Fluxuating Control Cities on Pull through signs

[Alps]

We're getting derailed here, but if you read 19th century British lit like I have, you'd note that "x" is often used in longer words that make that sound regardless of the correct spelling, just to shorten things up a bit. So I took no issue with the post title on that basis.

[NE2]

I really dislike when people omit the dash in to-day and to-morrow.

[1995hoo]

I really dislike when people omit the dash in to-day and to-morrow.

I dislike it when people confuse a hyphen and a dash.

[roadman65]

You know what really bugs me is the fact that many words in the English language are not spelled as they are pronounced like in other languages.

I think the way "environment" is spelled E-N-V-I-R-O-N-M-E-N-T is stupid!  I know its the way the English language came about to make it that way, but how we say it is without the "N" and the "R" and "O" reversed.  It makes it difficult and frustrating when spell check marks it wrong and you have to take time to get the dictionary out to see how misspelled the word really is, even though technically you are the one incorrect for what you have thought the word's spelling always was.

Enough said, there are plenty of examples of this language wide that can write a book longer than Gone With The Wind, but our language is the hardest in the world due to its inconsistencies in lettering.  I sometimes want to write the way I think it ought to be spelled, and I think many of us have already.

[1995hoo]

Everyone I know pronounces "environment" the way it's spelled except when it's in the longer form "environmental" (which I usually hear said like "en-vi-urn-mental," so the first "n" is still pronounced).

I think two of the weirder ones in this respect are "February" and "Wednesday," neither of which I've ever heard said like they're spelled except by teachers trying to emphasize the spelling. 

[Big John]

Don't get me started on "Colonel".  How is the "olo" pronounced "er"?

[1995hoo]

Don't get me started on "Colonel".  How is the "olo" pronounced "er"?

Here's one explanation:

http://teachinghistory.org/history-content/ask-a-historian/22270

[A.J. Bertin]

Another current fad in that vein is the ever-increasing misuse of the word "fail" as a noun, such as the people who say things like, "The condition of the grass at FedEx Field on Sunday was a huge fail." WRONG! There's no such thing as "a fail." The correct word is "failure"

AMEN!!! Thank you!!! This whole "fail" thing annoys the crap out of me too.

Please learn to use quote tags properly. -Connor

[Alps]

Please learn to use quote tags properly. -Connor

You could say his quote tag usage was a fail.

[Roadsguy]

How 'bout "epic fail is."

[roadman65]

Everyone I know pronounces "environment" the way it's spelled except when it's in the longer form "environmental" (which I usually hear said like "en-vi-urn-mental," so the first "n" is still pronounced).

I think two of the weirder ones in this respect are "February" and "Wednesday," neither of which I've ever heard said like they're spelled except by teachers trying to emphasize the spelling. 

Ditto on the Wednesday or February thing as if some letter rearranging is done it would be better.

However, those were named after Greek gods just as the planets are.  I do not know in other languages how they derive at the names for their months.  As a child, a big misconception was that I though all languages world wide used our names for days and months.  When I first learned of the Spanish and their names, I thought the Spanish were being rude to Americans and saying FU to us and ignoring most important common names and being smart.

Where I come from they use envi- ur-ment to say the word.  Just like some people say draw for drawer or fir for for.  Also many I heard say for the letter "W" as dubba yah instead it is proper to say double U. I was corrected on the last.

I would like to know why in Canada, the word center is spelled "centre" or meter (the metric measure) is also spelled differently as "M-E-T-R-E" and also ton is tonne.   We both speak the same language, but we spell some key common words differently.

The English language is derived from many other different names, so it gets complicated

[agentsteel53]

trust me, guys, you're not gonna ever get a less intuitive pronunciation than that of "Enraughty".

go ahead, guess how it is spelled phonetically.

[NE2]

Rhymes with draughty?

[kphoger]

Another current fad in that vein is the ever-increasing misuse of the word "fail" as a noun, such as the people who say things like, "The condition of the grass at FedEx Field on Sunday was a huge fail." WRONG! There's no such thing as "a fail." The correct word is "failure"

AMEN!!! Thank you!!! This whole "fail" thing annoys the crap out of me too.

Please learn to use quote tags properly. -Connor

I'm still at a loss, even after a couple years' thinking about it, as to how "epic fail" should be translated into Spanish.  Yes, people have asked me.

[agentsteel53]

I'm still at a loss, even after a couple years' thinking about it, as to how "epic fail" should be translated into Spanish.  Yes, people have asked me.

