Are you getting these wrong too?

Join word nerds Jess Zafarris and Rob Watts (aka RobWords) as they discuss amusing mis-heard phrases and vocabulary snafus known as "eggcorns," "malapropisms," and "mondegreens."
👂LISTEN: podfollow.com/words-unravelle...
or search for "Words Unravelled" wherever you get your podcasts.
==LINKS==
Rob's KZbin channel: / robwords
Jess' Useless Etymology blog: uselessetymology.com/
Rob on X: x.com/robwordsyt
Jess on TikTok: tiktok.com/@jesszafarris
#etymology #eggcorns #podcast

[@bikerjock2654]

An elderly gentleman once told me that his granddaughter had asked him to sing the “pie weighing song”. “The pie weighing song?”, he asked her, “I don’t think I know that one.” “Yes you do grandpa.” she insisted, “Some where over the rainbow, weigh a pie.”

[@Subfightr]

Wow. Lol

[@katietoole8345]

😂

[@loisdungey3528]

❤. 😂

[@glenprideaux]

My young foster children used to refer to me, an older carer, as their fossil father. I embraced the term.

[@patrickbenthamradley5429]

LOL great one ! ( From another old fossil ! )

[@loisdungey3528]

Can I laugh? As a not-quite fossil! I think this is super cool. When someone gives you a special name that MEANS something.

[@Outliver]

Reminds me of a similar, actually quite popular phenomenon we have in Germany. It's when we hear German words, names or even full sentences in English song lyrics. We call those songs "Agathe Bauer" songs. The term originates from a woman calling a radio station, wishing for a song she thought was called "Agathe Bauer". What she meant was "I got the power" by "Snap!". This quickly became a trend and different radio stations have now collected hundreds of those songs. Might be worth an episode, I don't know.

[@chantellelandon85]

Omg Ellie that's so funny lol 😂 I'm currently learning German myself, so that's good to know haha 🤣😆

[@carolinejames7257]

Something similar happened in my hometown. Late one night someone called the radio station to request a song, but they were drunk and their speech was slurred. (The requests were by telephone back in the day, and were broadcast.) He kept asking for what sounded like The Cedar Tree song, and the presenter kept asking questions, trying to get a song title or artist. Eventually he asked the person calling in if he could sing a bit of the song, which he did. It sounded something like: "See da tree how big iss grown, But den it hasn been too long...". The song is Honey, by Tammy Wynette among others.

[@chantellelandon85]

EllieDYorks lol yup true

[@Murcielago1999J]

That happens a lot in Spanish as well. It is kind of a meme, singing "Agua en tu refri" (water in your fridge) in I want to break free by Queen. The most famous one is "esas son Reebok o son Nike?" (Are those Reebok or Nike?) for the song This is the Rhythm of the Night. Even the band Twisted Sister sang "Huevos con Aceite" (Eggs with oil) during their song We're Not Gonna Take It when they toured in Mexico

[@WordsUnravelled]

I had Agathe Bauer in my notes but forgot to mention it(/"her"). Next time... Rob

[@fretfulporpentine]

When I was 7 years old, I became ill with what was originally thought to be rheumatic fever. My classmates at school sent me hand-made “get well soon” cards, wishing me a quick recovery from my romantic fever.

[@lakrids-pibe]

[@WordsUnravelled]

The affliction of every lady character from classic lit who died of Sad.

[@mysapphirestar]

Not strictly a Mondegreen but there is a line from La Donna e Mobile in Rigoletto that sounds just like “elephant’s ears”. We actually have an app now for producing Malapropisms. It’s called Autocorrect and for that I am internally grapefruit.

[@loisdungey3528]

😂

[@OlliWilkman]

Way back 20 years ago Rathergood had a flash animation on this; if you look up "elephants yeah" on youtube, you'll see it.

[@R08Tam]

My favourite malapropism was my Mum's. If I changed the subject, mid conversation, she would say "oh you're going off on a tandem again".

[@Pippis78]

Ooh! I like that! Going on a tandem isn't going completely off rails but on a parallel track along the main thing your talking about!

[@jonrolfson1686]

Going on a tandem is nice. It’s better when you’re not going alone.

[@Pippis78]

@@jonrolfson1686 Going on a tangent together with someone! That could be it too!

[@airsicklowlander7756]

The internet is great because it lets you find other people who have the same incredibly niche interests as you.

[@indeedgrasshopper]

Yeah, you even end up running into people who enjoy the same books as you. Gotta go, highstorm coming.

