Jan 5th – Family Circus & Malapropism: Sleep vs Steep

Hello everyone!

Today’s comic is Family Circus featuring the topic of malapropism.

Comic Breakdown

“Be very quiet, Jeffy.  Grandma’s tea has to sleep for three minutes.” – Dolly to her brother Jeffy

What is going on?

Dolly has mixed up two similar sounding words with two completely different meanings.  This is a malapropism. 

She mixed up “sleeping” with the word “steeping”.

What does steeping mean?

Steeping is when you soak something, usually food, in a liquid. 

Steeping one’s tea is when one soaks tea leaves or a tea bag in hot water for several minutes in order to increase the taste and flavour of the drink. 

What did Dolly mean to actually say?

“Be very quiet, Jeffy.  Grandma’s tea has to steep for three minutes”

To read more about malapropisms, click here and here.

Today’s images are from here, here, and here.