word mutilations that piss me off to an irrational extent

[papergreen]

- laundrymat
- expresso
- whip cream
- duck tape

...like i'm liable to think less of you as a person if you use these in writing or in speech.

Comments

[drzachary]

What do you think of eggcorns?

'for all intensive purposes'
'escape goat' <-- my favorite.

[jessebeller]

i always liked "for all in tents, and purposes"

[drzachary]

is that an eggcorn though?

[loopbliss]

"for all in tents and porpoises"

[jessebeller]

also "should of," "could of" etc
also "mediums"

[papergreen]

eh. small potatoes.

[papergreen]

as in psychic?

[jessebeller]

you mean psychics

but also as in "what size t-shirts are these?" "mediums"

[jessebeller]

a lot of these examples can be correct in certain contexts.

whip cream can be imperative, duck tape is not only a brand name but also what one does when a roll of tape is thrown, etc.

improper usage is still improper usage. even though a screwdriver works on screws, screwing a nail is still wrong.

[papergreen]

the colloquial usage is what everyone who's commented on this post is railing against.

[papergreen]

and it's still not. even if you're stephen colbert, the word is "truthiness".

[papergreen]

"truthiness" is obviously a neologism and not a colloquial usage of anything. he coined the phrase. on purpose. to describe something that did not previously have a word for it.