This Baby is Missing a Letter

A good friend spotted this sign in a restroom at Disney World and snapped a photo to share with me. He commented that it amazed him how much the deletion of one letter from the beginning of a word can totally change the pronunciation of the word. I think the oddity of this example comes from the fact that when a string of consonants starts a word and one of the consonants is dropped the resulting word usually still rhymes (ex. "bloomed"..."loomed", "crusted"..."rusted", "strap"..."trap"..."rap", and so on).




That is not the case here, and part of the reason is that we are talking about consonant sounds, not letters. The word "changing" may start with two consonants in alphabetical spelling, however, phonetically, the letters "c" and "h" combine to form one sound - /ʧ/(aka /č/).


So, phonetically, we have "hanging" /hæŋəŋ/ compared to "changing" /ʧenʤəŋ/.


By adding the letter "c" to the "h" in the word "hanging", the word initial sound changes from a fricative to an affricate. Because sounds like to hang out with other sounds with whom they share commonalities, it is not surprising to see the affricate /ʤ/ in the word "changing". It also does not surprise me that the /æ/, which is a lax vowel, becomes /e/ (a tense vowel) in "changing" because if consonants were classified by tenseness, I would think that affricates are more tense than fricatives.

Onomastics - Creative Restroom Signage

Onomastics or onomatology is the study of proper names of all kinds and the origins of names. The words are from the Greek: "ὀνομαστικός" (onomastikos), "of or belonging to naming" and "ὀνοματολογία" (onomatologia), from "ὄνομα" (ónoma) "name". - Wikipedia


One of the many ways that businesses add character to their establishments is by creatively naming their restrooms. Here are a couple spotted on the web.

I was recently out at one of the newer restaurants in my hometown when I happened upon these interesting restroom signs.

I get the name "Joe" for the men's restroom (after all, Average Joe, Joe Public, Ordinary Joe and Joe Sixpack have long been used as generics to represent the average American male); what I don't get is "Sally" for the women's restroom. The female equivalent of the above named "Joes" has always been "Jane". In my experience, "Sally" is used as a derogatory nickname for effeminate men. So what gives?

Maybe it has to do with Urban Dictionary's top definition for Sally: "A really, really hot girl."

Apostrophe Errors Part 2 - Ladie's Room

The sign for the women's restroom at one of our local taverns is a plaque that reads "women", unfortunately, a holiday wreath is covering the regular sign so the sign pictured below has been placed on the door temporarily. I have stopped having a beer with my burger during the holidays.

For more on restroom apostrophe errors click here.

Apostrophe Errors - Boys and Girls Restrooms

The signs on the restrooms at my sons' middle school read BOY'S and GIRL'S. Pictured above is the boys room (as one of my sons was with me, I was unable to get a picture of the girls room because he was about to "die of embarrassment."). At any rate, I wonder who the one lucky boy and one lucky girl are that each get to have their own personal restroom.

Thankfully, the Language Arts teachers at the school are always among the first to point out this apostrophe error.