Eggcorn-like something or other

[Jonathan Lighter]

Yeah, but have you ever noticed how rarely we can answer a question that people are really interested in ?

   Like "why are ships referred to as _she_ ?"  "What did they call the 'OK sign' in 1917 ?"  "How do you know somebody somewhere wasn't saying 'angels on horseback' in 1702 ?"

  And once in a while, when we do answer one, like "When did people start calling NYC the 'Big Apple' ?"  suddenly nobody wants to know.

  JL

"Rex W. Stocklin" <stocklin at EARTHLINK.NET> wrote:
  ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: "Rex W. Stocklin"
Subject: Re: Eggcorn-like something or other
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At 1:42 PM -0800 1/14/06, Jonathan Lighter wrote:

>Emerson had "The Oversoul," we have "The Undermind."* What's the problem ?
>
> * Punctuation modernized for the underminded.

Mind if I say, that on this roll call of Brobdingnagian linguists I
pretty much feel like an undermind. ;-)



you can lead a horse to water but it gathers no moss
Rex Stocklin
Fishers

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