Wife's eggcorn

[Wilson Gray]

On 1/4/06, Douglas G. Wilson <douglas at nb.net> wrote:
>
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "Douglas G. Wilson" <douglas at NB.NET>
> Subject:      Re: Wife's eggcorn
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> > > >"I feel like _Dog Chow_!"
> > > >
> > > >"Dog Chow," is, of course, a registered trademark of the
> > > >Ralston-Purina Co.  of St. Louis, my beloved home town. What my wife
> > > >is reaching for is, "I feel like dog _shit_!" ....
> > >
> > > Maybe so.
> > >
> > > What about "[This place looks like the] dog's dinner"?
> > >
> > > What about "[Now you're in the] doghouse"?
> > >
> > > -- Doug Wilson
> > >
> >
> >
> >I don't get it. Are you suggesting that what she's actually modelling
> >may be, "I feel like the dog's dinner," i.e Dog Chow, or "I feel like
> >I'm in the doghouse==>Dog Chow"? It's possible, I guess.
>
> I guess I'm wondering which of these is/are originally euphemistic. For
> that matter one might wonder whether "dog-shit" in some usages might be
> originally dysphemistic for "dog's dinner" or whatever.
>
> Analogy: I have a casual suspicion [only] that "f*ck the dog" may have
> originated as a dysphemism for "walk the dog".
>
> Analogy: What was the thing from which one "can't make chicken salad", in
> the earliest version? Was it "chicken scratch", altered to "chicken shit"?
> Or the other way around?
>
> -- Doug Wilson


Okay. I see. Unfortunately, our life experiences are too different. I
learned the expression, "dog shit," so late in life that it's not part of my
active vocabulary. That is, I not only don't use it, but I also don't even
think it, except on those rare occasions when my wife speaks of feeling like
Dog Chow. I'm totally unfamiliar with "bleep the dog," "walk the dog," and
"can't make chicken salad," except in their literal meanings. Well, I do
know "bleep the dog" as one way of saying, "I don't care about the dog." I
knew "chicken-shit" only as "cowardly," till after I had
been sworn into the Army. At that point, those already sworn in started to
laugh at us and to shout, "You'll be sor-ree!" and the recruiting sergeants
began to show a new, less-pleasant aspect of their personalities.

-Wilson Gray