[@katietoole8345]

When I hear moot point, I always think of Joey from Friends, "Moo point. It's like a cows opinion. It's moo."

[@KristenRowenPliske]

I thought of that, too! 😂😂😂

[@eloisesmith6467]

Oooh! I remember a mondegreen! John Fogerty (Credence Clearwater Revival) had a song that was misinterpreted by many as "There's a bathroom on the right." The actual lyric was "There's a bad moon on the rise." Fogerty got such a bang out of it that in one live performance he sang the bathroom version. 😄

[@Eric1AL]

That's a good one. Classic.

[@ChadN-xh9sz]

My twin brother and I said that one. We knew it probably wasn't right but it cracked us up

[@kennethflorek8532]

Proud Mary was such a huge hit that another star had a hit of it later. (Tina Turner) In an interview, Fogerty straightened out a line that I never could make out in the original but in the remake it was (wrongly), "punched a lota pain down in New Orleans," which I believed. He said it was, "pumped a lota 'tane down in New Orleans." 'tane = octane = gas? Kinda too bad.

[@anjadrolshagen6388]

It reminds me of Elvis singing "Do you gaze at your bald head and wish you had hair" in oder version of are you lonesome tonight.

[@SrRatSandwich]

My favorite mondegreen is when Freddie Mercury says “I am adopted!” in Another One Bites the Dust (real lyric is “bite the dust, hey” but “I am adopted” is better)

[@elmoteroloco]

My mother, now a nonagenarian and who only speaks Rioplatense Spanish, a few years ago was waiting for me happily and eagerly to show me the pendant with a beautiful cross that one of her great-granddaughters had given her. "It's liturgical steel!", she told me excitedly... in Spanish "Litúrgico" sounds quite similar to "Quirúrgico" (surgical) and logically, for my mother, the religious option made much more sense.

[@neskire]

My favourite mondegreen is the song “What a Wonderful World” sung by Louis Armstrong. He sings “and the dark sacred night” but it sounds like “and the dogs say goodnight”. 😏

[@lcmgen]

I have a nice mondegreen, being a native dutch speaker. For the last 40 years or so I heard, in the Pink Floyd song One of the Few, "What do you do to make ants meat?" instead of "What do you do to make ends meet?"

[@donnafiori2565]

When my son was just a little boy, he mistakingly thought refrigerator was "fridge a-later" which totally makes sense, too.

[@YHIEEDC]

Yep I was the same as a kid "fridge" meant cold and "a-later" because you eat food out of it later than it's been put in there!

[@bpekim1]

When my little sister was a tot, her interpretation of spaghetti was “psgetti”.

[@christycoats]

As a young child, when I heard people saying "this morning," I thought they were saying "the smorning," and I wondered what a smorning was.

[@WordsUnravelled]

The smorning sounds like that mystical time of day when the pixies come out. I like it. R

[@sevenstars004]

I have frequently heard people say, "taunt" rather than saying, "taut." "Is the string taunt?" Sometimes, I would say politely (acting as if I didn't catch what they actually said, so not to come across as being rude), "yes, it's taut. I just tightened it." There were a few occasions where they would reply, 'you mean, 'taunt?'"

[@loisdungey3528]

😂. " I would never tease/ be mean to my violin/guitar/harp"!

[@TheSmallFrogs]

When I first went to infants' school, aged 5, we learnt the Lord's Prayer by heart long before we learnt to read fluently. I misheard the last part and thought it was "for thine is the kingdom, the power and the chlorine". "Glory" wasn't a concept that had particularly had an impact on me, but chlorine I'd heard of, because it made your eyes sting in the swimming pool.

[@heneagedundas]

"Harold be thy name".

[@garyd5095]

@@heneagedundasI love it, I would say it that way for the humor.

[@pauljordan4452]

For me, it was learning the Our Father aged 5 and realising faith helped with my inherent anxiety.

[@martinstephenson2226]

Dave Allen (Irish comedian) had a good one: in the name of the father, and of the son and into the hole he goes.

[@shryggur]

From the place of ground zero, O Lord, deliver us. From the rain of the cobalt, O Lord, deliver us. From the rain of the strontium, O Lord, deliver us. From the fall of the cesium, O Lord, deliver us. From the curse of the fallout, O Lord, deliver us. From the begetting of monsters, O Lord, deliver us. From the curse of the Misborn, O Lord, deliver us.

