It’s a popular pastime of cynical disaffected youth to criticize small talk. I’ve done it myself occasionally. The type of thing where you mock how relatives greet each other at the airport “How was your flight?”. Depending on your reference point, the frustrating or funny thing about ridiculing small talk is that the criticisms are usually a dead end. We usually contribute nothing of our own that could be a small talk substitute. Then some ominous voice booms an if/then statement “If 1. you dislike that when acquaintances meet they comment on the weather and 2. you lack the creativity to come up with a replacement for this staple of human conversation, then shut the fuck up.”

What’s the weakest reason for choosing one word over another whose meaning is similar? I think it’s a tie between giving in to time constraints and lacking the motivation to lookup the best fit or an altogether new word. The best reason is “It won’t make an appreciable difference to the writer or reader either way.” Or claim that the subject of your writing transcends language and therefore even a vocabulary as large as webster’s would be hopelessly unable to describe what you mean. The latter justification is kind of a cop-out, and if you used it excessively you would risk receiving accusations of being a stupid fuck.