vocabulary and grammar.

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What is the deal with "hypocrite? Why is it pronounced like "kit" with that e on the end? It should be spelled the way it is pronounced. And "I before e, except after c" how often does that actually apply. And why do we need the letter x? Is it not always silent at the beginning of a word? And the sound it makes in the middle of a word can be substituted.

Anyone have any more?

I like talking about this kind of thing. I don't really understand the examples that you gave. Is "r" in "hypocrite" not supposed to be pronounced? I always pronounce it. Any way, it's very well known that the correlation between the spelling and pronunciation in English is rather weak. If you want examples, I think you'll find many: e.g. busy, pretty and many more.

I think the English language needs a serious spelling overhaul so that words are spelled exactly how they are pronounced.

ˈhipəˌkrit

HIP-uh-krit

I don't know whether you're a native English speaker, but if you've ever tried spelling words phonetically and then read them back, it's really difficult. That's because we're used to certain letter patterns.

Try leaving the "x" out of certain words and pronouncing them. "Except" would be "esept". Some words in English are spelled oddly because of the language from which they originated. English is a mutt language made up of Latin, Greek, Celtic and Germanic bits with other odds and ends thrown in, like Native American and Aboriginal Australian.

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And some other languages from the former british colonies too. However, most languages borrow some words from other languages. Often from english.

this reminds me of a poem.

I take it you already know
Of tough and bough and cough and dough?
Others may stumble, but not you,
On hiccough, thorough, lough and through?
Well done! And now you wish, perhaps,
To learn of less familiar traps?
Beware of heard, a dreadful word
That looks like beard and sounds like bird,
And dead: it's said like bed, not bead -
For goodness sake don't call it deed!
Watch out for meat and great and threat
(They rhyme with suite and straight and debt).
A moth is not a moth in mother,
Nor both in bother, broth in brother,
And here is not a match for there
Nor dear and fear for bear and pear,
And then there's dose and rose and lose -
Just look them up - and goose and choose,
And cork and work and card and ward,
And font and front and word and sword,
And do and go and thwart and cart -
Come, come, I've hardly made a start!
A dreadful language? Man alive!
I'd mastered it when I was five!

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In my experience lots of people get some of those wrong. Especially, but my no means exclusively, lough (loch).

Also, hiccough is a somewhat questionable spelling.