Agreed; I had no idea what word was wanted there. I knew it wasn't "jive", but I knew no other word that sounded remotely similar that could take its place.
Yeah, I got all the others fairly easily but was totally at a loss for that one. Apparently the malapropism of "jive" is so widespread that it captured my brain.
People in the US who've never heard the word "jibe" have simply heard other people incorrectly using "jive". For at least 40 years (or more) I've known it was "jibe" and that it meant "to agree with".
Don't worry, I died too. I spent around 10 minutes actually reading the page below; was too busy cracking up. I got these from this site, it's funnier reading the full sentence.
Shouldn't "depository" be accepted as well? - Great quiz otherwise, especially when you know exactly what the wrong word is, but can't think of the real one. The only one I really didn't know was "jive".
This is a good idea for a quiz but I think it could have been executed better. The large majority of these phrases are things I have never heard uttered. On the other hand... I have heard people say some of these things routinely:
chomping at the bit
hunger pains
I should of studied grammar
I could care less
etc etc... there are tons of these in very common usage. A quiz on the subject would be cool.
I've also heard about Drake circumcising the globe before... with a large clipper.
Hunger pains is fine. Isn't it? (he asked with doubt creeping into his voice) Or have I malapropped my whole life on that one? And if all my mates say that too, which they do, how many malaproppers does it take before it becomes the new normal?
I don't think the point was necessarily to replicate phrases in common use (the term "malapropism" just as validly refers to a single word as it does to an entire phrase); I think the point was that Quizzer6794 wanted to see if he could MAKE US SPEW OUR BEVERAGES OUT OUR NOSES AND ALL OVER OUR SCREENS and give us asthma attacks from laughing hysterically! And may I just say, mission accomplished. The visuals that popped into my head (Darwin running around stark naked, jurors and court officers flinging around Chinese dumplings, a canine lupus wearing a gold lamé sweatsuit), or the realization that a couple are already true just the way they are (everyone in any office does have at least one cuticle of their very own, Wikipedia really *is* a suppository of knowledge) had me in friggin' STITCHES. Yes, please make more of these, Quizzer6794, but make them just like this one! I'm even inspired to try my hand at one. This was among my top 3 or so favorite JetPunk quizzes ever. Kudos!
"I could care less" always really rankles me. There may also be an interesting quiz on expressions that were once wrong, but became correct through widespread usage, like "boldface lie," which used to be a malapropism of "baldface lie," or the word "momentarily," which means "for a moment," but is so frequently and incorrectly used to mean "in a moment" that its meaning has almost changed by consensus. By the dictionary definition, "I'll be with you momentarily" means "I'll be with you for a moment before I leave," but of course everyone understands it to mean "I'll be with you in a minute."
If we're defining 'malapropism' as 'an act or habit of misusing words ridiculously, especially by the confusion of words that are similar in sound', then I wouldn't consider 'chomping at the bit' one of them. Probably more appropriate to think of it as an accepted variant of 'champing at the bit', since there's no substantial change in the idiom's meaning.
I never heard the Brutish expression before. I looked it up, and I never heard of Hobbes or Leviathan, either. It sounds like dry reading material, but thanks for teaching me something new today.
One of Hobbes' friends (and his first biographer) reports that Hobbes was six feet tall. We also know that he lived to the age of 92. He appears to have lived comfortably most of his adult life, enjoying the patronage of rich sponsors.
So while he was British and may have been nasty (he wrote in favor of authoritarian rulers, having spent much of the English Civil War in self-imposed exile), he was neither solitary, poor nor short.
Could "ambitious" work instead of ambivalent for ambiguous, too? I get it that ambivalent is nearer to the malapro..priated (?) 'ambiguous' in meaning, but since this is not the case for the other words in that quiz (say constipation package), I don't see why it shouldn't work (unless, of course, it's gramatically wrong, in that case please ignore my suggestion, I'm not a native speaker).
I could also see someone mistaking ambitious for ambiguous more easily than ambivalent, at least if you're going with the "similar-ish sounding, different meaning" theme like you did with the rest of the words. Ambiguous and ambivalent share a meaning (sort of), the rest of the words does not share a meaning, just some phonetic resemblance.
I *am* a native speaker, and this was the only one I missed! I also tried "ambitious"...
And she COULD have been "ambiguous" about a job offer, if she were the one offering a job to someone...I had no idea what was needed here. Not a complaint, just a comment.
Irregardless of how you may feel about the spelling, it was accepted as acceptable by the folks at Webster's in 2020. Just one more crazy thing in a relatively insane year.
If you do a #2 please include a quote from Archie Bunker. One of my favorites - "I don't believe in no religion where the head guy says he's inflammable".
I have always understood jibe to mean to mock someone - and that's what my Oxford English dictionary says. The usage in this quiz must be solely American I think. Perhaps it could be changed to something with a more universal meaning?
I'm American and I've never heard "jibe" used like it is in this quiz. Also, even if it can be used in that sentence, it isn't a malapropism because one of the definitions of "jive" is "to be in accord with" which makes sense in that sentence. I think it should definitely be changed.
This quiz is messing with my brain. I read the word photogenic and all other words starting with "photo-" evaporated from my mind. I genuinely managed to come up with "photoscopic" before I remembered the word photographic existed.
Super dark, sorry
chomping at the bit
hunger pains
I should of studied grammar
I could care less
etc etc... there are tons of these in very common usage. A quiz on the subject would be cool.
I've also heard about Drake circumcising the globe before... with a large clipper.
So while he was British and may have been nasty (he wrote in favor of authoritarian rulers, having spent much of the English Civil War in self-imposed exile), he was neither solitary, poor nor short.
I could also see someone mistaking ambitious for ambiguous more easily than ambivalent, at least if you're going with the "similar-ish sounding, different meaning" theme like you did with the rest of the words. Ambiguous and ambivalent share a meaning (sort of), the rest of the words does not share a meaning, just some phonetic resemblance.
And she COULD have been "ambiguous" about a job offer, if she were the one offering a job to someone...I had no idea what was needed here. Not a complaint, just a comment.
Good quiz though!
I did not that your post predated the change.
http://www.abbottsimulator.com/
Shaun: What you mean?
Liz: Well, you guys hardly get on, do you?
Shaun: No, I mean, what does 'exacerbate' mean?
Liz: Um, it means to make things worse.
I get that if you leave I job you may get some redundancy pay etc. but I'm lost at to what a new company may compensate you for.
Who gets compensation when they START a job?