A: What’s up? You seem distracted.

B: I was working at peak efficiency when opening up my email became the shiny object to my day. I got this email from my ex-boyfriend who is asking me out to dinner.

A: Will you go to dinner with him?

B: I don’t know. When we broke up, he said hurtful things.

Note: This slangy term refers to “the distracting item, person, or activity that keeps you from doing what you should be doing.” As the proverb goes, all that shines is not gold, your time and effort might be wasted while you go for all the shiny things. Therefore, the shiny object has come to mean “distraction.”