I think I've exclaimed "ay! falta" but that isn't nearly correct.

[english si]

However, those were named after Greek gods just as the planets are.  I do not know in other languages how they derive at the names for their months.

Wednesday is named after Woden, who was Germanic (and similar linguistically to Odin in Norse). Many languages seem to name most of the days of the week after the '7 planets' that the Greeks had (mostly using Roman names - Venus, not Aphrodite for Friday in all but Greek) - including Latin-based and Gaelic-based languages. English, however, like German and Scandinavian languages use the Germanic system of naming the days of the week: Sun-day, Moon-day, Tiw's-day, Woden/Odin's-day, Thor's-day, Frige's-day and Saturn's-day (this one is from the Latin, though the north-Germanic peoples of Estonia and Scandinavia call it 'washing-day').

I would like to know why in Canada, the word center is spelled "centre" or meter (the metric measure) is also spelled differently as "M-E-T-R-E" and also ton is tonne.   We both speak the same language, but we spell some key common words differently.

It's the American spelling that's different. Blame 1066 and all that for the original spelling, blame Webster for America's changes from that, like dropping 'u's and flipping 're' endings.

trust me, guys, you're not gonna ever get a less intuitive pronunciation than that of "Enraughty".

go ahead, guess how it is spelled phonetically.

Ionnrachtaigh, though that's not English phonetic spelling (and it's "Enroughty" that you meant).

It's not even one of those classic aristocratic surnames that tweak in a huge way, like Featherstonehaugh, Marjoribanks or Cholmondeley (the best non-surname example must be Magdalene College Oxford's pronounciation, though Lieutenant is pretty strange too).

Oh wait, you mean the weird Virginian pronounciation that comes out like the East Midlands (of England) city where the Rams play (did some googling as had no idea why that was weird) due to a family squabble. It's also a spelled funny, rather than pronounced funny, word - unlike all the other weird surnames.

[agentsteel53]

(and it's "Enroughty" that you meant).

yep, biffed that one.  oopsie

It's also a spelled funny, rather than pronounced funny, word - unlike all the other weird surnames.

if a word is spelled not like it is pronounced, is it spelled or pronounced funny? 

[jwolfer]

You know what really bugs me is the fact that many words in the English language are not spelled as they are pronounced like in other languages.

I think the way "environment" is spelled E-N-V-I-R-O-N-M-E-N-T is stupid!  I know its the way the English language came about to make it that way, but how we say it is without the "N" and the "R" and "O" reversed.  It makes it difficult and frustrating when spell check marks it wrong and you have to take time to get the dictionary out to see how misspelled the word really is, even though technically you are the one incorrect for what you have thought the word's spelling always was.

Enough said, there are plenty of examples of this language wide that can write a book longer than Gone With The Wind, but our language is the hardest in the world due to its inconsistencies in lettering.  I sometimes want to write the way I think it ought to be spelled, and I think many of us have already.

At some point in time the odd spellings were pronounced phonically.. in some cases its just easier to say things the way we do or the sound a letter represents has changed over time ( ie  knife was said k-nif-e in Middle English.  At the time of the conquistadors Spanish used X to represent something close to the CH sound... this is where the term Chicano came from. The indigenous called their land something like "Meschico" the Spanish spelled it as Mexico)... there have been moves to simplify spelling over the years, like Noah Webster removing our from words like Harbor

[Brandon]

At the time of the conquistadors Spanish used X to represent something close to the CH sound... this is where the term Chicano came from. The indigenous called their land something like "Meschico" the Spanish spelled it as Mexico)... there have been moves to simplify spelling over the years, like Noah Webster removing our from words like Harbor

IIRC, the "X" is more like a "SH" sound, not a "CH" sound which has been in Spanish for a very long time.  It's more like "Me-shi-co".  Many words in Mexican Spanish seem to retain this X = SH sound i.e. Xcaret = Shcaret.

[agentsteel53]

IIRC, the "X" is more like a "SH" sound, not a "CH" sound which has been in Spanish for a very long time.  It's more like "Me-shi-co".  Many words in Mexican Spanish seem to retain this X = SH sound i.e. Xcaret = Shcaret.

the "sh" vs "h" distinction is, interestingly enough, also prevalent in Patagonia - especially the Argentine side.  it took me a bit of time to figure out that a syllable pronounced "sho" was the local variant of "I" ("yo"), for example.

