The strange, the bizarre and the unexpected

[floppers]

which is humourous, because it shouldn't be a pleasant surprise by definition...

[Razorflame]

I found TRANSMOGRIFICATIONS on a board a few days ago, was pleasantly surprised to find it.

[DrPlacebo]

After finding HEROISMS on a board, I tried HEROISE, because why not? It counted.

[floppers]

If more people in the world speak English, as compared to American, then MYTHOLOGISERS should be more common that the Z version. In the meantime, the multilingual amongst us (at least those of us who speak both English and (North) American) get both in the game, if both letters are available...and they often are. You guys should consider yourselves lucky, because you wouldn't have the metre/meter triggers that the English speaker/writer has.

[Spike1007]

We Americans do like our myths. That brings up the question of whether MYTHOLOGIZERS should be more common than MYTHOLOGISERS. Unfortunately I didn't check that.

[floppers]

Yaaaaay!!! Very entertained by that concept mdyak! It's 6.33am here (possibly tomorrow), and I don't usually laugh (or even speak) before 7.30am!

Whether the British spelling is rarer that the American spelling would have to be based on whether the game is based predominently in English, or the American dialect. That ENUF is accepted would seem to be an indication that UK slang/dialect can become common usage. It would be fun to know more about who/how the dictionary is compiled.

[mdyak]

The other day though, I got DEMYTHOLOGISERS for 18 points (wide), and DEMYTHOLOGIZERS for 31 (ultra-rare). That threw me.

Maybe Americans just don't talk or write about DEMYTHOLOGIZERS very much while people in the UK use this word a lot.

[Spike1007]

While it annoys me a little, I'm kind of used to the idea that the singular can be accepted while the plural isn't (or vice versa). It bothers me more when dropping or adding the -S or -ES changes the rarity. (I go for high average points/word, and if I get a great plural, I'll agonize over whether I should try the singular & risk blowing my average for the board.)

Early on in my WordTwist career, I thought that British spellings should somehow be classified as more rare than American spellings. (OK, that shows a little cultural bias. I'm sure the British see it the other way.) Anyway, after a while, I came to the conclusion that the "rareness" was pretty much the same either way, although there were point differences due to using -OU- rather than -O- or -S- rather than -Z-. The other day though, I got DEMYTHOLOGISERS for 18 points (wide), and DEMYTHOLOGIZERS for 31 (ultra-rare). That threw me.

[Brisul]

The scores of my first two games this month were 972 and 971. I don't think I've ever started a month with nearly identical scores back to back like that.

[JJBeanie]

ENUF - I was surprised when it was accepted. I only entered it because I had time to spare and thought I'd try my luck. I didn't expect it to be a valid word.

[floppers]

Well, do we want to limit ourselves to one instance of goodheartedness, or should we all be aspiring for the multiple? Sometimes, more is more!

[bwt1213]

Goodheartednesses is a word and worth 25 points. The singular isn't even allowed; apparently it's not a word.

[floppers]

Perhaps, it has something to do with the cultural background, and boundaries, of who is compiling the dictionaries. My wondering is infuluenced by a book my Mother is currently reading, titled "The Dictionary of Lost Words". According to the blurb the book is about a little girl collecting words discarded by a team gathering words for the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary, and the words discarded relate mainly to female liberation, suffragettes, etc. Should the person/persons developing any collection of words have sufficent exposure to certain cuisines, cultures, cheeses or schnapps, I think their biases could influence which words "make the cut". Particularly if the exposure relates to schnapps...things can get quite giddy with enough exposure to schnapps, clay bottled, freezer dwelling or not.

English, German, Latin and Korean is an interesting collection, English and German have some derivation from Latin, but all four have very different structure, so...Touche! I'm thinking we all speak a little French.

[DrPlacebo]

To most people here on the West Coast of the US, Japanese food is likely to be much more familiar than Indian.

But that's beside the point. Food is one thing, because it crosses borders -- why the Indian military ranks? Subedar, the Indian and Pakistani armies' equivalent to Captain in most English-speaking armies, is literally used nowhere else in the world, and the only reason I know the word is from reading historical fiction.

[bwt1213]

I have to say that I aspire to being that kind of uncle. As far as Germany is concerned, my first cousin (my father's sister's son) was the US Ambassador to Germany for more than 20 years -- John Christian Kornblum. He certainly spoke German far better than I can. I muddle along, and sometimes surprise myself. Languages are a minor hobby of mine; pity I don't know any of them well enough to count myself fluent any more. But I can probably make myself understood in four. That's really quite a minor achievement, I think. But they are four rather different ones -- English, German, Latin, and Korean. So, tell me more about the schnapps in those clay bottles and all the kinds of cheese. I live in Wisconsin, and there was once a law in this state that any meal served in a restaurant had to include a side of cheese at no cost.