We wonder why people have trouble learning the English
language -- even those of us have it as our first language!!!
You think English is easy???
1) The bandage was wound around the wound.
2) The farm was used to produce produce .
3) The dump was so full that it had to refuse more
refuse.
4) We must polish the Polish furniture.
5) He could lead if he would get the lead
out.
6) The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the
desert.
7) Since there is no time like the present, he
thought it was time to present the present .
8) A bass was painted on the head of the bass drum.
9) When shot at, the dove dove into the bushes.
10) I did not object to the object.
11) The insurance was invalid for the invalid.
12) There was a row among the oarsmen about how to row
13) They were too close to the door to close
it.
14) The buck does funny things when the does
are present.
15) A seamstress and a sewer fell down into a
sewer line.
16) To help with planting, the farmer taught his sow
to sow.
17) The wind was too strong to wind the
sail.
18) Upon seeing the tear in the painting I shed a
tear..
19) I had to subject the subject to a series
of tests.
Let's face it - English is a crazy language. There is no
egg in eggplant, nor ham in hamburger; neither apple nor pine in pineapple.
English muffins weren't invented in England or French fries in France ..
Sweetmeats are candies while sweetbreads, which aren't sweet, are meat. We take
English for granted. But if we explore its paradoxes, we find that quicksand
can work slowly, boxing rings are square and a guinea pig is neither from
Guinea nor is it a pig.
And why is it that writers write but fingers don't fing,
grocers don't groce and hammers don't ham? If the plural of tooth is teeth, why
isn't the plural of booth, beeth? One goose, 2 geese. So one moose, 2 meese?
One index, 2 indices? Doesn't it seem crazy that you can make amends but not
one amend? If you have a bunch of odds and ends and get rid of all but one of
them, what do you call it?
If teachers taught, why didn't preachers praught? If a
vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat? Sometimes I think all
the English speakers should be committed to an asylum for the verbally insane.
In what language do people recite at a play and play at a recital? Ship by
truck and send cargo by ship? Have noses that run and feet that smell?
How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while
a wise man and a wise guy are opposites? You have to marvel at the unique
lunacy of a language in which your house
can burn up as it burns down, in which you fill in a form
by filling it out and in which, an alarm goes off by going on.
English was invented by people, not computers, and it
reflects the creativity of the human race, which, of course, is not a race at
all. That is why, when the stars are out, they are visible, but when the lights
are out, they are invisible.
PS. - Why doesn't 'Buick' rhyme with 'quick' ?
You lovers of the English language might enjoy this .
There is a two-letter word that perhaps has more meanings
than any other
two-letter word, and that is 'UP..'
It's easy to understand
UP,
meaning toward the sky or at the top of the list, but when we awaken in the
morning, why do we wake UP ? At a meeting, why does a topic come UP ? Why do
we speak UP
and why are the officers UP for election and why is it UP to the secretary to write UP a report?
We call UP our friends. And we use it to brighten UP a room,
polish UP
the silver; we warm UP
the leftovers and clean UP the kitchen. We lock UP the house and some guys fix UP the old
car. At other times the little word has real special meaning. People stir UP trouble,
line UP
for tickets, work
UP! an appetite, and think UP
excuses.. To be dressed is one thing, but to be dressed UP is special.
And this UP is confusing: A drain must be opened UP because
it is stopped UP. We open UP a store
in the morning but we close it UP at night.
We seem to be pretty mixed
UP
about UP!
To be knowledgeable about the proper uses of UP, look the word UP in the
dictionary. In a desk-sized dictionary, it takes UP almost 1/4th of the page and
can add UP
to about thirty definitions. If you are UP to it, you might try building UP a list
of the many ways UP
is used. It will take
UP a lot of your time, but if you don't give UP, you may wind UP with a
hundred or more. When it threatens to rain, we say it is clouding UP . When
the sun comes out we say it is clearing UP...
When it rains, it wets the earth and often messes things UP.
When it doesn't rain for awhile, things dry UP.
One could go on and on, but I'll wrap it UP, for now
my time is UP,
so......it is time to shut UP!
Bon courage!
Ha! Beautiful counterbalance to the last post...
ReplyDeleteI'd seen the first part before...but not all of it.
ReplyDeleteas for the uses of UP...don't tempt me...
Amazing!
ReplyDeleteWe are so used to the way we speak and our language, that we don't notice what you've brought to our attention.
Thanks! That was an eyeopener.
Tammy- Thank you. And thanks for the comments on the cockroach story.
ReplyDeleteFly-I'd love to tempt you! You could have a ball with that word.
JoAnna-You're right. As much as this learning French thing pains me at times, I'm still glad my native language...the one I learned naturally from birth...is English!
I love this! (We certainly take a lot for granted when it comes to l'Anglais!)
ReplyDeleteDelana, First, happy thanksgiving! what are you doing to celebrate?
ReplyDeleteSecond, very funny post...i just started tutoring 'an ado' in english and as michele says, 'speaking english is like breathing' for us so it's weird to think of it from a distance.
Third, isn't it so nice to know that even though sometimes we feel alone we always have each other.
Fourth, eggs?
Wow, that was a lot.
aidan x
Quelle horreur cette langue anglaise! I was asked today by a french friend to provide the rules for "any" vs. "some". OMG! Chaos reigns in our language.
ReplyDelete