Lessons in Grammar and Spelling: Vaycay vs. Vaca vs. Vacay

How do you spell the short version of vacation?  The answer lies below. You know how you say to your significant other or friends, "Let's go on a (insert short word for vacation)". Or, "You deserve a (insert short word again)." How do you spell it when you do write or text it? Let's discuss it below.

Vacay: If you were to pronounce this correctly it would sound like this, "vuh-kay". That sounds silly doesn't it?

Vaca: If you were to pronounce this one correctly it would sound like this, "vuh-kuh". And isn't this the Spanish word for cow? It's something like that.

Vaycay: Pronounced correctly, "vay-kay". Yay! Let's go on a vaycay! I LOVE vaycays.

While it does require and extra letter, it remains worth it to not look like an idiot when writing. Please use correctly.

7 comments

  1. Anonymous28 July, 2014

    Orrr... you could just write "vacation." It's two letters longer and it doesn't sound like you're talking to a toddler.

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  3. If you look at its online use, you'll see that "vacay" is used 6x more than "vaycay". "Vacay" also looks more similar to its root "vacation" - it looks more like a contraction. And keeping with people's linguistic laziness (just look at adverbs, and how "ly" is disappearing), "vacay" is one less character to type than "vaycay". And to further the lazy typing theory, the letter "y" is more effort to reach on a qwerty keyboard than the letters v, a, or c. So a word with the letter "y" twice is even more effort to type. Evolution often favors the path of least resistance, and I believe "vacay" is here to stay, no matter how much it offends linguistic logic. The English language is known for its exceptions and idiosyncrasies, and "vacay" is no different - "vacay" is idiosyncratically and illogically correct.

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  4. Nobody would ever pronounce vacay vuh-kay

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  5. You don't pronounce vacation vuh

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