"By" = "Until"--(syntactic blend?)

[Cohen, Gerald Leonard]

Looks like this may be a blend: "Use by Dec. 19" and ""Guaranteed fresh until Dec. 19."

Gerald Cohen

> ----------
> From:         American Dialect Society on behalf of Jonathan Lighter
> Sent:         Saturday, September 25, 2004 12:20 PM
> Subject:           "By" = "Until"
>
> I'm eating a small package of cheese crackers and I see boldly printed on the label:
>
>
>                                      Guaranteed FRESH by
>
>                                             DEC 19 2004
>
>
> Not the first time I've seen this, BTW.  But so far only on food packaging.
>
> JL
>
>
>