Hi-yo, Dear Members!

We’ve all heard people say that this or that person "has another thing coming."  

But somewhere I read that the correct expression is "has another think coming":  t-h-i-n-k.

Comments, anyone?

Why, thank you, Katy!

That makes sense now.  You know, I didn’t think of the first part of the expression, If you think—

It looks like I remembered the ending and not the beginning, so I must have the other think coming!

Regards

"You have another thing coming!" may be an example of a mondegreen, ossified into common usage.
I would put the commonly-rendered expression "I could care less!" in the same category, because if you think about it before saying it…  ;)
gailr

Thanks for the site, Gail—re "mondegreen."

Now it’ll be interesting to see when this word will take its rightful place in the dictionary.

BTW, is "rightful" the correct adjective to use in this case, simply because it is a word which has a meaning?

Regards, Everyone!

Well, I’ve been totally mondegreened! I always thought, and have said, "You’ve got another thing coming". That’s not the kind of idiom you want to get wrong…

- Garzo stood corrected.

Unless it’s Christmas or your birthday, in which you might hope you’ve got another thing coming!
gailr
not a material girl

I wouldn’t have thought that the phrase came from "another think coming" in a million years!

Wow!

Sitran

I have only ever read "another think coming" but only ever heard "another thing coming". How long will it be before the commonly heard one becomes accepted as the correct one?

"I could care less" is only used in North America as far as I know. I’ve only ever heard "I couldn’t care less" on this side of the Atlantic.

JtW

Dear Jonah,

I always took the phrase, "I could care less" as a challenge!

"I couldn’t care less" was always hyperbole, but if that’s what you’re thinking, you’ve got alot of thinging to do!

Or somethink like that that makes sense!

Like I said, "Wow!"  I was just "thinging," not thinking!

Sitran

To "I could care less," I reply, "You could if you applied yourself."  :D

However, if someone says: "I could of cared less," I just let it go…

gailr
Who is resisting that pesky new helping verb "of".

"I could of cared less,"

Seems OK to me, although the orthography leaves a little to be desired. "Could’ve" and "Could of" are practically homophonic, aren’t they?

- PW

yes, PW, they are very close.  I have seen people write it that way alot!  (Not me, though!)

If only I could of* gone!

Sitran

Yes, "I couldn’t care less" is supposed to mean that "I don’t care at all" or as infinitely as close to not caring as any caring could intimate.

Sitran

I too had always said "another thing coming", and it’s only in the last three or four years that the penny finally dropped. *

Before that, I guess I’d been a victim of over-correction: in the north of England, "something" is often pronounced "somethink" - and I had it ingrained in me at an early age that that was a Bad Thing. I must have misapplied the same logic to "another think coming".

Ed
* (Where the hull does that come from btw - slot machines?)

[quote author=edman link=board=idiom;num=1085839521;start=15#15 date=06/08/04 at 10:33:20] the penny finally dropped. *(Where the hull does that come from btw - slot machines?)

If you’re old enough to remember the "penny push" machines at such places as Great Yarmouth, I think it would have come from there. Perhaps it pre-dates those to some other sort of devices.

Strange… I found this hit in a Google search:

Turkish Idioms beginning with the letter J

Could this have originated in Turkey?  That seems somewhat odd to me…!

-Tim