My boyfriend, who is lounging around in bed behind me, has a few lame-o, obviously against-the-spirit-of-the-game suggestions.
His first is fish and fish (s.). In this case, the (s.) is meant to be the standard dictionary abbreviation for “singular.” I claim that this is craven cheating.
He also suggests “Sepharadim” and “Sepharadism,” “goyim” and “goyism.” Since both “sepharadism” and “goyism” didn’t exist until he thought them up for this game, I think that neither one of those is a valid solution. I feel the same way about something like “annulae” and “annulase.”
If you were accepting words from another language, we could have “men” and “mens” (Latin for “mind.”) I don’t think that’s quite kosher, either.
Can you think of a plural word that becomes singular by adding an “s” to the end? You can’t change any of the letters in the first word, like cactI to cactUs.
If you wanted to be a bit more mainstream, you could go with “watchspring.”
The “add an S” one is stumping me, so here’s a new one: can you name a word for which the plural shares no letters in common with the singular? A hint: the plural referred to here is archaic, although technically correct.
word with no singular form-
How about scissors? pants? pantaloons?
If “water” would cut the mustard (which I don’t think it does), than pretty much any material noun will work…eg. snow, wood, steel, etc.
Give a word means one thing in one context and its direct opposite in another (note: there are several of these).
I would suggest “raze” and “raise,” but that obviously only works in a speaking context. If you include slang, you can count “bad” and I’m sure a whole lotta other words.
hint? Does the “ooo” word contain any hyphens, apostrophes, accents, umlauts or anything of the sort?
Do phrases count? Like “That the last thing I want before I go to bed” could mean “I need to have that before I go to bed”, or “I don’t want that at all”.
Also, “You can never water these plants too much” could mean “It’s impossible to add too much water” or “Don’t overwater these plants”.
*Originally posted by walor *
Here’s a few. Words that contain:
6 x A plus six consonants TARAMASALATA
6 x I plus eight consonants INDIVISIBILITY
And as for the “word means one thing in one context and its direct opposite in another” one, I’ll give an example: clip. As in to attach (clip to a board), and to sever (clip your hair). Now that I told you, you can’t use that one!