Hyphens

My story today involves a veritable math geek.  We were discussing last names and he has more names than I do if you count the fact he's a "the second".  I asked if his last names were hyphenated.  He responds in the affirmative.  Then tells me,
"it's hypen"

Um, excuse you?  Did you, Mr. Statistics/Math/Science/CPA/Auditor Geek just try to tell me how to spell?  Me?  An English major from the #1 English Department in the country?  Not only that, but let's turn words into math.  We'll go back to our young'un years for this one.

The word is pronounced: hi-fen.  Well, we know that in this circumstance the hi section is hy due to the fact that... well... we just know.  But that's not the part screwed up, so we'll move on.  We also know by virtue of the fact we're old enough that the second part of the word is not "fen" as it is just never that easy.  So what else makes the f-sound? 

P+H=F-sound

It's math!  It's math!  Just with letters!  It's algebra!  Should I make a theorem about this and turn it into geometry?

Upshot is folks, sound out the word.  Then correct the writing geek. 

It's not hypen.  It's hyphen.

And that's your word lesson for the day.  Go use it in a sentence.