Thursday, February 2, 2006

ISN'T ENGLISH A FUNNY LANGUAGE ?

ISN'T ENGLISH A FUNNY LANGUAGE ?

There is no egg in eggplant or ham in hamburger; neither apple nor pine in  pineapple...

Is cheese the plural of choose?


If teachers taught, why didn't preachers praught?


If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat?


Ship by truck, and send cargo by ship?


Have noses that run and feet that smell?


Park on driveways and drive on parkways            

                                                                                                                            
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, two indices?
                                                                                                                    
How can the weather be hot as hell one day and cold as hell another?
When a house burns up, it burns  down.                                                                                            
You fill in a form by filling it out,

and an alarm clock goes off by going on.
When the stars are out, they are visible, but when the lights are out, they are invisible.
And why, when I wind up my  watch, I start it, but when I wind up this essay, I end it?
.English muffins were not invented in England or French fries in France.                                                                                                                                                 

How can 'slim chance and a fat chance' be the same, while  ' wise man and a wise guy' are opposites?

                                                                                                                         

No wonder English is so hard to learn 

 

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yes it seems to me that English has some very odd rules to it.  Hugs,
Lisa

Anonymous said...

Oh man, I go to work for a couple of days and I miss out on picture games and fun with the english language...
Have a great weekend!
Linda :)

Anonymous said...

It's amazing some of the irony in speech.    mark