eggcorn

[Wilson Gray]

Cf. also _boatload_, possibly < _buttload_ < _shitload_.

--
-Wilson
-----
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint
to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-Mark Twain


On Wed, Nov 16, 2011 at 3:12 PM, Charles C Doyle <cdoyle at uga.edu> wrote:
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> Sender: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster: Â  Â  Â  Charles C Doyle <cdoyle at UGA.EDU>
> Subject: Â  Â  Â eggcorn
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> A student just reported on a test that the Elizabethan age produced a "shipload" of sonnets.
>
> "Shitload" (or "shit load") is well attested, with millions of Google hits, in the sense of 'immense quantity'.
>
> Google shows quite a number of instances of "shipload" in that sense, decorum possibly encouraging a mishearing.
>
> --Charlie
>
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