Unpaired Words

A Solitary Boot. Eliot Hodgkin,1944. Eliot and his wife Mimi were in Southwold, England, when Eliot noticed the boot. After he finished drawing it, they went back to their car where a warden came rushing towards them. Little did the Hodgkins know, that the warden was looking for “two lunatics” walking on a mine field

Prefix or
Suffix reversed or
left off. They
have no in-,
no un-, no dis-, and no -less.
Orphaned, they amuse.

Ept and whelmed,
Gruntled, kempt, and couth.
Flappable,
Trepid, ert.
Corrigible and gainly,
Stinting and ruly.

But there’s more!
Effable, nocent,
Nocuous,
Pervious,
Pecunious, turbed, shevelled
And domitable.

And change the
Suffix! Reckful and
Ruthful and
Gormful while
Sensically scathed and bunked
Feckful and gusted.

Featured image: The snow plough came early this morning. Still snowing.

JosieHolford

View Comments

    • If you are gruntled you must be happy. Happy that the tRump will finally be gone and we will be reft no more and instead we can be raught.

  • There should be a 'leave the pre-fix off' day each year. Good fun. I wonder where the mine field was in Southwold. I was there this summer. Came back with two shoes luckily.

    • My guess is that they laid mines on whatever looked like potential invasion landing sites. Aka beaches.

      And walking on a minefield would not be at all ruptive and the fear would be sipated.
      However, sounds like Hodgkin was quite combobulated and nerved by the experience.

Recent Posts

A Bonfire in the Dark

When I was in the emergency room last year having busted my elbow, a nurse…

2 weeks ago

Locked Out

Most of us have done it at some point or another - accidentally locked ourselves…

3 weeks ago

The #1970 Club: Germaine Greer and The Female Eunuch

Thanks to the #1970 Club, I've spent the spare moments of the past week immersed…

1 month ago

The Forgetful Mog

Thanks to the #1970 Club,  I have a new mog in my life and a…

1 month ago

The #1970 Club: Language and Learning

The #1970 Club is starting tomorrow (October 14th) and I'm prepared with some reading and…

1 month ago

How do they live with themselves?

How Do They Live with Themselves? This was the question Roger Rosenblatt asked in The…

1 month ago