[dr_lew]

What part of "slang" don't you get?

I don't get what that has to do with anything. You cited "hock" as in "ham hocks" and "hawk", as in "sell", and implied that Reuters, and the rest of the world, had these two words confused, which is a pixilated notion. Delta is most decidedly not "hawking" its assets.

[AntiGuv]

You cited "hock" as in "ham hocks" and "hawk", as in "sell", and implied that Reuters, and the rest of the world, had these two words confused, which is a pixilated notion.

I now think I was wrong about that, and if I had indeed been polishing this for 40 years I probably would've discovered that sooner!!

I don't get what that has to do with anything.

In what might as well be another life, I was once a journalist. I had it drilled into me not to use slang in articles unless it's directly relevant to the topic at hand and clearly delineated as such. That was my problem to begin with! My own misperception about the origin of the given slang doesn't change my problem.

One of the reasons BTW that slang should not be used is because it leads to confusion and misunderstanding. This thread is a case in point......

[AntiGuv]

PS. And thanks for correcting my error. Especially since I found a cool site as result: Online Etymology Dictionary.