Discussions about eggcorns and related topics
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Chris -- 2025-05-10
This might be something other than an eggcorn…I’m a novice at this, but have been collecting unusual and irregular usages for a couple of years.
One of my favorite and most prolific language manglers produced this one for me the other day. He was describing an accident that occurred when the roofers were replacing a damaged section of shingles and sheathing at his home. One of the roofers was stepping from rafter to rafter over an unsheeted section of roof and missed his footing. Instead of catching his balance or falling to the ground, he fell astraddle one of the roof rafters…My speaker told me: “he fell and landed right on top of his groans”.
He must think I’m a pretty sadistic guy…I started laughing at the figure of speech, but for anyone who has experienced that scenario the expression seems perfect.
Jay
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Some time ago I thought that someone somewhere may have eggcornified “growin’ pains” as “groan pains” but found no confirmation on Google. What I did find was some groin/groan confusion which I assumed were misspelling/typo errors, but now it seems that perhaps they aren’t:
I had immense groan pains, and my testes were extremely tender. I took Benadryl, and it helped me a bit, but I was tired all day. I heard Claritin really …
yoyzige.hostaim.com/once-a-day-claritin.htm – Cached
I do feel really painful groan pains which Tina says is a sign my pelvic boans are separating. I have been keeping busy with creating marketing material for …
babylindsley.wordpress.com/2008/09/04/long-time-no-post
The usage you cite is curious – a centaur moonlighting as a roofer could easily slip and damage his groins/groans I suppose – but your informant seems to use groan in place of testicle which is certainly something other than an eggcorn. But don’t give up, Jay, and welcome to the forum…
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