Caller "Penny" complained that pronouncing the word kilometer as "ki-LO-meter" (with the stress falling on the second syllable) is incorrect. Without even referring to the dictionary I personally was inclined to accept both pronunciations as common. But beyond that, her argument is, frankly, whacko. At least the grounds upon which she made her assertion were ... bogus. (Insert here standard disclaimers: I am not a professional pronunciationist; there are many exceptions to pronunciation "rules", etc. etc.) Following Penny's claim, the following familiar words would be pronounced thusly: THER-mo-meter, BAR-o-meter, TACH-o-meter, SPEED-o-meter (the thing that measures the distance from the navel down to the top of one's swimming shorts, which in some cases I've seen is a great distance like unto a great-circle polar route); and there are others which I will leave for others to offer. Penny based her claim on the common pronunciation of the word kilogram (KI-lo-gram), with the stress on the first syllable. But kilogram has a single syllable affix "gram", and when a single-syllable affix is attached to a two-syllable prefix, the stress indeed is often (maybe not always) on the first syllable as she claims. But this is not usually the case when two-syllable affixes are involved. Are you ready for this: Kilometer has a two-syllable affix "meter" and often in such cases the pronunciation for such words (i.e. one with a two-syllable prefix such as "thermo" followed by a two-syllable affix such as "meter") takes the stress on the second syllable of the prefix (ther-MO), not on the first syllable as Penny claims -- she would say THER-mo-meter; the rest of the world says "ther-MO-meter". INTERESTINGLY, however, we all know of other instances in which that same prefix "thermo" indeed DOES take the stress on the first syllable, such as "THER-mo-coupler" or "THER-mo-stat". I could go on a bit more about two-syllable prefixes followed by a single-syllable affix (kilogram, microdot, minivan, etc.), but because I am not a licensed or-THO-grapher (that is to say, "OR-tho-grapher" in Penny-speak, I'll quit now. The moral of this little commentary is this: When a listener calls CarTalk to complain about pronunciation, hang up. Here's the link to the entry on "kilometer" and its pronunciation in the online Merriam-Webster dictionary: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/kilometer (Name withheld because I don't want the orTHOgrapher's union to come get me for practicing without a license.)