Archived Posts
Thu, 25 Aug 2005
Eggcorn re-ducks.
Last Friday, I posted a short piece about an eggcorn I'd found. [See: Stupid anarthrous noun phrases.]
The eggcorn I'd pointed out was: rift >> riff.
In Scott Maxwell's Orlando Sentinel column, (published on Tuesday, 8/23/05), I found the converse of that eggcorn: riff >> rift!
Lawmakers, guitars and Willie Nelson
[...]
Billy Gardell, the Winter Park High School grad who grew up to be a comedian and TV actor (Yes, Dear; The Practice), tore up Bonkerz comedy club in Altamonte Springs on Saturday night in front of an eager hometown crowd. Rifts on politicians, parenthood and Florida in the summertime ("God's way of getting old people ready for hell") went over particularly well.
[...]
[Emphasis is mine.]
An eggcorn in a widely-circulated newspaper should not pass unnoticed. That the eggcorn I used for an example was turned upside-down and printed in our local rag guarantees it will not pass unremarked.
Maxwell's eggcorn could have been a typesetting error, but in an automated, modern newsroom, this is an unlikely explanation.
It may have been an innocent typo that escaped Maxwell's attention and slipped past the copy editor. The letter "t" is adjacent to "f" on a qwerty keyboard. A spell-checker would have missed the substitution.
(A typo is not a genuine eggcorn: Requisite is that the words must be conflated in the writer's mind.)
The copy editor may have been the source of the eggcorn, introducing it when the column went to print in a attempt to fix something that wasn't broken. If this were the case, a dictionary should've been consulted before making changes.
I was astounded when I read Maxwell's column. I quickly checked my site statistics. No, the Tribune domain hadn't visited recently. Maxwell hadn't surfed here from his desk at work, but he does follow the local political blogs: Maybe he enjoys perusing them while he's off the clock. If Maxwell had read my earlier post, there was the remote possibility that he had planted the eggcorn as a joke.
Though I cannot with absolute assurance reject the idea that a local columnist would perpetrate a joke so obtuse as to be lost on the majority of readers, I find the notion absurd.
In my original post about eggcorns, the example was an excerpt from a stand-up comedian's writing. Maxwell's column excerpts a comedian's stand-up act in the same sentence as his eggcorn!
Maxwell has a wicked sense of humor, but I don't believe he planted that eggcorn, I think he dropped it there by accident.
Someone with a rational/scientific, secular worldview would view Maxwell's eggcorn as a mere coincidence.
A more esoteric interpretation would attribute the occurrence to the nebulous principle of synchronicity.
I chalk it up to providence. The way I figure it, God likes a good joke.
Update:
I sent Maxwell a quick note this morning and he was kind enough to reply.
I wrote:
Hi Scott,
In your column, published Tuesday, 8/23, was the use of the word "rifts" intentional, was it a simple typo, or was it a real eggcorn?
Had you conflated the words rift and riff? Riff is the correct word choice for your meaning. If you had unintentionally confused the words and it wasn't just a typo, then we have a genuine eggcorn in print, a rare and wondrous find.
Coincidentally, I had recently written about eggcorns on my blog, using the same rift/riff conflation as example, but in the converse.
http://www.spacecoastweb.org/blog/2005.08.14_arch.html#1124509826368
Your column made excellent fodder for a follow-up post.
http://www.spacecoastweb.org/blog/2005.08.21_arch.html#1124964724954
If you could confirm that it wasn't a typo, or an intentional substitution, I would like to submit it to the Eggcorn Database.
http://eggcorns.lascribe.net/
All the best,
Dave
Maxwell's reply:
dave,
i think i could save some face by saying it was, in fact, a tip of my hat your previous posting. but that wouldn't be true.
i would lean towards believing it was a typo, since i do know the difference. but honest to pete, i'm not sure. brain freezes are quite common in my profession ... in fact, i'm not sure mine has thawed yet. scott
Since Maxwell knows the difference between "rift" and "riff" and suspects a typo, it does not meet the criteria for a genuine eggcorn and doesn't merit inclusion in the Eggcorn Database.
[I'd like to thank Scott Maxwell for being a good sport and replying so promptly.]
MetroPlan Orlando paves way for citizen input.
MetroPlan Orlando is the metropolitan planning organization for surface transportation in Orange, Osceola and Seminole Counties.
By 2025, the planning organization hopes "to have a regional, integrated multi-modal transportation system that safely and efficiently moves people and goods to, through, and within the urban area and which enables the Central Florida community to flourish in the global marketplace."
In a bold move for a public agency, MetroPlan has begun a blog, open to comments from the public:
MetroBlogOrlando.com
Update: The blog is now defunct, too bold a move for a government agency, after all.
Second update 10/14: Here's a comment from a reader:
It was a good thing while it lasted, but as you mentioned, perhaps a little too bold. I still think blogs can be a good tool to inform and involve the public. I hope at the very least we helped pave the way for other government organizations to use blogs sometime in the near future.
Thank you for supporting our efforts.
Bob
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