Comments on: You know you should stop when you can’t think of titles https://www.thduggie.com/thduggies_blog/2007/you-know-you-should-stop-when-you-cant-think-of-titles thoughts and family activities in an industrial suburb Wed, 07 Nov 2007 19:41:11 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.4.7 By: thduggie https://www.thduggie.com/thduggies_blog/2007/you-know-you-should-stop-when-you-cant-think-of-titles#comment-1160 Wed, 07 Nov 2007 19:41:11 +0000 http://www.morbidcornflakes.ch/thduggies_blog/?p=118#comment-1160 I know it isn’t that odd per se for the stressed syllable to shift as an additional syllable is added (or subtracted, if, as you point out, we take the chronological order from plural to singular) because the stressed syllable is a fixed number of syllables from the end (ante-penultimate in this case), but it’s still counter-intuitive for me and makes English pronounciation difficult. Particularly since there are counter-examples like innovate/innovative/innovatory.

Yes, you could, and I can think of one red “matchbox” beauty in particular that would certainly qualify.

]]> By: SursumCorda https://www.thduggie.com/thduggies_blog/2007/you-know-you-should-stop-when-you-cant-think-of-titles#comment-1159 Wed, 07 Nov 2007 17:51:48 +0000 http://www.morbidcornflakes.ch/thduggies_blog/?p=118#comment-1159 Interesting. I never thought the pronunciation of “antipodes” was odd — but now I know that’s because I never heard or even thought of it in the singular. It looks as if the singular is actually a more recent form than the plural, which may account for the difference.

I don’t know the cost of your microscopes, but I’ll bet I could find a car more expensive if I tried. 🙂

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