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Chris -- 2018-04-11
Commentary by Alex Smaliy , 2005/02/25 at 3:03 am ¶ I’ve recently noticed “hickup†for “hiccup.†Google delivers some 17k hits for it spelt as one word, and 7k for split and hyphenated versions.
Don’t know how to reply to comments on that part of the site, but anyway, this came up in discussing touch based — for which hicked up is a kind of opposite.
It never bucked, hicked-up acted weird, nothing!! It started and idled perfect, and performed nothing less then absolutely flawless.
while all this was going on the TV service hicked up a couple times and both my sons got weird messages
The server hicked-up quite a bit today but has worked reasonably well for the last couple of hours.
I must say I’ve experienced some suspicious situations in rough seas where the enigine hicked up terribly
Man you could tell he was so genuinely pissed when he said that, his voice even hicked up when he said it like he was about to cry from frustration.
That last quote actually took a while to find—as you can see most examples of this are metaphorical usages, where something other than a person is thought of as hicking up. [Most examples are misspellings of hiked up (mountains, prices, skirts, etc._) or mean “acting like (a) hick(s)â€.]
There is very likely blending going on, with chucked up, threw up, f..ed up, messed up, acted up, kicked up (a fuss) , etc. But it is eggcornish in that the standard imagery of V + up = “suddenly malfunction†is imposed on the word “hiccupâ€, which otherwise lacks it.
Of course there is hicking up as well:
You should be able to make changes on-the-fly without it hicking up like you say it does.
It acts like hicking up. Even in parking position when started. It seems to be lack of air or what?
i am just hicking up bile as well (apart from the peas and fish episode :sick: ) and i am very proud of myself – this morning i managed to puke
I am sorry, I suffered a complete loss of composure when I read your state., which resulted in my sneezing and hicking up simultaneously.
Last edited by DavidTuggy (2008-11-13 18:29:50)
*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .
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Really funny!
I have no idea what “hicking” might mean, unless it is a spelling of the onomatopoetic “hic”-in which case it’s not an eggcorn. As you say, some of the more visceral “up” verbs (horking up comes to mind) may be motivating the error.
Hatching new language, one eggcorn at a time.
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Well, even if “hick†remains unanalyzable, the analysis of “up†contributes new imagery. Haven’t we had some other eggcorns where only part of the originally unanalyzable acorn gets clarified with new imagery?
To the extent that “hick†is given a meaning, I suspect that you are right that it would be taken as onomatopoeic for hiccuping.
The reanalysis of “behave†comes to mind as similar in important ways. The children that say “I am being have†have imposed the imagery of “beâ€+adj on “behaveâ€, and probably reanalyze “have†[heʲv] as “doing what you are supposed to/what is politeâ€. Similarly “hick†is something like “give a convulsive jerk that interrupts the smoothness of normal breathing/runningâ€.
*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .
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More relevant data (i.e. more data that are relevant, not data that are more relevant):
The BB pairing went off without a hick and with BB maps would take you where you need to go.
The first day of school went off without a hick. they both woke up ready to go!
just rewind time, so i did and finished my run without a hick. afterwards i did notice my lifebar slowly ticking away and my looks also changed.
Overall, the distribution upgrade went without a hick. Quite some noticable improvements in term of eye candy
Probably some influence here from “without a hitchâ€. “Without a hick-up†was much more common.
Last edited by DavidTuggy (2008-10-21 12:29:49)
*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .
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