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  LOGOLOG
a weblog of wordplay by Eric Harshbarger

Beyond BOOKKEEPER

Do you notice anything unusual about the following couple of sentences (other than the fact that they see a little contrived)?
Omelette eggs seem moot to Otto. Oh, he effortly eats them anyway.

The word BOOKKEEPER is the only one in the English language that has three pairs of adjacent double letters (though, if you allow hyphenated words, you might get away with SWEET-TOOTH). There are plenty of words with two adjacent pairs (COFFEE, COMMITTEE, BARROOM, and so forth), but BOOKKEEPER stays ahead of the pack (I've read one fellow's comments that the occupation of SUBBOOKKEEPER should be allowed).

On a recent plane flight to London I got thinking about all of the above, and decided to try to think of the longest sentence (or sentences) which extended the number of adjacent double letters (possibly bridging between two words). For example, the simple sentence, "Anna adds six and seven." has four adjacent double letter pairs near the beginning (obviously additional, non-paired letters are acceptable before and after the adjacent pairs).

After about 30 minutes (still somewhere between the United States and England) I was able to cook up the pair of sentences at the start of this LOGOLOG entry. While they would probably never occur in real life, they are quite coherent.

And between them is an amazing run of fourteen adjacent double letter pairs:

Omelette eggs seem moot to Otto. Oh, he effortly eats them anyway.

Can you do better than that?

(a slight restriction of no repeated words in your answers should be imposed to prevent trivial examples)

-- Eric

[20 February 2007]
   
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Comments about this article:
"We have a balloon. No odd eel - look; keel! Loom Ma: a llama!"

lloonnooddeellookkeelloommaall

15 pairs, but making much less sense than yours, so does it count?


Posted by: Peter


Well, it's all subjective. Certainly we want to avoid completely nonsensical arrangements of words that just happen to work. The more coherent the better; yours is somewhere in that 'gray area' [grin].

Posted by: Eric Harshbarger


Having read this challenge I went away and pondered it for a while. I came up with the following and felt rather proud of myself:

"He is a great cook, but will frequently ask my opinion on how long to simmer potatoes. Despite his considerable culinary fineSSE, EGGS SEEM MOOT TOO. OOH, HE ERRS SO Often when he boils them."

It was only after I came back and re-read your entry that I realised I had subconsciously stolen your "eggs seem moot" succession. I decided to post it anyway with apologies, however, as it manages to squeeze in an extra pair to make 15 in a row. :-)

Posted by: MightyMax


Nicely done. Sixteen, anyone?

Posted by: Eric Harshbarger


I love aabbccddeeffgghhiijjkkllmmnnooppqqrrssttuuing you.

Posted by: andy


Anyone heard of a balloonneer?

...and the balloonneer room meet took keen Noor reeling with surprise.

with 17 pairs

Posted by: Paul Wright


sorry 16 pairs, it seems I can't count properly!!

Posted by: Paul Wright


 
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