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Original poster

Has DH got another think coming or have I got another thing coming???

812 replies

NotMyRealName2015 · 01/11/2015 14:56

I’ll clarify Blush

DH and I were having a light hearted debate about who was going to sort the garden out this afternoon (there are weeds growing out of weeds, and we have guests coming this week)
DH said that if I thought he was doing it today ‘I had another thing coming’.

I pointed out the phrase was ‘another think coming’ and that he should now go and do the garden as punishment for his failure. Grin
However, he is insisting I am wrong and that ‘thing’ is the right word. I say that doesn’t even make sense! What ‘thing’ is coming?? He just says ‘English doesn’t always make sense.’ (Not technically his first language but he has a British parent so has always been bilingual and is completely fluent)

MN jury needed. Who is correct??
Loser will obviously be doing the garden. Winner will sit down with coffee and biscuits, looking smug and saying 'you've missed a bit.'

OP posts:
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VivienneHolt · 30/07/2019 17:05

It is absolutely, indisputably 'think'.

Just because a lot of people say 'thing' doesn't make it right!

TalkingAboutPride · 09/07/2019 10:10

Oh cripes, zombie thread!

TalkingAboutPride · 09/07/2019 10:09

Thing as in some THING else is going to happen to what you think 😁

As opposed to "if you think I'm doing that you can think again" - totally different phrase!

TalkingAboutPride · 09/07/2019 10:06

Best get your gardening gloves on. I really wanted to be on your side too, but it's definitely thing!

cantfindname · 08/07/2019 18:51

It's think as in 'he can think again'

RockinHippy · 08/07/2019 18:41

Spiting feathers is another common Geordie one & it definitely means angry 😐

RockinHippy · 08/07/2019 18:40

It's think, always was growing up in the N.E where this was common & if you look at the structure of the phrase it's the only one that makes sense. You have that thought & I'm not doing it, so you have another thought/think coming

DadDadDad · 08/11/2015 23:37

I didn't know that one, but it seems that "spitting feathers" to mean angry is catching on, despite the older meaning. So that upstart interpretation may be another thing coming. Grin

www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/spitting-feathers.html

SDTGisAnEvilWolefGenius · 08/11/2015 18:34

Yes - 'spitting feathers' means being very thirsty.

Clobbered · 08/11/2015 17:53

THINK.

And its spitting TACKS, not feathers, when you're angry.

Tsk.

cheapskatemum · 07/11/2015 19:30

It's think

Original poster
NotMyRealName2015 · 06/11/2015 21:16

Classics!!! How exciting must get a life Grin

My DH will be so proud. Thank God our argument didn't go on as long as this thread has...the garden never would have been finshed

OP posts:
MrsDeVere · 06/11/2015 18:08

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

DadDadDad · 06/11/2015 17:38

Actually, purple, amid the barracking and stubborn ignorance, I've found this one of the more intelligent and enlightening threads. About a hundred posts back I dug out links to a national newspaper where both think and thing were used, including separate transcriptions of the same speech that chose differently. I find that fascinating not some tedious sign that civilisation is unravelling!

DadDadDad · 06/11/2015 17:28

*reply
(showing my poor education Grin)

purpleponcho · 06/11/2015 17:27

I don't think it's commonplace at all, This is honestly the stupidest thread on Mumsnet. We are losing braincells by being here.

walks off muttering, "Classics, indeed..."

DadDadDad · 06/11/2015 17:26

That was a really to purple at 17:06

DadDadDad · 06/11/2015 17:24

You just can't extrapolate the quality of someone's education from one error. And this error is unimportant, because it's a fairly uncommon phrase in written English, that hardly shows an ignorance of some fundamental element of grammar.

It's easy to say from a position of knowledge that any educated person would see the illogicality of "thing", but so many idioms are obscure when you analyse them, that it is just an unrealistic of how we use language to think they would spontaneously realise an error.

StarkyTheDirewolf · 06/11/2015 17:22

No, honestly, I'm not purple I just think it's rude to assume someone is poorly educated because of a misheard idiom. It's common place, as proved by this thread. Smile

purpleponcho · 06/11/2015 17:19

You are clearly taking my remarks more personally than intended.

Retreating from this thread... because it's not a Classic, damn it.

StarkyTheDirewolf · 06/11/2015 17:13

Who's illiterate? Jeez, well clearly both my wits and my humour have failed me. I'll cope.

purpleponcho · 06/11/2015 17:12

FWIW, MrsdeVere, "You've got another think coming" is EXACTLY the sort of thing that my Latin teacher, who had been at Oxford, loved to come out with. Also "close, but no cigar" and "Aha, a trap for young players!" - before giving me a detention for scanning Virgil incorrectly. (Argh, flashbacks!) His speech was rather richer in idioms and oddities than that of most people.

purpleponcho · 06/11/2015 17:06

I don't see illiteracy as anything to be proud of, either, Starky.

It depends on what you define "educatedness" as -- merely drifting through "that box-ticking facade you call any education system" or being genuinely well-read, knowledgeable and so on.

Errors such as "for all intensive purposes" and mixing up "their/they're/there" don't tend to made by people who read lots of books and see the words used in their proper contexts (assuming that the reader has no special needs).

In my view, saying "another thing coming" is more egregious than most errors because you should be able to work out the correct version by using your noggin. It's also a lovely, jocular old phrase, and it seems like a failure both of wits and of humour to get it wrong.

Forgive the inevitable typos, please.

It does annoy me to see errors dismissed as unimportant just because allegedly educated people made them. It really doesn't do anything but call into question the quality of their education.

MrsDeVere · 06/11/2015 16:54

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

StarkyTheDirewolf · 06/11/2015 16:10

Honestly, I'd rather be "poorly educated" with manners than rude purpleponcho