Discussion Forum—A Way with Words, a fun radio show and podcast about language

You're asking about the pronunciation rather than the spelling, right? This one is easy. When a word ends in one of the sounds 's', 'z', 'sh' or 'zh'—sound, not letter—then its plural (or the third-person singular verb) has the additional vowel to separate the two sibilants. "Dogs" is pronounced /dAgz/ and "cats" is pronounced /kats/; but "busses" is pronounced /bVs@z/, "buzzes" /bVz@z/, "cashes" /kaS@z/ and … I can' think of a word that ends in '-zh' just now, but you get the idea.

Likewise, a word that ends in a '-d' or '-t' sound has the additional schwa to separate when you add "-ed": "Backed" is pronounced /bakt/ and "bagged" /baIgd/, but "breaded" is /brEd@d/ and "texted" is /tEkst@d/.

[Moments later:] Oh, of course: Any word that ends in the sounds '-tch' or '-dge' ends in '-sh' or '-zh', too, so "batches" is pronounced /batS@s/ and "badges" /badZ@s/.

Garry Shirts said:

Is the past tense of texting text ed as in blast ed or treat ed or is it like wrecked or tracked?

Of course, Bob is completely correct.

But, I think there might be more to your question than first meets the eye. I have often heard /tekst/ with a past meaning for the action of texting. I have also often heard the verb text casually pronounced as /teks/. (*Tex me when you get there.) This casual pronunciation, based on the rules Bob accurately describes, would result in a past tense form pronounced /tekst/. This treatment, while far from standard, still follows the phonetic rules above, just as if the verb were spelled *tex with a past tense of *texed. (c.f. hex, hexed)

I do not recommend that one adopt the casual pronunciation. However, the alternate spellings of txt and txtd are perfectly acceptable. (wink)

Drownded: Not just in the American South.

http://books.google.com/books?id=xJIEAAAAQAAJ&dq=drownded&pg=PA93#v=onepage&q=drownded&f=false