Malaphor of the Year (2016): Let’s Give Them a Round of Hand!

2016 was quite a busy year, with more malaphors posted than any other previous year.  I still have quite a backlog but keep ’em coming.

There were many great ones this year, so it was very difficult to come up with a winner.  Who can forget “Even a blind squirrel finds a nut twice a day” (posted March 13)?  I am still wondering when this occurs.  Also in the running was “hindsight is 50/50“, the last malaphor posted for 2016 (posted December 20).  Seems that hindsight has been indeed 50/50 considering the revisionist history we see these days.

As this was an election year, malaphors continually spewed forth in the political world.  Hillary Clinton said the beauty, “that’s the creme de la resistance” when discussing her time with her grandchildren (posted May 27).  Sarah Palin uttered the word “squirmish” when referring to incidents between Arab countries (posted January 20).  Donald Trump blurted out “things are not rosy-dory” (posted August 1) when discussing the current economy.  Perhaps he had just seen Finding Dory?

But the one that struck me as the perfect malaphor was sent to me by an old friend.  He was at a conference and he heard the master of ceremonies utter this beauty (drum roll please): “Let’s give them a round of hand!” (posted Novemeber 3).  “Round of hand” not only is a great mix of “round of applause” and “give them a hand”, but conjures up that ubiquitous steamship round of beef found at the end of the buffet table.   I also could hear myself easily saying this malaphor at some point.  So here’s to another great year of malaphor hunting. Give all of yourselves a big round of hand!