[@WildStar2002]

My favorite personal mondegreen was from when I was little and hearing in Sunday School about how Jesus cured a man with "leopard seeds"

[@trinefanmel]

I have one from my childhood: whenever we used to sing the song "There is a Gate that Stands Ajar". I didn't know 'ajar' was a word meaning slightly open, so when we got to the refrain (chorus) "Oh depth of mercy, can it be | That gate was left ajar for me?" I always wondered why we were singing about someone leaving us a jam jar by the gate...

[@wes643]

My childhood Mondegreen was hearing “Later on, we’ll perspire, as we dream by the fire” in “Winter Wonderland”.

[@ngonStrafe]

I would absolutely love for you all to do an episode on American vs British manglings of the poor French language. I don't know for certain who is worse, but after many years of listening to history youtubers from the UK I can - at the least - confidently say that the Brits have a deep and abiding love of mispronouncing French place names in fascinating and fantastical ways.

[@may81944]

Yes please! When I was a travel agent the representative of British Rail visited our office in Nashville to let us know about new service to Bewly. Since I had never heard of such a place I asked that he show me on the map. He promptly pointed to Beaulieu. I think it must be revenge for 1066.

[@Ken19700]

For all intensive porpoises

[@CouerDeLion82]

I had a linguistics professor tell this story some 20 years ago that he, as a child, lived in a house with heat registers that were painted red. When his parents later remodeled the home the registers were repainted blue, so he began to call them “blue-gisters” because he had always thought they were called “red-gisters”.

[@jbejaran]

The most prominent mondegreen that always tripped me up and that has a somewhat unsavory alternate meaning was from the song "Blinded By The Light" by Manfred Mann's Earth Band. There's an oft-repeated line in the chorus that actually says, "Revved up like a deuce, another runner in the night". The first half of this line is famously heard by many as "Wrapped up like a douche". It's so established, it's actually hard to hear it the correct way even when the correct lyric is known.

[@georgecarlson1460]

My favorite was the child who heard "angels and archangels" and thought it was, "angels and dark angels" so was convinced that angels came in both white and black.

[@waynemansfield1527]

Our young son once said he liked the "sore feet" song while listening to "Killing Me Softly With His Song" he heard "Killing my sore feet " and now we can only hear "sore feet" when we hear this song

[@kevinmyles6436]

"Doggie-dog world" is so wonderful.

[@arayflores]

I learned a few years ago that a co-worker and I had opposite misunderstandings about the same word - "façade." I had only heard the word (or maybe saw it without recognizing it as the same word - like walaa! for viola!) and imagined that it was spelled "pha-sod." I think I imagined "ph" instead of "f" because it seemed kind of fancy. Meanwhile, my co-worker who grew up in Fiji had only seen the word, but never heard it pronounced. In his head it was "fa-kad."" When we figured out our equal and opposite mistakes, we were amazed at the coincidence that we could each be so wrong about the same word!

[@allendracabal0819]

Voilà, not viola, which is an instrument.

[@loisdungey3528]

I'm never quite sure how to pronounce "facade". Is it faasaad?

[@allendracabal0819]

@@loisdungey3528 Basically, yes. The stress is on the second syllable. The first syllable is unstressed, so its vowel has the standard unstressed vowel sound (often called "schwa").

[@MaharGuitar]

I heard a sports commentator say, "He was abducted into the hall of fame."

[@RareInTheHistory]

The "for intensive purposes" was one my former supervisor used a lot, as well as "ankther words" instead of "in other words." We mostly communicated by email, and she'd send a daily assignment list to the department, so it was very easy to see it wasn't the correct phrase. My other former manager used to say "it's a mute point" instead of "it's a moot point", and that one I had to hear a few times before I realized what she'd really said. They were both very smart and fantastic managers otherwise! I actually miss working for them.

[@wwciii]

The most common misspelling I see are the people who write anchors away instead of aweigh.

[@ThatGeezer]

I attended a Church of England primary school, where I learned the Lord's Prayer: "Our father who art in heaven, Harold be thy name..."

[@Quenstar]

I was purposefully saying "in-your-window" instead of "innuendo," trying to be funny; my young friend thought I was saying it correctly, and started using "in-your-window."

[@conniebruckner8190]

When our daughter was tiny, just shy of 3, she came to the kitchen without her slippers on. I admonished her: "You know you're not supposed to come into the kitchen with your bare feet!" She looked at me quizzically and delared: " these not bear feet, these my feet!"

