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Chris -- 2025-05-10

#1 2010-12-04 09:49:46

Peter Forster
Eggcornista
From: UK
Registered: 2006-09-06
Posts: 1275

'ball point figure' for 'ball park figure'

To many people outside North America a ‘ball park’ signifies, puzzlingly, an area where you may park your ball – ‘ball park figure’ would make even less sense, and is therefore ripe for eggcornish interpretation. I heard someone on the TV use the expression ‘ball point figure’ a few nights ago, and it suggested a rough calculation with a biro on a scrap of paper as opposed, I imagine, to the definitive calculation carefully executed on vellum with a quill and ox-gall ink.

Also, any rough ballpoint figure of how much graduate intake is going to be slashed by in 2009?

Anyone got a ballpoint figure on the price of a fly wheel?

It is still unknown how much was exactly stolen but the ballpoint figure is thought to be more than 1 billion Swedish kronor or about 150 million dollars.

Now, lets check out the differences in prices (I’m throwing out ballpoint numbers, correct if you disagree)

Not asking for specifics, just a ballpoint estimate.

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#2 2010-12-04 11:07:03

DavidTuggy
Eggcornista
From: Mexico
Registered: 2007-10-11
Posts: 2768
Website

Re: 'ball point figure' for 'ball park figure'

That one hit me out of the left blue yonder. I like it!


*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .

(Possible Corollary: it is, and we are .)

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#3 2010-12-05 17:10:05

burred
Eggcornista
From: Montreal
Registered: 2008-03-17
Posts: 1112

Re: 'ball point figure' for 'ball park figure'

So good. Of course we do need places to park our balls when we’re not playing with them so I don’t know why that should pose any conceptual difficulty. But further support comes from ball point estimate:

Post a job you need doing and we can give you a ball point estimate
http://www.facebook.com/topic.php?uid=1 … noscript=1

Hmm, now what to make of a bald part figure?

Custom cars
perfection. i would love to do a project like that…just have not got the space at the moment…do u mind pm’in a bald part figure of what it cost?

I thought it was bald part…..you know when you ask for a rough estimate, you ask for a bald part figure!!!!! No…..I didn’t think it made sense either.
http://forums.sv650.org/showthread.php?t=74479&page=3

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#4 2010-12-06 11:08:47

Peter Forster
Eggcornista
From: UK
Registered: 2006-09-06
Posts: 1275

Re: 'ball point figure' for 'ball park figure'

That one hit me out of the left blue yonder.

Ah yes, I suppose our equivalent would be something like silly mid on (or off – I’ve no idea really) which doesn’t seem to have caught on in N America for some reason. But I’m reminded that my first encounter with “stepping up to the plate” seemed something you’d do to help out those with too much on their plate and you’d do it with a knife and fork and not much appetite. There are other interpretations:

I thought “stepping up to the plate” had something to do with railway engines. Are you sure it’s about baseball?

Our equivalent to the plate thing is “stepping up to the crease” which is probably a little too suggestive of intimate cleavages – bald part figure? – to break free of its sporting context.

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