I'm still not sure how "slough" is pronounced (from Little House books.) I'm leaning towards "slew"/"slow" maybe because that was what my mom called it. But in my head, it is "sluff."

Just checked on Merriam Webster (with pronounciations sounds): It rhymes with "ow!" as you might say after you have stubbed your toe, but before the profanity.

The shedding meaning of it is sluff though (I don't know which sense LHotP was using).

Just checked on Merriam Webster (with pronounciations sounds): It rhymes with "ow!" as you might say after you have stubbed your toe, but before the profanity.

I think MW is on crack.

The water version is "Slew" most certainly. Slew, in fact, is an alternate spelling, and is the "Slew" in question in the name "Seattle Slew".

I think it's slew.

The shedding meaning of it is sluff though (I don't know which sense LHotP was using).

Right, as in "the snake sloughed off its skin."

Slew, in fact, is an alternate spelling, and is the "Slew" in question in the name "Seattle Slew".

Really? Huh. Learn something new every day. (I always wondered about that...)

I'm still not sure how "slough" is pronounced (from Little House books.)

I always read it as "sloff," so you can be pretty sure it's not that.

So far, in reading this thread, I've found three words I've been pronouncing wrong.

When I was a kid, the school and my parents thought I seemed to be learning sort of weirdly (reading WAY above grade level, but having lots of trouble with writing and spelling) and had me tested. The tests found that my oral vocabulary and written vocabulary were almost totally seperate. Beyond the vocabulary that a kid my age was supposed to have, there were a whole bunch of more difficult words that I'd use in conversation, and a whole bunch that I'd understand when I was reading, but almost no intersection between those two sets. My six-year-old brain just hadn't figured out how to read a word, understand it, and then translate it into a spoken word to be used in conversation, or how to look at a written word and realize it corresponded to a spoken word I already knew. After reading this thread today, I think that I've resolved that problem less well than I'd thought.

Really? Huh. Learn something new every day. (I always wondered about that...)

One of the names they considered for him was White Swan Slew, but for reasons related to brand recognition (for want of a better term), they went with the larger, better known Washington city.

Sloughs are a good place to birdwatch, and sometimes kayak, if there's enough water at high tide. Marshlands and bird layover spots are sloughs - slews.

But the snake is "sluff."

I always say twen-tee, too. I've wondered if it's a regional thing, the of-ten vs. of'en. I learned it from my parents, but they were not from PA. PA folk said of-ten often.

What's "humint?" It's the first I've seen that word.

What's "humint?"

Human intelligence. Information from the people on the ground, or what we didn't have in Iraq.