But we didn't learn. We kept at most of it - phoenix, cough, dough etc. He even suggested sensible transformations such as ache → ake, soup → soop, tongue → tun

But we didn't learn. We kept at most of it - phoenix, cough, dough etc. He even suggested sensible transformations such as ache → ake, soup → soop, tongue → tung, machine → masheen etc. All of these make phonetical sense unlike the existing spellings (for whatever reason they exist). I had read about Cut Spelling which, to me, sounds more like SMS lingo - something like "how du u du" - and even though I find SMS lingo really irritating (I have to see that a lot on dating apps) it actually does make sense phonetically :)