[@brucelangley1716]

Jess, I’d been thinking about “one fell (foul) swoop” as video went one and then you mentioned it at the end. There used to be a yacht on Sydney Harbour named “One Foul Sloop”

[@WordsUnravelled]

Ha! Love that. - Jess

[@chezmoi42]

In our family, as a result of a Spooner moment from Gran, it became 'one swell foop'.

[@garyswan]

Along with the wet/whet one you mentioned, the other one I keep hearing is 'on tender hooks' which kind of makes sense in a slightly grisly way - you could imagine being held in suspense by tiny hooks into tender flesh! The tenter was a frame for stretching cloth using hooks and so 'on tenter hooks' alludes to someone being under tension or apprehensive. I loved the extension to the eggcorn which Dave Gorman highlighted in one of his shows, where a misheard phrase 'Bowl in a china shop' was being used to mean something that is completely expected and unsurprising. Or to mean something fragile. It's the variations in language that make it so interesting - life would be so dull if we all spoke the same way.

[@bpekim1]

You guys are a delightful team. I love the content and humor in your show! When I was in college in the late seventies Blue Oyster Cult had a hit that was always on the radio called Don’t Fear the Reaper back in a time when you couldn’t easily find printed song lyrics. One of my pothead friends would always sing “don’t fear the reefer” when it played. He argued with me a number of times that I had it wrong as it was his anthem.

[@llewdis]

I love “Rob Words,” but I think I have a new favorite…

[@steve_s9412]

My great-grandmother, when speaking of occasions when the authorities had to close off an area, possibly because of unexploded wartime bombs, would say "The police threw an accordion round it."

[@NorthernTigress]

I'm not sure which category this fits in, but there is a service where I live that allows you to rescue food that a shop or restaurant might otherwise throw away by purchasing it at a discount. The name of the company is "Too Good to Go." My husband and I both refer to it as "Too Good to Throw," and I have to force myself to say it correctly when I go to pick up my food.

[@nanoRat]

The one "MONDEGREEN" that drives me crazy is 10,000 Maniac's version of "BECAUSE THE NIGHT" when Natalie Merchant sings "The way I feel when I'm in your hands.", I hear it as "The way I feel in the automat". No matter how hard I try to un-hear it that way, I can't.... AND when I tell other people this, they don't even know what an "automat" is.

[@claudebeazley]

As a child, I had problems with "raised to the ground", it wasn't till I started shaving that I understood my mistake.

[@daverose8082]

My 5 year old son came home from school and asked me what a "dance settee" was. When I asked for context he said they had sung a song with the words " Dance then, wherever you may be, He is the Lord of the dance said he".

[@22poopoo]

Omg I thought it was dance settee at infant school too!

[@aurorabantersnatch3914]

'misshapen' When I read books as a kid, I read this in my head as 'mis-hap-en', figuring it had to do with a 'mishap.'

[@j.rinker4609]

Malapropisms are sometimes called "Dogberryisms" after Shakespeare's Dogberry. I also love Mondegreens, misheard song lyrics.

[@jonathanthegreat2008]

Keep the episodes coming, you two!

[@suno8911]

In Spanish Linguistics we call these “popular etymologies”. Less inventive a term than eggcorns, but obviously a reflection of people’s desire to make sense of them. 1. In Mexico, they call kites “papAlotes”, which comes from Nahuatl like “tomato” and “chocolate”, but people will sometimes call them“papelotes” (large paper) instead - you can guess why. 2. This one might be easy to understand as it pertains cognates to English words: people might say adversión” instead of “aversión” because they think it relates to the word for adverse (adverso). 3 My favourite by far is people pronouncing vagabundo (vagabond/beggar) as “vaga-mundo” (world-drifter). There’s also a super famous mondegreen that originated from the Mexican National Anthem. So many people hear a name at the start of a particular verse that it became a literary character and long-standing meme: Masiosare.

[@AutoReport1]

In English it is folk etymology. Folk etymology can produce eggcorns, but it also alters the spelling and pronunciation of unfamiliar words to make them more familiar looking. E.g. standgale for staniel, mistaking the meaning of the bird's name as standing (hovering) in the wind, when it was actually stone-cry, referring to the sound it makes. It is the mistaken revision of a word based on a false etymology.

[@Scottymol]

When I heard The Star-spangled Banner as a child I used to think it was by the dawnzerly light, which sounded like a perfect bright shimmering adjective.

