speaking of aigcorns...

[Benjamin Zimmer]

On Mon, 18 Jul 2005 21:34:06 -0400, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
wrote:

>>From an on-line story:
>
>"I just want to know why you kept the pictures, why would you do that
>and risk other people seeing them?"
>
>"No one else has seen them. I didn't risk anything. The thing that
>bothers me is that you were just getting ready to sail me down the
>river  and that didn't bother you one bit."
>
>
>Understandable enough, given the current opacity of the connection of
>"sell NP down the river" with the slave trade (and not, I gather,
>with the prison at Sing Sing) and the association of sailing with
>rivers, not the mention the phonology.  But an eggcorn it is.

And in she goes...

http://eggcorns.lascribe.net/english/465/sail/


--Ben Zimmer