Weight, Weight, Don't Tell Me

Tue Mar 4 14:49:14 UTC 2008

On Mar 4, 2008, at 6:23 AM, Doug Harris wrote:

> From the National Weather (Whether?) Service this morning:
>
> " A SIGNIFICANT ACCUMULATION OF ICE IS EXPECTED WITH ACCUMULATIONS
> UP TO 1
> INCH.MIXED WITH A LITTLE SLEET & SNOW. THE ICE WILL LIKELY CAUSE
> TREES &
> POWERLINES TO SUCCUMB TO THE WAIT OF THE ICE WITH POWER OUTAGES
> EXPECTED. "
>
> ALMOST an eggcorn. More an egg splatter.

looks like an ordinary misspelling to me.  though WAIT for "weight"
isn't on standard lists of common misspellings, i don't see the
semantics of "wait" in the quote above.

googling on {"weight of the"} pulls up a fair number of instances of
"wait of the world" that are clearly plays on words.

arnold

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