Taking a break from Flashback Friday today to tell you a funny story about occasional stupidity. 😉 Note the two words below and their definitions (Hatch vs. Hatchet)
You’d think that being 36, a writer, and a very voracious reader that I would know the difference between hatch and hatchet. In fact, I do. If you ask me what a hatch is, I can tell you that it’s an opening—to a building or cabin of a boat or plane. And if you ask me what a hatchet is, I’ll tell you it’s an axe.

But somehow in my brain, I never got the connection in the idiom, “Down the hatch!” (The idiom, of course, referring to something (pills or food or whatnot) going down someone’s throat like the hatch of a plane.)

While giving our seizure kitty his three meds this A.M. (poor kitty takes 6 pills a day), I said, “Open wide,” and my husband pried open his mouth. Our kitty is really smart—he will stick his tongue on the roof of his mouth so that you can’t push pills down his throat. So when I say “pried open,” I mean it.

I followed up the first part with my usual, “Down the hatchet!”

My husband looked at me and said, “It’s hatch. You know, as in a hatch or an opening?”

I literally facepalmed. I have no idea why I never made that leap. I think I’ve said hatchet my entire life. I’ve been offering my kitty an ax this whole time. *facepalm*

Even authors can get it wrong sometimes. So what word mix-ups have you made?