[cstrahan]

> relying on stock phrases to relay information

You can see this in other common phrases.

Take "miles per hour" for example. I've met plenty of people who can't figure out how long it would take to get from A to B at X mph. They'll deliberate over how they know from running on their treadmill that they run (on average) at 8 mph, and they recall that it usually takes them Y minutes to run Z miles, and then they factor in the diameter of their car's wheels (because surely a car with larger wheels gets there faster for the same mph vs a car with smaller wheels), and finally sprinkle in a bit of multiplication to arrive at their best guestimate.

That is, plenty of people don't realize that "per" means "for each", and that it's not some singular word "milesperhour", but a phrase meaning "miles traveled for every hour spent travelling".

Other fun phrases thrown around without understanding (or with similar words mistakenly swapped in):

Miles per gallon.

For all intensive purposes.

Nip it in the butt.

Bone apple tea.