November 30, 2004

Future NPL members in the news

A heartwarming story about a kid who memorized the spelling of a word over 300 letters long.

The second reader comment at the end misremembers the spelling of "pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis", but it hardly matters, since that word was a hoax perpetrated many years ago by some of my fellow members of the National Puzzlers' League (a group this youngster seems bound to end up in someday), in an attempt to get a word into the dictionary, I believe. Good job, but I humbly suggest that "igry" is way more useful than "pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis".

Posted by Francis at 11:01 AM | TrackBack
Comments

Is "floccinauxinihilifilipicator" a hoax word too? (I don't even remember where it came from, let alone the correct spelling. I don't think I invented it, though. It's another word for "nitpicker".)

Posted by: Doug Orleans at November 30, 2004 02:46 PM

That one was actually used--or rather, the "-tion" version of it was. See http://www.worldwidewords.org/weirdwords/ww-flo2.htm .

Posted by: Lance at December 1, 2004 12:40 PM