Yes.
And I’m not really buying that “different” and “another” have different meanings in this case. Claiming that a thing must have a preceding thing in order to use that word seems like really stretching logic.
Thank you. I was getting depressed that I had to get 100+ posts in before anyone pointed out the phonetic issue here.
Of course casual speech turned the k into a g; it’s easier to say with the following k sound in ‘coming’. As it happens, the word that sounds like ‘thing’ has its own meaning in English, and so people hearing the casually spoken pronunciation thought it was thing and not think. This is not a terribly exceptional or mindblowing instance of language drift.
Yeah, but I think those constructions miss the point of the idiom. If that’s how you phrase it, ‘thing’ is going to make more sense - but it’s not a particularly memorable turn of phrase.
I freely admit I’m biased having grown up with a father who often said “If you think [this], you’ve got another think coming!” To use your last example, he might have said “If you think I’m buying pizza, you’ve got another think coming!” But if he said “You want pizza? You’ve got another think coming” we would have been all “bwah?”
Changing texts inside quote boxes is verboten on this board, furdmort.
As per the FAQ, relevant article.
Further, from the same link:
Since you’re still somewhat new to our forum, you are due a measure of slack. But don’t do this again, and please take the time to read up on the forum FAQ.
- Gukumatz,
IMHO Moderator.
And so there it is. A clash of cultures.
What’s really astounding is that my parents were Scottish, and still it was “thing.”
Hang on; I’m gonna email me mum.
I capitulate.
Me own Scottish mum says “think.”
Drats!
Taking a slight tangent here:
Whatever one’s opinion on think vs. thing is, it’s clear that thing is an eggcorn; a corruption of the original based on sounding alike. What other eggcorns do people prefer to the original for “good” reasons?
I posit “Once more unto the breech.” The real phrase uses breach of course, but I always preferred the visual of being loaded into a cannon to that of storming into a hole in a castle wall. It still lends itself to the same meaning as the original.
Originally it was kind of a play on the word. If you THINK that, you have another THINK coming. (Because your first THINK was wrong.)
Now it’s just buzzwords repeated by dumb people who don’t care what they’re saying, so “thing” works adequately well, particularly since no one can enunciate any more.
This is a very precise description of how I feel about the phrase with the use of “thing”. It makes it a sad, sad phrase.
And you would always have to scream at the person saying it: “What thing??!” Because it could be anything. Anything at all could be coming. A fist in the face instead of your girlfriend, sprouts instead of spaghetti, Ron Paul instead of Obama. What a terrifying perspective. I’d rather just have another think on it.
If it sounded awkward people wouldn’t say it. The whole *point *of common phrases and aphorisms is that they fall trippingly from the tongue. Can you think of one that doesn’t?
Indeed. And ironically “duct tape”, while useful in so many ways, is terrible for use on ducts.
Say what? My cooker hood duct is held in place very nicely with duct tape, thank you.
Normally, I’d disagree, but in this case I’m gonna duct the question.
As in D&R.
It’s not exactly ideal on ducks either.
Many a mickle maks a muckle.
Duct tape is pretty much never the best tape for any job. There is a brand of the tape called Duck Tape, with a picture of a duck on the label, so now all those wrong people can just capitalize and carry on.
Like Gracer, I always assumed people who said “thing” were illiterate, and was surprised at the extent of this misconception. When you learn language primarily in spoken form, these types of errors can occur, while the original remains correctly written in books. The phrase is meant to be somewhat humorous, and with “thing,” the joke’s on you.
They may not be all that wrong.
I get the cotton duck connection, but the tape isn’t made of cotton duck. If we go ahead and call it “duck tape” anyway, what would we call the original tape? The ancestral cotton duck tape led to a different tape with a different use, primarily holding things temporarily while leaving a permanent residue.
If you order two ducks in a restaurant, and you think you’ve just finished one, then you’ve got another duck coming.
Exactly, it’s used as a vaguely threatening but unspecified consequence, that will happen when you prove to be sorely mistaken.