You might not realize it, but
there is a chance that the name of your boat is silent. Polyanthus is a silent word, for instance. You cannot say it aloud.
Callipygian is another. Impossible to
vocalize.
Imagine that the latent anarchist
within you wants to name your boat Pigshyt.
“You can’t call it that,” the
club commodore tells you gruffly. “It’s unheard of!”
“Precisely, Mr. Commodore, you can’t
say it. That’s why it’s unheard of,” you point out. “The P is silent, as in
psychiatrist. The I is silent, as in bait. The G . . . they’re all silent. The
whole word is silent.”
As a matter of fact there are
17 letters in English that
have two or more pronunciations, at least one of which is silent. That’s more
than half the alphabet, including all the vowels. See here:
Silent As in
Y say
P psychiatrist
B plumber
G gnome, sign
S island
O phoenix
E pole
H honest
A cocoa
C scent
I bait
T castle
K knife
L talk
U guitar
W wrap
N hymn
So be very careful when you
choose a name for your boat, otherwise you may not be able to tell anybody what
it is. They say silence is golden, but it’s not always the best form of
communication in an emergency.
Today’s Thought
To communicate through silence is a link between the thoughts of
men.— Marcel Marceau
Tailpiece
I have to laugh when I hear owners of Toyota Priuses and Honda Civic
hybrids arguing over who uses the least gasoline. Christopher Columbus got the best mileage
ever — he averaged several thousand miles per galleon.
(Drop
by every Monday, Wednesday, Friday for a new Mainly about Boats column.)
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