ethanol (another buzzword).

I heard a snippet of news the other day that the Japanese have come up with a plan that allows a vehicle’s air conditioner to run on solar power. They have installed solar panels on top of the rig — I guess there goes the moon roof, that runs the A/C inside. Big deal! Try and sell that idea to someone who lives in North Dakota or Green Bay, Wisconsin.

One of the latest and greatest ideas are designer dogs.

Mixed breeds of this and that, usually small dogs, have hit the market and the prices are out of sight.

Just check the pet section in any newspaper and you’ll be able to find an advertisement for them. Yorki Poos, Morkies (Maltese crossed with a Yorkshire Terrier) or a Puggle (a Pug/Beagle cross).

Some are even three-way crosses like Pekingese, Chihuahua and Dachshund mixes.

Most of the critters start out as papered purebreds until some smart person decides to try and create a new breed and charge $600 or more for them.

Back in the day, we had a name for those types of dogs. We called them mutts!

I’ll tell you what, it’ll be a cold day in my solar-roofed, air conditioned car before I shell out 600 bucks for a mutt. I’ll try the local animal shelter first, they have a whole bunch of mutts out there.

If someone wants to design an item, how about new bats for major league baseball?

Right now, the players in the major leagues are swinging junk.

Ash bats shatter and maple ones explode, and it won’t be long before a fan, a player or an umpire gets speared by a flying shard of hardwood and is seriously injured.

Here area couple of ideas.

Why not drill a hole in the bat’s handle up into the barrel and insert a round piece of metal? Something like a light-weight piece of rebar.

A second idea would be to wrap the bats’ handles with fiberglass tape.

The rules say nothing can be done to enhance the bat’s performance, but there comes a time when you have to weigh performance versus safety issues.

Besides, fans like to see baseballs sail over the Green Monster in Boston or bounce across Sheffield Avenue and break windows in Chicago.