not quite eggcorns

[Mark Mandel]

On Mon, Dec 22, 2008 at 11:57 AM, Arnold Zwicky <zwicky at stanford.edu> wrote:

> On Dec 19, 2008, at 8:10 PM, Victor wrote:
>
> > ... 1.    I don't want to wear this hat because it's too big for me.
> > -- Do
> > you want to wear my hat? -- No, it's *too-bigger*!
>
> this is from a kid, but "too bigger" 'too much bigger' (and "so
> bigger", "that bigger", etc.) are moderately common (as a non-standard
> variant, not an error).
>
>   ..too big is terrible... hehe... yes, C CUP is enough ...above D is
> too bigger... A/B should be ignored. ...
> bbs.chinadaily.com.cn/viewthread.php?gid=2&tid=594913&extra=&page=40
>

This may be a joking comparative, (too big) + er, like the following:


> the kid example has a somewhat different semantics for "too much
> bigger" -- something like 'even more too big'.  as in this example:
>
>   If GM and Chrsyler are too big to fail, wouldn't merging make them
> "too bigger to fail" like all of these banks that are swallowing
> each ...
> www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/28/gm-making-case-that-its-t_n_138493.
> html<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/28/gm-making-case-that-its-t_n_138493.html>
>
> an extra wrinkle is that "too bigger" (etc.) sometimes occur with what
> looks like ordinary degree modification (without the "a(n)"):
>
>   It's not too bigger deal, I'm sure this list is mirrored somewhere.
> www.nabble.com/Can't-import-keys-on-OSX-td19287064.html<http://www.nabble.com/Can%27t-import-keys-on-OSX-td19287064.html>
>

Might this not be a reanalysis of "it's not too big a deal"? (Instead of
going to "not too big of a deal", as we have discussed a lot lately.)

m a m

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