Another think/thing coming?

leon66a said:

"If you think grammar is uncomplicated, you've got another thing/think coming?

What say you, AW, think or thing?

Also, is you opinion definitive enough that you would override your editor who changed it in your manuscript?

Click to expand...

The idiom since I can remember is "You have another think coming."

So, resisting the urge to correct "you've got" in a sentence dealing with grammar, get rid of the echoes, and not end a statement with a question mark, your example should read:

"If you think grammar is uncomplicated, you've got another think coming?"

Edit: I was too hasty; the repetition of think and think is effective.

I've always heard it as "you've got another thing coming."

Both work (or should I say, are used), but the original 'think' is better because the dig is deeper. It implies that the rebuked is going to have to change his/her mind, whereas 'thing' only suggests that they will be getting resistance to their stance. Make sense?

"Think." It is a play on words. (Thought/think.) It is so often misstated as "thing" that many people don't get the gag.

--Ken

If you use the entire phrase, then "think" works, I suppose, but if you truncate it to "You've got another think coming," it sounds completely erroneous to me.

Maybe this is a regionalism or something, but I've NEVER heard the "original" version.

MacAllister said:

I find idiom interesting anyway, but when I hit one of these little pockets of weirdness, it's just too cool for school.

Click to expand...

I love it. Language marches on.


Long ago and far away, I gave classes on U.S. idioms to Japanese businessmen at American Microsystems Incorporated outside Pocatello. We rode off on many hilarious tangents from the obviously outdated workbook I still have.

It includes, "If you think ____, you’ve got another think coming" as an idiom for "You are mistaken."

I’ve probably been seeing "thing" on younger people’s lips lately, while supposing they said "think."

I sure have another "thing" coming. Ha ha ha, it still "sounds" weird in my head.

I think "another thing coming" qualifies as an eggcorn -- one that has become as popular, or even more popular, than the original, but still an eggcorn.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eggcorn

I agree that "think" is the proper word to use, but most people aren't aware of that and believe it's "thing". As for which you should use, who's saying it? If you want to play up the character's ignorance, have them use "thing" and then have a more well-informed character correct them, or at least have them roll their eyes, or think about how the other person got it wrong. If your character is well-educated, on the other hand, then have them use the phrase properly.

Orianna2000 said:

I agree that "think" is the proper word to use, but most people aren't aware of that and believe it's "thing".

Click to expand...

Not over here. 'Thing' raises my hackles. Hate it, hate it, hate it, especially when I see it in published books. Makes me wonder WTF the editor was smoking.

Before reading this thread, I had never heard "thing," only "think."

Who'da thunk it?

I remember it well.

Example; If they think they'll get away with that, they've got another think coming!

scarletpeaches said:

Not over here. 'Thing' raises my hackles. Hate it, hate it, hate it, especially when I see it in published books. Makes me wonder WTF the editor was smoking.

Click to expand...

Also down here.

Maryn said:

Maryn, who will never accept "woah" as correct, though

Click to expand...

"Woah" is a perfectly good spelling of Bugs Bunny saying, "Of coahse you know, this means woah!"

Bugs taking a wrong turn burrowing under Albu-koik-kee, New Mexico, made us think U.S. bunnies burrow and live underground, which they never did in Montana.

I, too, have never heard the phrase used with other than 'think'.

My mind is blown. I have never heard it phrased as "think". I do like the original better, but if I'd seen it in a book I would have thought it was wrong. Must be a regional thing, or a regional think.


(You can't actually be banned for making terrible jokes, right?)

Tifferbugz said:

You can't actually be banned for making terrible jokes, right?

Click to expand...

I thing you can.

Judas Priest got it wrong, which may have led to some of their fans getting it wrong as well.

It's "think."

The reason you hear it as "thing" is simple: phonetically, "another think coming" and "another thing coming" are identical.

G and K are paired: they are the same sound, the only difference being G is voiced and K is devoiced. When, as in this case, the "g" would be devoiced (at the end of a word, immediately preceding another "k" sound, you usually link the two), it's possible to mistake that "k" for a "g," but it's not.