[@bdempster44]

Before I was 10 years old, I heard when someone committed suicide, they had committed sewer side, which in my brain meant they had offed themselves as the sewers are where waste goes.

[@wwciii]

Someone asked my brother when he was quite young what his favorite kind of beans were and he promptly replied "porkun".

[@JuliaWinton]

My brother heard the lyrics to You've Picked a Fine Time to Leave Me Lucille as the man having "400 children and a croc in the fields" so wasn't surprised the man was upset she'd left.

[@loisdungey3528]

We too. Only I'd forgotten about the croc! We were just horrified at the poor woman having 400 children! 😂

[@loisdungey3528]

I've just remembered, we also used to sing- you took a fine time to leave me lose wheel. With 400 children etc

[@thewol7534]

My favorite mondegreen was from a kid I was babysitting who was singing the Paul Simon song "Homeward Bound" and warbled "Home where my dog's escaping" instead of "Home where my thought's escaping." No wonder he wanted to get home.

[@sirilucksana]

I initially thought it was "Home, where my daughter's skipping" when I was a kid

[@sydhenderson6753]

Not from me, but I had a friend who heard "I heard cathedral bells dripping down the alleyway" in 'For Emily, Wherever I May Find Her."

[@justcarcrazy]

I just love that French song about the pink aeroplane, "L'avion Rose".

[@yalova84]

I love these new poscasts - thank you. Being rather old and raised in the ULK with no TV when I was young, I read a lot. As a result, I know most of the "correct" versions. But watching the show I was wondering why I knew "champing at the bit". Then I remembered having to learn "The Listeners" by Walter de la Mere. It starts: ‘Is there anybody there?’ said the Traveller, Knocking on the moonlit door; And his horse in the silence champed the grasses Of the forest’s ferny floor: Over 65 years ago, and it still sticks in my brain!

[@serendipity4505]

me too

[@netgnostic1627]

I bought a whetstone just recently. It only cost a couple of bucks at Dollarama. I sharpened my jackknife and my cooking knives.

[@chezmoi42]

Ah, but did you wet your whetstone?

[@dpcnreactions7062]

The character you mentioned reminded me of Mrs Slocombe From the British Tv show "Are you being served" She always says that she is Unanimous in her opinions.

[@TracySmith-xy9tq]

I'm loving this channel. Etymology fascinates me. I've heard etymology and entomology occasionally confused. As a child, I thought ornery was spelled awnry. There was a car in the sixties, the Karmann Ghia, made by Volkswagen. In my Rhode Island accent, I visualized it being spelled as Common Gear. I once saw disburse used when disperse was meant in a traditionally published book. It seems no one employs proofreaders any longer

[@129140163]

The first time I heard “Karmann Ghia”, I thought it was a Spanish word spelled “Carmenguía”.

[@rikkichunn8856]

Here in America, I have even heard "chafing at the bit."

[@johnharperks]

Here in the Midwest US you will sometimes hear an older person say "faunching at the bit".

[@TheValwood]

Which also makes complete sense. If a horse is struggling against the bit, its mouth could become chafed.

[@VEETEEARR]

My sister is great at malapropisms. "Andy's mum sometimes gets called in to work for the police, she's a terminator." (translator) "I've had to get some cream for my dog because the vet said she's got the minge." (mange) "There was a right 'promotion' going on outside the shop this morning." (commotion) My own mondegreen would be from the Neil Diamond song "Reverend Blue Jeans." (Forever in)."

[@janerkenbrack3373]

Mispronunciation happens when people learn words by reading; whereas egg corns happen when people learn words without reading.

[@HobbyHopperJoanne]

They can also happen when people have auditory processing disorders and sounds aren't clicking with the spelling irregularities.

[@normamcphee8956]

If one were to wreck havoc, wouldn't that mean that they restored a state of relative calm, thus destroying the havoc?

[@franblaye9639]

Mine was a combination. I taught myself to read when I was 5-ish. I didn't go to kindergarten. Well, I read many comics books and my favorite was Superman. I was positive that his city was pronounced "met-roe-POE-lis." Then my Mom straightened me out. After that, I asked if I wasn't sure.

[@loisdungey3528]

My daughter loves reading and has a slight hearing disability. She would often come out with some word that would have us have stumped! Until she showed it to us - written in a story. In my youth I was working with a girl whose last name was Buchanan. I'd never come across the name before and said Buckanan! Didn't live that down for a while!

