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From: warack@aero.ARPA (Chris Warack )
Newsgroups: net.puzzle
Subject: word islands [oops and more]
Message-ID: <302@aero.ARPA>
Date: Wed, 24-Jul-85 18:19:21 EDT
Article-I.D.: aero.302
Posted: Wed Jul 24 18:19:21 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 28-Jul-85 07:19:37 EDT
Reply-To: warack@aero.UUCP (Chris Warack (5734))
Organization: The Aerospace Corp., El Segundo, CA
Lines: 31

[Yum]
OK, so I blew it with 'ivy' [I thought 'icy' was 'icey'.]  That was stupid.
I have another though, 'iffy.'  This was brought to my attention by Alan
Foonberg.  He didn't see it as a word island; he was looking for ways to
disprove ivy --> ify [no, that's spelled iffy].  Anyways, see if you can do
anything with that.  Also, 'ecru.'  It might lose to a plural, 'ecrus.'  I
would never use a plural to ecru, but it might exist.

In a meta-discussion, I have found it all but impossible to find a
two-letter word island.  I doubt there are.  [This could be easily proved
since there are only 312 possible two letter words [26 * 6 [vowels] * 2
[order]], and many of these like 'ez' aren't words.]  Three letter words are
difficult too.  My strategy for looking is to find words with a middle
constanant, that end in y or a sibilant [s,z,sh,ch] that takes a non-'s'
plural, or that are not nouns or verbs.  There are a number that are close:
	any - and    ivy - icy     fry - fly    chi - phi
	elk - elks [non-standard but still a legitimate plural]
	
Four letter words, try looking in the pattern vcvc or vccv for words.

Has anyone else thought about this, or actually done similar work?

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