A malapropism is when the wrong words—with
similar sounds—are accidentally used. Popularized by Mrs. Malaprop, a character in a
play, a famous example of her goofs was when she meant to say "the
geography of contiguous countries" and came up with "the geometry of
continuous countries."
A spoonerism is the switching of the
beginnings of two words so as to create a new meaning. The new words are
real, but the sentence is confused. Example: "I have a half-warmed fish in
my head" instead of "I have a half-formed wish in my head."
 An elainism is when two words are
simply transposed in a sentence. They may be right next to one another, as
in "I usually stop at the nearest station service" instead of "I usually
stop at the nearest service station," or can be in completely different
locations in the sentence: "Yep, they're celebrating the Christ of birth."
"Elainisms" come from my girlfriend, Elaine,
who has a habit of saying
things completely backward from the way she intends to say them—usually to
humorous effect. She also has a habit of occasionally pulling malapropisms
and other humorous goofs.
Here follows some of Elaine's Greatest Hits.
Click on the images to see them in full size (otherwise, most are pretty
hard to read). Elaine comes up with great new elaineisms all the time, so
I'll add more as she comes out with them.
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