A hairy issue

[Morbius]

Yesterday's standard puzzle included the words pube (rare) and pubes (common).  Pube was added to the list of acceptable words following a suggestion from a forumite in 2013.  Presumably, until then pubes was treated in the same way as words like suds and odds - as a kind of pseudo plural without a singular form.  My issue is this: If we now accept that pube is a word, doesn't that invalidate pubes as an acceptable word on the grounds that it's a regular plural?   

[anona]

Like - if I remember aright - I think we can't play nares as the plural of naris because it would also be the unacceptable plural of nare.

I played pubes and pubis (but not pube - not heard of it) but was surprised that so many more people played pubis than pubes, which I know better as a plural-only word than as the plural of pubis.

[Les303]

I was one of those who was a little slow when it came to physically maturing.
I was a short - arse with a baby face & looked quite a few years younger than my actual age.
So i copped a fair bit of teasing & bullying as I approached puberty which was a blessing in disguise as I quickly worked out that if I didn't learn how to handle myself, I would be picked on for the rest of my life.

My mother abhored violence of any kind & refused to allow our father to tell us about his time in the army.
It was only after he had passed that we became aware of his boxing prowess when we came across a box that had been hidden away at the back of a closest.
It contained trophies, awards & several articles about the championships that he had won while representing his division during his time in the army although his boxing career was quite short as after sufferring a schrapnel wound to his back, he never boxed again.
I remember going to bed that night feeling very proud, my dad was a war hero, my dad was a champion boxer, my dad...isn't here.
I silently cursed him, how could you leave me when i am so young, how can you not be here for me at a time when i need you so much, i cried myself to sleep.

I had my first serious fist fight when i was in grade six.
It was against a much bigger boy from grade 7 & of course it was over a girl.
I am sure that i have told that story before & i only raise it again because it is only now that i think that maybe dad was with me that day.

Imagine my delight when the following year,  our footy coach ( who just happened to be my teacher from grade 6 ) took me aside after training one afternoon.
He explained that he was involved in opening a new youth club that involved all sorts of activities as well as boxing training.
Because you are the captain of the football team, i would really appreciate it if you would come along in the hope that it will encourage other kids to join, there will be no charge & i will train you personally.
Oh Mr. Bowman, i would really love to but even though it will be free i don't think that my mother would ever allow it.
Don't you worry about your mother, i'll have a talk to her.
Sure enough, the very next Monday afternoon, I was allowed to go to boxing training at the youth club.
One afternoon a week soon turned into 3 then into 5 & that was on top of footy training which was 3 nights a week, my only days off were Saturday which was when we played footy & Sundays & i loved every minute of it.

After just a few weeks Mr. Bowman took me aside, Les, i am really pleased with your committment & progress, you are a natural, you are beating everyone in your weight division with ease & you are even outclassing most of the boys in the higher weight divisions so i would like to enter you into a competition called " Golden Gloves " that is coming up in the next few months, that will put you up against the very best from throughout the state.
Naturally i acceppted the challenge & trained harder than ever.

I couldn't believe it when i heard the news that Mr. Bowman had suddenly died from tumours on his brain.
He was the fittest man that i ever knew, always ate the right food, never smoked, never drank, he would jog 5 miles to & from school every day & was probably the best allround sportsman that this town had ever seen.

I never did find out how Mr. Bowman had convinced my mother to allow me to do the boxing training but after his death, despite offers from other coaches, i was never allowed to continue & soon drifted back into my bad habits.

Anyway, i digress , the teasing continued about my lack of facial hair & i was into my late teens before i could actually grow enough bum fluff to feign a genuine shave, even to this day i can get away with shaving 3 or 4 times a week & find it impossible to grow a beard.
I do think that i have had the last laugh because just shaving 3 or 4 times a week is painful enough so i really do empathise will those fellows who have to shave twice a day but i must admit that i am also envious of people who can can grow a glorious full beard like TRex.

[auntiemo]

Welcome back, Les.

[Les303]

 

[TRex]

I do think that i have had the last laugh because just shaving 3 or 4 times a week is painful enough so i really do empathise will those fellows who have to shave twice a day but i must admit that i am also envious of people who can can grow a glorious full beard like TRex.

It is strongly encouraged to maintain a beard in my religious tradition and it is easier than scraping one's face. I haven't shaved since I left the army in '79.

[yelnats]

I too have a full beard. I had to start shaving at about 16 and by 18 had to shave twice a day if I was going out at night. But shaving stopped when I was almost 20. I did the  rite of passage and headed off to Europe and as I'd only used an electric razor and wasn't going to start with a blade. I still have a brand new shaving brush my brother gave me for Christmas that year.

I had a job as an ice-cream seller in Germany and it was suggested that I should shave. The job only lasted 3 days. The first I sold ice-cream "Shokolade oder vanilla", "dreizig oder funfzig", the second day was too cold, the third day was too wet, and I didn't get paid. The fourth day I went off to the arbeitsamt and found a job that paid any day I turned up. That was the end of shaving and I have lived happily ever after!

I learned a couple of German words as a result, "aufrazieren!" is "shave!" I replied to the old lady in English that I didn't understand her. Stachelschwein is porcupine.

Years later I was discussing shaving with a Chinese friend and he only needed to shave once a week, and his cousin plucked anything that came up! I may have been able to cope with being beardless if I had only needed to shave once a week.

Trex's beard appears to be much fuller than mine. I keep mine to about a month's growth.  

[Alan W]

When pube was accepted as a rare word I said:

Yes, indeed, pubes is allowed.

One thing I hadn't realised until I looked it up, is that pubes is more than just a colloquial term for pubic hair. Pronounced "pyu-bees", it is a Latin-derived word meaning "the lower part of the abdomen at the front of the pelvis, covered with hair from puberty". It is also the plural of pubis.

As regards the informal term for pubic hair, some dictionaries list only the plural form, but some list pube as a word for a single pubic hair. Usage examples of the singular form don't seem to be plentiful, but there are a few. For example, How to be a Woman, by Caitlin Moran:

To see even a single hair, curling out the side, would be to have the whole world going, 'Is that a PUBE I can see? A PUBE. Lady Gaga?

I think pube should be admitted, as a rare word, but without removing pubes (so to speak), given its much more frequent appearance in the language.

The usage of pubes as a singular word for the pubic area is clearly illustrated in this 1983 quote from the education journal Theory into Practice:

One of the earliest surviving statements about human growth is found in a Greek elegy by the poet, Solon, who noted the occurrence of puberty as the covering of the pubes with hair.

This sense of the word pubes is listed in a number of the online dictionaries, so I don't feel it would be justified to remove it completely as a word, but perhaps it ought to be made rare. But then neither pube nor pubes would be common, even though pubes is quite frequently used.

Yet again it seems that every change made to clear up "plurals" confusion is likely to make matters worse.

[mkenuk]

....even though pubes is quite frequently used.

That final phrase answers the question, surely. It is 'frequently used', so it should be common.

pube could be included as rare.

Isn't it the same with throe (uncommon) and throes (common)?

[Morbius]

Yes, the word pubes (meaning pubic hairs collectively) is frequently used, but my argument is that it can only be allowed if pube (meaning a single pubic hair) is not allowed.  The other meanings of pubes are certainly not commonly used, so if we include the word on the basis of those meanings it should be rare.

I'd argue the same for throe/throes.  Throes should only be allowed if throe isn't.

Having said all that, I've learned to live with such quirks in the game.  Remembering them is part of the challenge of playing.