Monday 6 August 2007

Top 5 Words I Frequently Mispell (sic)

I am ashamed to say my spelling is atrocious. Without a decent spell checker my blog's would undoubtedly be littered with misspellings and typos. I still rely on those old strategies taught at school to deal with certain words; Wed-nes-day, B-e-a-u-tiful and Bus-i-ness being particular favourites. However there are other words that have alluded my brain's capacity to cope with for so long I doubt I will ever avoid them.

1. Definitely

2. Whether

3. Lettuce

4. Twelfth

5. Disappointed

Definitely should definitely be spelt definately. I am sure in this one case I am right and the rest of the world in error. This one is stuck so solidly in my psyche that I don't recognise it as being wrong unless a spell checker picks it up, and even then I question whether the spell checker is not working on some flawed U.S. based version.

My difficulties with whether stem mainly from my geography studies. The introduction of weathering somehow introduced into my brain a previously unheard of third variation of the word spelt wether. My strategy for avoiding this one is to remember that there are actually only two variations and if I'm not talking about the rain or the sun then I need to add an 'H'.

Lettuce is not a word you have to write down very often, in fact I'm almost certain the only time I do it's on my shopping list. For some unexplained reason I feel the overwhelming need to add an 'A' and so for a long time ended up with the version 'lettauce'. My wife was quick to point out the error of my ways and I have now managed to improve my spelling in a slight, but still completely incorrect manner, so that my shopping lists now read 'lettace'.

Twelfth has long been a struggle. I think mainly it's the confusion between having a 'v' in the standard version (i.e. twelve) which then becomes completely redundant in the ordinal version.

Disappointed is just one of those words which you suspect has far too many double constants. For ages I have spelt it dissappointed, which I then adapt to dissapointed as I think I've spotted it's evil trick. Thank heavens for spell checkers they really have contributed to the well being of the world!

Irony of ironies - turns out I can't spell misspell either. I've left it in the title as a stark reminder to myself that sometimes there are areas that even spell checkers fear to tread.

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