From: G6JPG@255soft.uk   
      
   On 2026/2/21 0:33:21, Bennett Price wrote:   
   []   
   > Ode to a Spell Checker   
   >   
   > I have a spelling checker   
   > I disk covered four my PC.   
   > It plane lee marks four my revue   
   > Miss steaks aye can knot see.   
   []   
   I haven't seen this for ages - nice to see it again; and, I don't think   
   I've seen as many verses as this before. I've saved it (as chequer.txt   
   !): do you know who originally wrote it, and/or when? I like to give   
   credit where I can. (Hang on: I'll ask Google AI ... It says "Jerrold H.   
   Zar, a professor at Northern Illinois University." Doesn't give a date,   
   though says "gained popularity in the 1990s" (or when I rephrased the   
   question "was written in the _early_ 1990s" [my emphasis]).) The version   
   I know starts   
   Eye have a spelling chequer (or check her),   
   It cane with my pea sea.   
      
   One version at https://arnold.hosted.uark.edu/Other/ZarOde.pdf .   
   Another is of course called AN OWED TO SPELL CHEQUER.   
      
   If you like this ode, you'll probably love "The Chaos", a piece about   
   the anomalies of English punctuation, actually written by a Dutchman! in   
   1922. An example is at https://ncf.idallen.com/english.html - it's heavy   
   going to read _because_ of the pronunciations, but the above also   
   includes links to a couple of readings.   
   --   
   J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()ALIS-Ch++(p)Ar++T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf   
      
   Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a long time making it (Anon)   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)