[jwolfer]

At the time of the conquistadors Spanish used X to represent something close to the CH sound... this is where the term Chicano came from. The indigenous called their land something like "Meschico" the Spanish spelled it as Mexico)... there have been moves to simplify spelling over the years, like Noah Webster removing our from words like Harbor

IIRC, the "X" is more like a "SH" sound, not a "CH" sound which has been in Spanish for a very long time.  It's more like "Me-shi-co".  Many words in Mexican Spanish seem to retain this X = SH sound i.e. Xcaret = Shcaret.

I have a BA in Spanish...  I know about the "Meshico"... the Spanish fit it as best they could in their language... happnens many times in language contact the closest sound it used and many times it is not exact.

[kphoger]

X is one of the most confusing letters in Mexican Spanish.  To add to what has previously been brought up, I should point out that the letter X is also used interchangeably with the letter J in some cases (e.g., Xalapa/Jalapa, Ximénez/Jiménez).  So, in Mexican Spanish, the letter X can be pronounced in the following ways:

as KS or GS - Example:  exigente (demanding)
as S - Example:  extraño (strange)
as SH - Example:  Xoxtla (a town in Puebla)
as H - Example:  México (hmmmm....)

[english si]

if a word is spelled not like it is pronounced, is it spelled or pronounced funny?

Depends what came first:

• Featherstonehaugh morphed into being pronounced 'Fan-shaw' having originally been much closer to the spelling - that's pronounced funny.
• Enroughty pronounced 'Darby' was due to a family (the Enroughtys, funnily enough - and pronounced fairly logically) being offered the chance to inherit a fortune, provided they called themselves 'Derby'. So they did, only they spelled the word pronounced 'Darby' E-N-R-O-U-G-H-T-Y. I guess as they had more correspondence by mail than face-to-face or it would be Derby pronounced 'Enright') so they kept their old, more posh-sounding and respectable, name - that's spelled funny.

---
Isn't the Spanish 'x' related to the Greek 'χ' (chi)?

[kphoger]

Isn't the Spanish 'x' related to the Greek 'χ' (chi)?

More accurately, the letter x itself is historically related to the Greek letter chi–regardless of which language you're talking about.  Where the Greek letter chi originated is a topic of debate.

In Medieval Spanish, the letter x was pronounced as SH, as it still is in Catalan, Portuguese, et al.  It later morphed into a guttural H in Spanish (à la México), more or less equivalent to the modern pronunciation of j (hence the alternate spelling, Méjico).  Most of the Mexican words and names in which the x is pronounced as SH are indigenous words; x was chosen to represent that sound in the development of those written languages, and some of those words have no pure Mexican equivalent (e.g. nixtamal).  Interestingly, the x in the name Mexica–the primary Aztec people after which México is named–is pronounced as SH, which is different from its pronunciation in the name México.



By the way,  GHOTI.

[lepidopteran]

ODOT went through a phase with Wheeling shown as the control city for I-70 EB west of downtown Columbus, later changing it back to Columbus.  Meanwhile nearby, there is still a mixture of old signage (dwindling but still out there) with Indianapolis as a control city for I-70 WB, with Dayton on newer signs.  If there is room, might as well include both.  70 actually hits Indy but misses Dayton proper to the north, although the DAY airport is on the other side of I-70 from the city.

I-70 runs through Dayton's northern suburbs, so the control city fits OK.  Perhaps when I-70 was built back in the '60s, the area was not quite so suburbanized.

Going WB on I-70 in the London, OH area, there was at least one Springfield (OH) listed as a control city.  This alternated with a usual Indianapolis control city (which, for some reason, had a capital N in the middle of the word).  At present, the signs at the closely-spaced OH-29 and US-42 interchanges did away with pull-through signs altogether, except for one at OH-29 telling of the upcoming US-42.

For a time up until the late 1980s or so, SB I-75 at I-70 had a low-profile BGS that listed the control cities as Springfield and Richmond (IN).  NB I-75 had more complete Columbus/Indianapolis signage listed since the mid-1970s at the latest.

On I-75 near Findlay, by those huge (formerly GW) sugar mills, there used to be a curious pull-through sign reading "Toledo, Ottawa".  While this is due to the short multiplex with OH-15, the name Ottawa is likely a bit confusing to those unfamiliar with the village to the east.  (Is it the village of Ottawa Hills near Toledo?  Or Canada's national capital?)