20130817: Homonyms, part 2

More Examples

1. pair, pare, pear
1. pair--a set of two, as in "Hm, need a pair of socks."
2. pair--to assign a task with one other person, as in "They were paired as the leads in the new movie."
3. pare--decrease, lessen, as in "He pared down his staff."
4. pare--to remove the outer covering or skin of with a knife or similar instrument, as in "I'll pare the apples first."
5. pear--bottom heavy fruit, as in "I'll have the pear and clotted cream."
6. pere--French noun; in English, father.  "Voila, mon pere."


2. peak, peek, pique
1. peak--mountain top or other local maximum, as in "Let's keep climbing until we reach the peak."
2. peak--to reach a peak, as in "I think audience interest in that show peaked in May."
3. peek--secret look, as in "You peeked at the Christmas presents, didn't you?"
4. peek--examine the next byte in a file content stream, without moving the file pointer, as in "Use the peek function, then test for EOF."
5. pique--ruffled pride, as in "In a fit of pique, I threw out your comic book collection."
6. pique--to excite, as in "The play piqued my interest in Moliere."


3. Pole, pole, poll
1. Pole--person from Poland, as in "I think his father was a Pole."
2. pole--a long stick, as in "I think we need a pole to get the Frisbee out of the tree."
3. poll--a sample on an issue, or an actual vote, as in "The NY Times poll indicated an even lower rating for the House."


4. praise, prays, preys
1. praise--to commend, as in "I came to seize the berry, not to praise it."
2. prays--worships religious object, as in "The monk prays three times a day."
3. preys--hunts, as in "The bat preys on the insects."


5. principal, principle
1. principal--(noun) head of school, as in "The principal had a few things to tell me in his office."
2. principal--(adjective) chief, as in "The principal reason for the change was lack of funds."
3. principle--fundamental doctrine or tenet, as in "To understand the Romans, I read about the principles of the Stoics."
4. principle--in essence or substance, as in "After some discussion, we agreed in principle."


6. cause, because, caws, Coz
1. cause--(noun) something or someone that produces an effect, result, or condition, as in "The high use of air condition was the cause of the brown out."
2. cause--(noun) a charitable undertaking, as in "...for a good cause."
3. cause--(verb) to produce an effect or condition, as in "The high winds caused some trees to fall."
4. because--(conjuction) similar to since, as in "They rested because they were tired."  This word is often pronounced, 'cos, which sounds exactly like the others here.
5. caws--The sounds were faint, but he heard the many caws of the crow.
6. Coz--surname.


7. sees, seize, seas
1. sees--(verb) present third person singular of 'to see' as in 'he sees the stars in the sky.'
2. seize--(verb) to steal something against the will of the previous owner, as in 'I saw the thug seize the woman's purse.'
3. seas (noun, plural) plural of sea, the body of water.
4. See's--name of a candy store chain, See's Candy.