There's not much room. Photo by
M'reen
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 animal organs.
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?
Why is the plural of mouse mice but
the plural of house isn't hice?
Should it be houses and mouses?
Or more than one goose is geese but
moose aren't meese
A number of dice are die but
multiple grains of rice aren't rie!
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.
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!
Now it's UP to you what you do with this
email
that was sent to me by a friend and so has no author that
I know of.
A practical overview of Turbo Charged Reading
YouTubeHow to choose a book. A Turbo Charged Reading
YouTubeEmotions when Turbo Charged Reading
YouTube
Perhaps you’d like to check out my sister blogs:
To quote the Dr Seuss himself, “The more that you read, the more things you will know.
The more that you learn; the more places you'll go.”
