When is a plural not a plural?

[Binkie]

Am I being particularly dense here ? (probably, I hear you sigh ) I'm still uncertain why "cities" for example, is acceptable but "cries " is not. I may be a word lover and hoarder, but I think the finer points of English usage may have passed me by!   

[Linda]

Hi Binkie - cries was available - at least it was accepted in my list!  I'm no expert but my understanding of the rule is that if a word can be made into a plural by adding 'ies'  such as tries, fries etc then it is ok but you can't just add an 's' to the end of a word in order to pluralize it.  If the word ends in an 's' and is a word in itself - such as 'aegis' then that's ok too.  Think that's correct - no doubt somebody will correct me if I'm wrong.   :

[biggerbirdbrain]

Yes, Binkie. I agree with Linda. Another example of words just ending in "s" is iris -- which plural would be irises. And cries went through on my game, as did tries. Maybe you went too fast and might have reversed two letters, and intented to do cries, but it might have come out creis, or something like that. I know, often, my hit rate goes down because I get going so fast, I don't really see exactly what I've written, even though I thought I wrote the right one.

I'm stumped on the common words this time. Just one away from the standard puzzle.

Cheers,
3-B

[Linda]

Glad you agree with my interpretation of the rules, BBB, I am thrilled to have actually got all the common words in the Standard puzzle today - what joy to finally get a rosette!  However, am 5 away from the Challenge rosette and that's the way it's gonna stay as I'm getting v. frustrated and am off to do some hoovering to release pent up annoyance!!! 

[Binkie]

Thanks for the clarification! I probably did type too fast....been caught like that a few times. I feel faintly cheered to know that you haven't got the last common word, either BBB......I'm tearing my hair out !   

[biggerbirdbrain]

I wonder, will this game become another common cause for baldness in women?
Ha, ha!

I may not ever get back to the game to finish it all. Fell asleep too early last night to start, and now, it's off to work I go.

Have fun,
3-B

[Alan W]

What you all say is correct. The only plurals not permitted are those made by simply adding S to the end of the singular word. And the same applies to verb inflections: you can have TARRIES, but not SAYS.

There are a few funny cases where a word is the plural of two different words. For example HOOVES is the plural of HOOF and also of HOOVE (a disease of cattle). Since the second meaning seems very obscure, HOOVES is allowed. In fact even GOES comes into this category, because there is a word GOE - apparently an archaic version of GO - but it would be ludicrous to exclude GOES on that account.

This the reason both STIE and STIES are allowed (an example that comes up in the puzzle quite often), STIES as the plural of STY. I presume STIE is an obscure variant of STYE.

So if you come across a word that seems to be treated inconsistently (as Binkie thought she had), sing out - the word list may need tweaking.

[Colhad]

I dare say "News" would be acceptable, as in the 6:00pm bulletin.

[Alan W]

Yes that's right, Colhad, "news" is definitely allowed. So are "odds" and "ides" and any other word that only comes in the plural form. In fact, I don't think "news" is really a plural word at all - we use it like a singular noun when we say, "The news is good." Not "The news are good."