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Chris -- 2018-04-11
Lot No: 232
An oak android barometer fitted with thermometer
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Nice addition, ampersand. Amusing confusion and one we’ll surely be seeing more of in the future. There are Android apps that can give you weather reports, and iPhones can apparently be used to measure wind speed from the rustle in the microphone. Wireless network relay speed can also provide a sensitive measurement of local air temperature. I suspect that the brass monkey idiom may soon give way to one involving loss of vital parts by iridium androids.
There is some potential for a typographical substitution of d for e, but a number of hits on the web show that this is clearly an “intentional” spelling. Another auction site repeats the android substitution several times. The only thing missing is the logic – I wonder if the users are really imagining something cybernetic or robotic about the devices. It’s fun to think so.
Last edited by burred (2011-02-26 20:34:21)
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I knew the word “aneroid” before I head “android.” But only in the phrase “aneroid barometer.” You started me wondering-does “aneroid” (=liquidless) ever refer to anything besides a barometer? I found this in a COCA citations:
We routinely recommend what is, in fact, the simplest and cheapest device, known as an aneroid sphygmomanometer. This consists of a blood pressure cuff that goes around your arm, connected by a rubber tube to a dial that registers pressure. You also need a stethoscope.
Hatching new language, one eggcorn at a time.
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