Who Won the U.S. Presidential Debate?

Sign the contract now so that the project can continue. Don’t be a clog in the wheel of progress. (Wrong)

Sign the contract now so that the project can continue. Don’t put a spanner in the works. (Correct)

This should remind ‘senior’ members of The Punch English class about some other corrupted idioms we have treated. Among the other deficient ones is ‘more grease to your elbow’, whose correct version is ‘more power to your elbow.” Another one is ‘wreck havoc’ instead of ‘wreak havoc’.

In March 2021, we discussed the same clog-in-the-wheel disease when a governor used it instead of ‘spanner in the works’. Not long after, another governor gave us cause to x-ray the proverb, ‘what is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander’, when he used its wrong form: ‘what is good for the goose is good for the gander’. Other similar proverbs like ‘cut your coat according to your cloth’ and ‘birds of a feather flock together’ have their bastardised forms as ‘cut your coat according to your size’ and ‘birds of the same feathers flock together.”

Here are some other structurally deficient idioms with their correct counterparts:

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