I'd Like to Buy a Vowel

          You just don’t hear much about vowels these days.  There they are, helping us string together words and communicate with the world, but they are completely unheralded.

Sure, they are bought and sold on television (Wheel of Fortune), coveted in Scrabble games, and probably get a bit of attention in national spelling bees, but that’s it.

So today I’m heralding vowels. I decided to see if there are any English words that use all of them in order and was thrilled (yes, I am easy to please) to find not one, but TWO examples.  Unfortunately, these are words most folks don’t know.  Okay, one of them most folks don’t know.

Let’s start with the most familiar one: Facetious.  It is not the same as sarcastic, though many people use those words interchangeably.  It actually means joking or being flippant about something serious.  I was being facetious when I was told I’d be having major surgery in November and I said, “You mean I could get out of cooking Thanksgiving dinner?”

          The next word is abstemious.  I am not sure I’ve ever heard anyone utter this word, but maybe I just don’t hang with the right people.  At any rate, abstemious refers to restraint and moderation, especially in eating and drinking (and this could be why, as a foodie, I have never heard associates use this term).  So you could say, “June was very abstemious when it came to dining.” Or maybe she had an eating disorder, who can say?

          (This should even please those who include Y as a vowel because both those adjectives can be turned into adverbs by adding ly, thus keeping the order.)

          You remember that our daughter, Nicole, went to Norway on her LDS mission.  So I decided to ask her if Norwegian had any vowels we don’t use. Turns out they have three more! (Wasn't it enough that they just won the most Winter Olympic medals? Now they have to have the most vowels?) Get this:

          Å is pronounced “oh” but the way someone from Long Island would say dog.  It’s more like “dough-ugh,” so the oh would be kind of “Oh-uh.”

          Ø is pronounced like the u in fur.

          And æ is pronounced like the short a in the word back.  In Norway their a is pronounced “ah.” 

          I wonder if they have words that include all eight of their vowels in order.  I’m betting we win on that one.

Just think of all the wonderful vowels you can enjoy if you buy my books right here!