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

[NotMyRealName2015]

I’ll clarify

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.
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.'

Thank fuck, squoosh. I was just about to distract you with the Wareing.

ALWAYS an effective strategy!

Think

It's 'think'

'Another think coming is the original form of the colloquial phrase aimed at someone who has a mistaken view. It comes from the old comical expression, If that’s what you think, you’ve got another think coming.

Because think in the second part of the expression is (intentionally) ungrammatical, some people hear another thing coming and repeat it as such. Plus, another thing coming usually makes literal sense, so it’s now more common than another think coming'

'Another thing' has just been borne from the original 'think', much like when people say 'should of, would of, could of' instead of 'have'. Before we know it, that will be normal too

It's similar to people who say 'daring do', when in actual fact, it's 'derring do'
(As in, 'Getting up to deeds of derring do'). People have started to pronounce it the way they hear it.

I think that one is more understandable because it's an archaic form, Evans, and "derring" isn't used in English in any other context.

I know, Grouchy (but it's still officially incorrect)
Simply making a comparison

Same as the Shakespearian quote 'All that glisters is not gold'. How many times does the word 'glisters' change to 'glitters' or 'glistens' when people quote it? Understandable, but still not right.

I've come back to this thread after several hours (in which, fortunately, I was productive and did some work) and I can't believe there are still people who are arguing it's "thing". WHY? Why not just admit you're wrong? Also, what is it with people who believe that "think" isn't a noun? Who have never, apparently, heard the phrase: "I'll have a think about that"?

Look, people, for once and for all, it's "think". We've proved that it's "think" (through references to the OED and elsewhere), we've explained logically why it's "think" and we've shown that "thing" makes absolutely no sense. Why still argue the toss?

hackmum - obviously some things are just too hard for the hard of thinking

Jeez. I must resist looking at the FB responses or I'll blow a gasket. Ignorance I can handle. Wilful ignorance drives me mad.

hackmum - I'm with you all the way until you say "thing" makes absolutely no sense. I used "thing" all my life until recently converting to "think" because the case is pretty clear.

However, for those first forty(!) years of my life, "thing" made sense to me, and others have explained how it made sense to them ("thing" in the sense of some vaguely threatening consequence if the listener persists in what they are thinking).

So, yes, "think" is correct, but please stop being so insistent that "thing" makes no sense at all, just because it makes no sense to you.

I feel physically sick now. I've always said thing . But I can see that I was wrong. I would have chosen thing in a quiz every time. Thank goodness for the anonymous internet so I don't have to hang my head in shame for too long!

It's definitely THINK

But DadDadDad, how does "thing" make sense? In order to have "another thing" coming, you must have a first thing. What did you imagine the first thing was?

I gave an indication of how it makes sense in brackets in my previous post, and others have had a go at justifying it on this thread, so I'm not really going to go over that again.

You seem to be missing my point: as I and other have used it for years, it clearly made some sense to us, and we can explain some of that sense, even if there are flaws in that explanation, as you point out.

So, I'm just objecting to what is coming across as an arrogant statement that "thing" makes NO sense at all. It does make some sense - that's what makes eggcorns like this interesting - even if ultimately it is wrong.

DadDadDad: I understand that it makes sense to you. I just don't understand why - your explanation above doesn't account for what the word "another" is doing there.

I suppose "damp squid" makes sense in some way to the friend I heard use it the other day. Perhaps she thinks a damp squid is somehow less effective than a fully wet one.

Damp squid, escape goat, 'thing' vs. 'thing', these are all good examples of how we're constantly filling in the blanks of what we think things mean. Yes they sort of make sense, especially once you think that's what the saying is, because your brain thinks up a rationale for the saying. But that doesn't make them correct.

I don't mind ignorance, I'm well aware that there are lots of things I know little to nothing about, and I don't hold it against others the same way I wouldn't want it held against me, but yes, I have to say wilful ignorance irritates me too. Once you know what the idiom actually is, and its origins, why on earth would you persist in using an inferior, and wrong, version?

Sqoosh I'm not actually sure that accounts for much of the misunderstanding as I'm sure plenty, if not all, of the people on this thread know that it's something/anything not somethink/anythink. But I suppose it could be part of it in some cases.

Anyway I have been twitching far too much over this so I think I'm going to go do something else for a while.

I'm hungry.

In the same way that "would of" makes sense to some, because it sounds like "would've," I suppose.

Even though it's WRONG!

It makes (some) sense to me and others (even after I have fully conceded that think is the right choice), so that is why I am suggesting you dial back your rather strident tone in saying that it makes absolutely no sense (implication: "as it makes no sense to me, I am not prepared to accept that it makes any sense to anyone else - not even to someone who is graciously admitting that their sense is flawed").

Holger - I agree with everything you say (well, except the hungry bit as I was taken out for quite a filling lunch ). That is why the eggcorn database is so fascinating - to see how people mishear, reinterpret and come up with wrong alternatives that can make a quirky or beautiful kind of sense. eggcorns.lascribe.net/browse-eggcorns/

Holger squoosh was copy-pasting things from the Facebook thread.

Ohhhh heh, sorry squoosh. That makes a lot more sense then, and I don't even need to know anything about the fb thread to be able to say that

hackmum - your explanation above doesn't account for what the word "another" is doing there.

OK, I've thought about that and I'll give it a go...

Look at this sentence: We should think about doing X, but that's a topic for another day. It talks about another day even though at that point no day has been referenced, so what's that "another" doing there? Surely the answer is that it is implied, that today is one day, and by contrast this topic is being deferred to a day that is not today.

So equally, if we say "if you think X, you've got another thing coming" (for anyone joining the conversation, yes, I know thing is wrong), then the implication could be, that there was this thing X you were thinking about, well X is not going to happen, there is going to be some other thing - so that would be "another thing." Flawed, but not entirely nonsensical.

Another thing coming