The Plural of Fool is Feel?

You’re listening to A Way with Words, the show about language and how we use it.

I’m Martha Barnette.

And I’m Grant Barrett.

Well, here he is with a somersault and a pirouette.

It’s our quiz guy, John Chaneski.

Hi, John.

Whoa.

Hey, guys.

How are you?

Ow, I think I pulled something.

It’s fine.

It’s fine.

We’ll just keep going.

We’ll go to the quiz.

Let’s just do what I do best.

Quizzing.

Everyone knows that the plural of foot is feet, and the plural of goose is geese.

And that’s just the gateway puzzlers need to come up with the false plural of boot, which is, of course, beats.

Beat. One boot.

I see.

One boot, two beat.

I finally found my missing boot. What do you think of my beat?

That’s a perfectly logical sentence in Puzzle Land.

Now, I’ll give you a clue to a singular word that has two O’s, and its false plural that has two E’s.

You give me both, please. I mean, please. Ready?

Gotcha.

Good. Here we go.

In 1973, Nixon made a speech in which he said he was not a blank.

Since then, many people have come to believe that all politicians are blank.

I am not a crook. Well, there are a lot of creak in Washington.

A lot of creak in Washington.

Once I got a good blank at that painting, I just had to go back and get several more blank.

You got to look. You got to look.

Oh, look and leave.

Right.

Yeah, I got to go back and take a leak.

Take several leaks.

Oh, my gosh.

Take several leaks.

You shouldn’t take a leak at the museum, though.

Don’t do that.

No.

Each guest house at the spa has its own blank.

It takes a lot of chlorine to maintain all those blank.

Pool and peel?

That’s right.

A lot of chlorine to maintain all those peel.

Hand me that blank.

No, not the hammer, the wrench.

No, not the crescent wrench, the monkey wrench.

Wow, you really don’t know a lot about blank.

Hand me that tool.

You don’t know a lot about teal.

Teal.

I got my whole, the teal in my teal box, my toolbox.

I entered my blank into the National Family Island Regatta, only to find I’d be competing against 88 other blank.

Oh.

Schooner and Skeener?

I think it’s sloop and sleep.

Oh.

It is sloop and sleep.

Yes.

Sloop.

I ended my sloop.

I was in a bad lie, so I asked my new caddy to hand me a strong two blank, only to find he can’t tell any of the blank apart.

Well, we’re talking about clubs, but what’s another name for a club?

And golf.

Iron?

Iron, putter.

Two.

It’s rare that we have a…

Two wood.

A wood and weed?

He asked for the two wood, but he couldn’t tell any of the weed apart.

That’s right.

I asked him for a wood.

He’s the worst caddy.

He can’t tell any of the weed apart.

Wood and weed.

You got it.

Very good.

Very good.

Or very geed.

I don’t know.

I’m lost.

Anyway, you guys are awesome.

I’ll see you next time.

All right.

Take care, John.

There he goes, tumbling out the door.

Whoa!

As you can tell, we goof around on this show, but we also have serious conversations about language.

And you can do that with us, 877-929-9673, or send your thoughts to words@waywordradio.org.