[@stevewakefield5001]

You two play of each other so well! Love the vlog. Look forward to whatever is next. Thanks!!

[@DopeSauceBenevolence]

OMG. It’s spelled “whetstone?” I’ve ALWAYS spelled it “Wet stone” BECAUSE IT HAS TO BE WET TO WORK PROPERLY. (Which is why you often see people spitting on them.) As opposed to what I’ve always called “dry stones,” that don’t have to be wet!!!

[@thewol7534]

When one is whetting a knife/sword/razor, you do wet the whetstone as doing so is supposed to float away the debris from the metal/stone.

[@joyhancock2703]

Ellis Peters entitled one of her books in the Felce series (Inspector Felce books set in the 1940s or 1950s) 'A Nice Derangement of Epitaphs'. Some authors get their book titles from funny sayings. It helps to sell books.

[@Tia-vj9ox]

Another favorite gift I received as a teen was Morris Word and Phrase Origins. I still have it and love it! I have a relative,who in an effort to sound intelligent, uses “big words” inappropriately. It is all I can do to not correct him or laugh.

[@geocyclist]

My favorite eggcorn was provided by my great-uncle, a veteran of WW2 from the mountains of North Carolina. After coming home from an appointment, he let us know that he had to clean the bedsheets "'cause the doctor said I had "flea bite us". I swar there ain't no fleas in dis house!"

[@loisdungey3528]

Love it!

[@francoiscarrier8745]

Being French Canadian, I still remember getting a kick out of a classmate who wrote down the lyrics to Culture Club's "Karma Karma Chameleon" as "Come on, come on, come on, Leon".

[@tommunyon2874]

Cartoonist Phil Interlandi penned "The Alpha Beté Noir" with the entry for P being Praying Mandatory or the Miserere. The accompanying illustration was of a preying mantis in bishop's robes and mitre. The text was words akin to: "This pious insect prays that his enemies will be devoured in time for its next devotions." Asked my mom at mass, "Who is Jenny Tory? [Genitori, genitoque, las et jubilatio...]

[@RickScully]

My argument for “butt naked” is that my under-educated Italian grandmother who barely spoke English would say that we were “culo nudo” if we didn’t have clothes on. Which translates to “butt naked.”

[@elizabethmcglothlin5406]

I find these endlessly entertaining! My children when young: Greatfruit definitely makes more sense than Grapefruit. (But I have no idea where tonynails came from.) Also my younger sister and friends were saying 'grosette' and I thought it was some sort of teenie-bopper speak. They were trying to say 'grotesque' and I made the correction but would never shame someone's attempt at a word they've read but never heard.

[@garyseabolt]

In the part of the south I'm from we tend to use the word leary, as in to be leary of someone as opposed to be wary of someone. A blending of these two could help explain the use of weary in place of wary.

[@DrachenGothik666]

That word is actually spelled _"leery"._ Leary is a person's surname. #boneappletea

[@MyNameIsNeutron]

In "Fragile" by Sting, I always hear the lines "On and on, the rain will fall" as "On and on, the rainbow farm," and "On and on, the rain will say how fragile we are" as "On and on, the rainbow sea, how fresh all we are."

[@Mindy14]

When I was young, Bold faced lie was one I used, I thought it was being bold, not bold letters.

[@user-hi7jy6ll2s]

Could BOLD-faced refer to old printing methods? Just a few years ago (ha!) I took a graphic arts class in which we learned the craft of type-setting in order to print.

[@loisdungey3528]

I've Always thought it was bold-face lie! As in, He told a bold- face lie!

[@monicabender3943]

I learned "epitome" from reading. For a long time I pronounced Epi-Toam (I understood it to be the epic version of a thing), until I saw some one write it as they said it. And honestly when I read it I still in my mind hear Epi-Toam.

[@renlyspeach7622]

Ever seen Brian Regan's "Epitome of Hyperbole?" It's hilarious and 100% inoffensive sfw clean comedy.

[@KusacUK]

My partner is German, and learned words like apostrophe and catastrophe from reading. Even after 20 years in the UK she still sometimes slips back into pronouncing them “appastroff” and “catastroff.” I really should try her with “synecdoche” sometime just to see what she comes up with…

[@Oldpqlyr]

MY favorite eggcorn (that I purposely use to humorously break someone's concentration) is "lost my (your) train of frogs?" 😅

[@conniebruckner8190]

😅🤣😂

[@alvarner1]

My mondegreen: In I'd Really Love To See You Tonight by England Dan & John Ford Coley the chorus is "I'm not talking 'bout movin' in/And I don't want to change your life/But there's a warm wind blowin' the stars around/And I'd really love to see you tonight. For the longest time I was sure they were singing "I'm not talking about millennia..." I still think my lyric is better. As to eggcorns, when I was a kid, for years I said "taken for granite" instead of "taken for granted."

