This is a perfect example of the frying pan calling the kettle black

Posted: January 26, 2014 | Author: | Filed under: black, COLORS, fire, kettle, THINGS | Tags: , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

I am not making these up.  This one was from a commenter (UltraLiberal) in response to a New York Times Op-ed by Gail Collins entitled “The Luck of the Pontiff”  –  http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/23/opinion/collins-the-luck-of-the-pontiff.html?smid=fb-share&_r=0  The commenter posted:

ULtraliberal

“Anti-Catholicism, with over one Billion Catholics in the world,I don’t think.  Catholics have to worry about extinction,This is a perfect example of the frying pan calling the kettle black.”

This is a mash up of “the pot calling the kettle black”  (criticizing someone for a fault that you have) and “from the frying pan into the fire” (going from a bad situation to a worse situation).  This is similar to previous malaphor postings  – “That’s the cat calling the kettle black” and “look who’s calling the kettle black.”  Obviously this proverb seems to be misunderstood, or at least not remembered correctly.  But then again maybe that’s just me calling the kettle black.  Many thanks to Barry Eigen for spotting this one in the New York Times on-line comments.  
Want to hear for yourself? Collins speaks on Thursday, February 17, at 5 p.m. at Ira Allen Chapel, University of Vermont, Burlington. Institutional sexism

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Look who’s calling the kettle black

Posted: May 13, 2013 | Author: | Filed under: black, kettle | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

This is a congruent conflation of “look who’s talking” and “that’s the pot calling the kettle black”, both referring to pointing out hypocritical behavior.   The best and most common malaphors are mixtures of phrases that have the same or similar meaning.

That’s the cat calling the kettle black

Posted: February 24, 2013 | Author: | Filed under: black, cat, kettle | Tags: , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

This is a mash up of “the pot calling the kettle black” and “cat calls”.  Let’s also throw in black cats for good measure, and maybe “cattle calls”?  Pot and cat are three letter words ending in t, another possible cause for confusion.  Thanks to Kimberly for providing this gem.

Black Cat Portrait

Black Cat Portrait (Photo credit: Georgo10)