For 80 years, a beacon atop the Grant Building in downtown Pittsburgh has flashed out the word “Pittsburgh” in Morse code. At least it was supposed to. No one knows for how long it’s been happening, but a sharp-eyed city resident waiting for a 4th of July fireworks show noticed the dots and dashes actually spell out P-I-T-E-T-S-B-K-R-R-H
“I was looking at it, and I saw the letter ‘K,’ which is dash-dot-dash,” Tom Stepleton tells the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. “I remembered ‘K’ because my sister’s name starts with ‘K.’ And I knew that wasn’t supposed to be there.” He took a video of the dotty message and dashed it off to YouTube.
Meanwhile, a survey reveals that “definitely” is the most misspelled word in the English language. A significant number of people insist on spelling it “definately,” the UK’s Daily Record notes. The other most commonly misspelled words include sacrilegious, indict, broccoli, and prejudice. The poll also finds that “57 percent judge other people on their spelling, with 42 per cent admitting they believe people who can’t spell are ‘thick.’”
Personally, I always need to check “embarrass” and ”cemetery” and for some reason, “judgment” never looks right to me, no matter how many times I’ve written it.
Judgment never looks right to me either. According to Merriam-Webster “judgement” is an alternative spelling, but spell checkers judge it worthy of the red underline.
I can remember having to take a spelling test for the temp agency I used to find a job while my DH did his Army officer basic course at Ft. Knox, KY. I had no clue how to spell the word “Cincinnati”. I knew it had at least one double letter but I wasn’t sure if it was the “n” or the “t” or both. Growing up in New England, it’s not something I’d ever had to worry about. But that particular city was less than 2 hours away from Ft. Knox so it was actually relevant. Whatever I guessed was wrong, but it was the only word I missed on the test so I still passed the agency’s screening.
Is Pittsburgh Hard to Spell? DEFINITELY (not ‘definately’)