In a message dated 10/22/1999 9:35:09 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
> From Harold's file . . .
>
> There are three words in the English language that end in "gry".
> ONE is angry and the other is hungry. EveryONE knows what
> the third ONE means and what it stands for. EveryONE uses
> them everyday, and if you listened very carefully,
> I've given you the third word.
>
> What is it?
>
> ________gry
Cecil Adams replies (check his website at http://www.straightdope.com):
Here's the answer: the word is gry, meaning "one tenth of a line"--not, as
one might guess in these degraded times, a unit of measurement in the drug
trade, but rather part of the decimal system of linear measurement proposed
by English philosopher John Locke (1632-1704).
A gry was a hundredth of an inch and a thousandth of a "philosophical foot."
Too bad Locke's idea didn't catch on; the thought of measuring things in
philosophical feet has an ineffable poignance. The Oxford English Dictionary
says gry is also an obsolete verb meaning to rage or roar.
But wait. Lest you think there is only one right answer to the truly cosmic
questions of life, I should advise you of the existence of puggry and aggry,
which also fill the bill. Puggry is an alternate spelling of puggree, meaning
either an Indian turban or a scarf wound around a sun helmet with the end
hanging down in back as a shade. An aggry bead, according to my Webster's
Third, is a "variegated glass bead found buried in the earth in Ghana and
England."
As with many enigmatic dictionary definitions, this leaves one abubble with
questions: Who buried them? And why Ghana and England? Sadly, we must defer
the amazing answer till some later date.
One last thing. Occasionally you'll hear the question above framed this way:
"There are three English words ending with -gry. Two of them are hungry and
angry. The third word is very common; in fact you have just encountered it.
What is the third word?"
Naturally you are puzzled, because none of the words Cecil has just quoted is
common. How do we explain this?
Easy. You are the victim of a despicable trick. The desired answer is "three."
_______
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