You Cannot Be Serious, # 70

While we’re on the topic of dental care, here is a puzzling choice of adjective — twice:

therapeutic taste

Other Englishes, # 3

These rather mangled instructions, submitted by Dr Faustus, come with Apachie brand bluetooth sports headphones:

alternativley; audiable; either devices

Spellchecking Is Never Enough, # 206

John Holloway finds a homophonous mangle in a manufacturer’s survey. Some quotation marks seem to have escaped too:

here for hear; quotation marks missing

Apostrophe catastrophe, # 102

The apostrophe’s absence seems somehow worsened by the inclusion of a possessive intensifier:

Link: Halfords, ‘Winter Demister Bundle’

your vehicles own heating system

You Cannot Be Serious, # 59

This product, with its tautologous description, spent much of this year in the remaindered display at the Rugby branch of Lidl:

decorative ornament

Double-take, # 181

I’m not sure this is a mangle at all, but it gave me a surprise in my local Lidl:

Barbie for Ken

Double-take, # 177

As Des Pond of Slough points out, the rather odd product name is only the beginning of the delights of this box of goodies, which he spotted in a Coventry branch of Aldi. Particularly noteworthy are the description of the product (at the lower right of the display packaging) and the rather strange wording in the circular flag next to the cowboy on the product box:

snack’n play [or snack’ n play?]; check backside for more fun; Hazelnuts spread and breadsticks with surprise

Double-take, # 148

This comes from Just Liam:

He remarks: ‘Tell me if I’m wrong, but I don’t want to be sexuring any candles if I’m not supposed to be doing so.’ Indeed. I wonder if the ambiguous capitalized instruction is intended to work as a subliminal message…

sexure for secure

Double-take, # 132

John Holloway spotted this in Tesco in Colchester:

John asks: ‘Is it “stir fries” or “stirfrys”? I feel as though it should be the former.’

Standard dictionaries don’t show a plural, which suggests that the term follows normal English rules, with one fry becoming multiple fries. Oxford Learner’s Dictionaries and Merriam-Webster Learner’s Dictionary confirm this, but all sources checked show that the term should be hyphenated: stir-fry and (where shown) stir-fries.

stir frys [noun]

You Cannot Be Serious, # 33

Sometimes mangles appear in the supermarket queue next to me, as recently happened in Lidl… This mangle seems to arise from misunderstanding the name of the second added ingredient:

Peach and Passion. Fruit Yoghurt

Double-take, # 109

William Shelton sends this, remarking: ‘Someone in marketing obviously skipped a lesson in English before creating the name of this Brazilian condom.’

Link: Sex Free Preservativos

In a secondary twist, the name also manages to imply that the company will be giving the product away…

Sex Free Preservativos

Double-take, # 61

Start here:

In case you’re wondering, Dune actually sells footwear. However, here’s a detail of the page that loads if you select ‘Dune Black Ladies’:

Link: Dune London | New In | Brands | Dune Black Ladies

It was not what I was expecting, and I fear I may be missing the point. Is white the new black? Is black the new black? Do you have to prove you’re black to buy from the range? How does ‘Dune Black Ladies’ differ from ‘Dune Ladies’?

More confusing still: one of the pairs (the white slingbacks above, labelled ‘Dune Black Slingback Espadrille Wedge’) also comes in blue…

white shoes in Dune Black Ladies