And, I don’t mean every once in a while, or as the punchline of a joke (as, for example, my mother one day asked me if I’d like to go “mock the wall” with her. After a pause, as my brain sorted out what she’d really suggested, I said "no, but I would like to watch).
I’m talking about the ones that happen so consistently (to you or someone you know) that your brain has nearly gotten to the point of Spoonerizing them back to their proper order.
For me, it’s that fab auto place that folks on the West Coast are familiar with: Econo Tube and Loon. I guess you get a rubberized waterfowl with each tuneup.
Also, we have the ever popular phrase “Pickled Tink” which I think is what happens on Pan’s buddy’s day off.
I’m always saying “breknake speed” for “breakneck speed.” Rather odd.
My physics instructor always says: “The earth goes around the moon, and the earth goes around the sun” instead of “The moon goes around the earth, and the earth goes around the sun.” His first language isn’t English, but I’m sure he knows the way it’s supposed to be said! Now I’ve got it stuck in my head: the earth goes around the moon! Luna-centricism, anyone?
I teach Renaissance art often and whenever I have to talk about a scene occuring on Calvary I suddenly stop dead, confused, as I’m POSITIVE I must have just said Calvary and everyone is staring at me and I can’t figure out what I did just say. I’ve actually started phrasing it all in a totally different way to avoid this inevitable breakdown.
There’s an Irish rebel song called “The Broad Black Brimmer” that I am simply incapable of singing correctly. It always comes out “The Bload Brack Blimmer” (well, sometimes I actually get the last word right).
If you’re talking songs, I always sing an incorrect lyric to Don Henley’s “Boys of Summer.” My brain always changes the part that goes “her brown skin shining in the sun” to “her bra strap shining in the sun.”
Years ago I made a mistake in a presentation, referring to the steeply dipping beds of a rock formation as “deeply stipping” and apparently seared it into my brain. Gets me almost everytime.
I’ve been listening to The Smiths: Singles a lot lately. I try to sing along, but no matter how many times I try I CANNOT say "Leeds side-streets that you slip down " Too many Ls and Ss and Ds. It always comes out something like “Sleed stride street that ya slit now.”