[@ricdavid]

I haven't heard that song in ages, but hand to god what I thought the actual lyrics to this were til just now: "I'm not talkin bout the livin, and I don't wanna change your mind, but there's a warm window and the stars are out, and I'd really love to see you tonight". So uh, at least I got the last bit right.

[@129140163]

I always thought it was “I’m not talkin’ ‘bout the linens”

[@sirilucksana]

I'm not talkin' 'bout the lemons

[@dayleennis7662]

I’m an amateur word nerd. I love this!!!

[@GrandPrixDecals]

Robs Scottish accent is pretty good, you can tell he’s not Scottish but it’s spot on.

[@ianinjapan2]

In Japan, they actually have a well-established tradition (over a thousand years?) of using similar-sounding-but-unrelated Chinese characters to fit the sounds of originally-Japanese phrases; it's called até-ji (当て字), or "assigning characters." Good dictionaries here will usually tell you if the Chinese characters people use to write some modern Japanese expressions are actually "até-ji" ones; i.e. that these characters actually have no relation to the original Japanese expression, and were only assigned based on the fact that they sounded suitable enough, and also kind of made sense in the way egg-corns do. One common example of these "até-ji" is the Japanese word for "anyway" ("tonikaku"), commonly written as "horns on a rabbit" (兎に角) based on the sounds "to" and "kaku" sounding like "rabbit" and "horns", even though the original Japanese expression had nothing to do with horns or rabbits. This "horns on a rabbit" might have been somehow connected to the (real) Chinese-based expression "legs on a snake" ("dasoku," 蛇足), which means to add useless explanations to something that is already clear (as "anyway" can also be kind of used in a similar way)? But there must be hundreds more of these "até-ji" words in common daily use here: egg-corns which acquired their pedigree of respectability through popular use over the centuries!

[@thedogfather5445]

At school, not paying attention, I became suddenly aware of the geography teacher asking me "why is market gardening in the Vale of Evesham intense"? I thought for a moment and answered, "because they don't have enough greenhouses".

[@helenamcginty4920]

As a 76 year old I came across a lot of these in the correct form as a child. Our school reading books had loads of, even then, obsolete words like pitcher. (Which I now find in a US English context for jug along with sconce for wall light in my hidden object games). I recall Beacon book 3, I think, had the most brilliantly gruesome stories that would not be allowed today. Like Titty mouse and Tatty mouse. That tale had loads of old words that, but for the illustrations I would never have understood. Plus my versions of Grimms and Anderson and my mum's 1920s xmas annuals. We still had coal delivered by horse and cart when I was very little and the rag and bone man and old farmer Snape with his triangular veg stall, still used horses and carts so champing at the bit was something I heard in context. Plus my (working class but well read) parents explained meanings to us.

[@Eric1AL]

I love this podcast. You guys have a great rapport. Don't know if this counts but one time I was watching CNN and the reporter called a fight among factions a "row" and pronounced it like "sew" or "go" instead of "now" or "sow". I might have yelled at the TV.

[@WordsUnravelled]

Oh no... R

[@tautology_zero]

Not malapropisms; but my wife finds it amusing that I naturally say malaphors - where my brain mixes up various metaphors, something that my kids have started doing deliberately now. For example I often say "We'll burn that bridge when we cross it". Though I've just accepted I get these wrong and now use them deliberately for humour value such as: "Does the pope poo in the woods", "It's not rocket surgery" and "Do you bathe in the blood of a thousand paintings?"

[@blancabt]

In Sevilla, Spain, there is the _Torre del Oro_ (golden tower). As a child I thought it was the _Torre del Loro_ (parrot tower), and I thought it was fascinating that they would have a parrot tower as one of their main monuments 🦜

[@laamonftiboren4236]

One I realised I had 'wrong' recently is 'all the range' instead of 'all the rage'. I still haven't got over it.

