Eggcorn Forum

Perhaps someone has given you a cold shoulder, an icy stare, frozen you out, left you in the cold, put the chill on you, acted as cold as ice, or given you a cool reception? The result of such rejection might be a feeling of iceolation.

“Iceolation/icelation/icolation” for “isolation” can be a pun, but I think I see a few instances on the web where the “ic-“ spellings are not intentional. They could be misspellings, but I think I feel a cold semantic wind blowing under the door.

Poppy forum: “this is a cool iceolation. I think the bigger chunks are also good because they might give off less fat and priorins than powder, while the alkaloids will still be washed out there, when they come in contact with the water.”

Comment on Bebo page: “iv been in iceolation for three days with suspected swine flu!”

Post on Arbor Day Foundation site: “These guys are iceolated from the surrounding woodlands in a former cow pasture. They are more than a thousand feet from any of their eastern counter parts so if they could hybridize I think the distance would prevent it.”

Page of anti-Muslim rants: “ icelation has never worked? Would you have the world be like Chamberlin peace in our time?”

Outfitter review site: “I had a new cook … that quit cause she couldn,t handle the icelation ”

Facebook comment: “[S]ince people in our day and age are reaching puberty faster, maybe we are reaching the ‘intimacy vs. icolation ’ stage, suggested by developmental psychologist erik erikson….”

Other switchable “iso-/ice-“ words are “isostatic” and “isotherm.” “Isostatic” is often associated with glaciers–lands that rise after icy glaciers melt undergo isostatic rebound. An isotherm is a curvy line connecting areas of equal temperature (equal coldness) on a weather map.

Comment on global warming post: “When you remove trillions of tons of weight from the ice caps and there is resultant icostatic rebounding where the ice was, its unlikely the plates will just pop up and shear right at the margins of Greenland where they are thick”

News release on snow conditions: “Said Prosser resident and longtime local backcountry enthusiast Bill Sinoff, good corn is caused by icothermal snow – meaning the snowpack remains the same temperature throughout its entire depth.”