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Chris -- 2018-04-11
Joe just issued a name-eggcorn challenge – this is my entry. “To have something down pat†means to be able to negotiate nimbly all the ins and outs of a complicated technique or procedure. “Have it down pat†gets 19k raw ghits at the moment. “Have it down flat†makes a certain instinctive sense to me that’s harder to analyze – perhaps the idea is that no remaining problems or obstacles “stand out.†Or maybe you’ve simply “flattened†the challenge you were faced with – as you might flatten an opponent. “Pat†and “flat†have a bit of semantic overlap in other contexts, too – a “pat†answer might also seem somewhat “flat†or uninteresting.
“Have it down flat†gets only about 300 raw hits right now. I was surprised, because I’m pretty sure I’ve heard it in conversation. But someone suggested in my last citation below that it might be a Northern California regionalism, so who knows? Books.google.com has only one instance. Examples:
But it is fun when you finally get a scene right and you have it down flat!
http://rvb.roosterteeth.com/members/pro … uid=232356
Trust me, when you are trying to learn this, slowing down too much is better then jumping too soon, as at least you are starting to get a more ingraned mental noting of the right timing.
Once you have it down flat you should be timing precisely enough that you experiance no deceleration due to ducking,
http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/ind … opic=90879
we have to have the village people reuniun before prom so we have it down flat at prom
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fu … d=37752023
“I know it down flat” sounds a little odd to me, but “I have it down flat” does not.
http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=1275261
[usage forum discussion on my reshaping]
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The flat of ran 100 yards in 9 seconds flat or she just flat doesn’t get it (or, If Dolly Parton was a farmer she’d be flat busted ) is likely involved here too. I usually if not always say she has it down pat but I can well imagine saying she has it down flat, aware as I did so that I was saying something unusual for me but that makes perfectly good sense. I would mean she just “plain†has it down.
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The rather pronounced sound difference of flat and pat makes this less eggcornish as well.
Last edited by DavidTuggy (2009-02-20 09:23:01)
*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .
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