[@McArid]

In German there are "Agathe Bauer"-songs. Basically misheard lyrics. In this case, it was the song "I got the power"

[@GunnarMiller]

I keep a Notes page on my iPhone, and record every eggcorn I see or hear. Some are annoying ("a real trooper" != trouper, "baited breath" != bated, "chomping at the bit" != champing), some are amusing ("neck gator" != gaiter, "Burrow of Manhattan" != Borough, "lamb blast" != lambast), but this one takes win, place and show: "went for the juggler" != jugular .

[@keithdavies6771]

A book by Malachi McCourt is entitled "A Monk Swimming" I think its from the Confession, "amongst women" that as a child he misheard, and it stayed with him.

[@clintonlemarluke1507]

We often joke, "I'm waiting with a worm on my tongue." to mean "I'm waiting with bated [baited] breath."

[@leonwilkinson8124]

A mondegreen to which I was subject for many years was from the "Silent Night" Christmas carol. I long thought the lyric was "round John virgin," instead of the correct "yon round virgin." "Round John" made more sense to me, but I also wondered who the heck he might be. In fact, I considered whether it might actually be "Long John virgin" because Long John was certainly a pirate like Long John Silver. Of course, I had no idea as a child what "virgin" meant, and it never occurred to me to question the possibility that there was a pirate in a Christmas carol.

[@chrisnorris9596]

I had a freind who was convinced that the first line of the Queen song "Killer Queen", "She keeps a Moët et Chandon in her pretty cabinet" was "she keeps a motorway shovel in her pretty cabinet".

[@pallasathena1555]

My gf says “mind field” when she’s trying to be dexterous with something but finds it full of difficulties

[@andrewnbrown]

A mondegreen of my brother's is from the Madonna song "Dress You Up." The actual lyric is "Gonna dress you up in my love" but my brother hears "Gonna dress you up in vinyl".

[@gfghjfgfghfj]

My favorite egg corn was 10 years ago in Texas. The caregiver for my elderly mom wrote in her report that my mom had "dire rear" earlier that day. I'm sure it was inconvenient and messy, but "dire" seems a bit exaggerated.

[@sundog486]

As a child, I made the same mistake with Awry. I made a similar mistake with the girl's name Penelope, which I thought was "Peny - lope.

[@j.rinker4609]

I think medical eggcorns are common because there's a lot of very technical medical terms. People may be focused on those and miss the common language pieces, or not think to question them.

[@eloisesmith6467]

For years, nay decades, for me there were two words for those little appetizer bites that you would get at receptions etc. The aural one sounded like ordurves. I never connected it with the written form, hors d'oeuvres, which in my head sounded like horsdovers. :D

[@tedblack2288]

I have heard hors d'oeuvre pronounced "hours devours"

[@EricaGamet]

We call them horse ovaries in my house. Of course we also call asparagus "spare guts." 😂

[@Chickadee2202]

Hearing how common and normal eggcorns are for everyone, even the more language-savvy people, makes me feel a whole lot better about thinking the phrase "rhyme or reason" was "rimer reason" for a very long time. I haven't heard of that one mentioned as an eggcorn before.

[@FaridTaba]

This is the best, most relaxing and most satisfying podcast to listen to! (Maybe that’s just me, I love words!) And you are both such lovely people. I love your smiles and your respectful, calm and refined way of speaking ❤

[@WordsUnravelled]

What a lovely thing to say! Thank you so much for listening.

[@renlyspeach7622]

My two favorite misheard song lyrics: The first is from an obscure song whose name or artist I sadly can't remember anymore. "Knelt down we pray" became "melted wheat bread." And the best is in Carmina Burana, by Carl Orff. It's not even in English (I think it's Latin), but when the melody swells, and the choir gets really powerful, I swear I hear "F--k me buttercup."

[@daigreatcoat44]

You say "carmeena", and I say "carminor". Let's call the whole thing Orff.

[@SusanJMT]

I have heard this so many times from men who are of the Greatest Generation: Prostrate for Prostate. I am very aware that men of that generation worked at a time when extreme and constant noise was not considered a workplace danger, with the result that these men became more than mildly deaf by the time that their prostate became troublesome.

[@TatianaBoshenka]

Are there any "fossil" eggcorns that have become correct over time from long usage?

[@Khyranleander]

Not quite what you're looking for, but "an uncle" was originally "a nuncle". Or so many etymology sites claim.

[@allendracabal0819]

Posted elsewhere in these comments is "rack my brain" / "wrack my brain". Apparently multiple authoritative sources treat both as acceptable variations, although only one of them was considered correct initially.

[@EricaGamet]

I believe one they mentioned is now acceptable either way: Coming down the pike/pipe.