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HUMOR PAGES
ENGLISH IS A CRAZY LANGUAGE
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, that
you comb through annals of history but not a single annal? 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? If you wrote a letter, perhaps
you bote your tongue?
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? Park on driveways and drive on
parkways?
How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise man and
wise guy are opposites? How can overlook and oversee be opposites, while
quite a lot and quite a few are alike? How can the weather be hot as Hades
one day and cold as Hades another.
Some wierd questions:
Why is it called a TV "set" when you only get one?
Why does your nose run and your feet smell?
What do they use to ship Styrofoam?
If someone invented instant water, what would they mix it with?
Why does an alarm clock "go off" when it begins ringing?
What's another word for thesaurus?
Why do they sterilize the needles for lethal injections?
Have you noticed that we talk about certain things only when they are
absent? Have you ever seen a horseful carriage or a strapful gown? Met a
sung hero or experienced requited love? Have you ever run into someone
who was combobulated, gruntled, ruly or peccable? And where are all those
people who ARE spring chickens or who would ACTUALLY hurt a fly?
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 clock goes off by going on.
English was invented by people, not computers, and it reflects the
creativity of the human race (which, of course, isn't a race at all). That
is why, 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.
OTHER INTERESTING QUESTIONS...
* If you saw a heat wave, would you wave back?
* Why don't ease, lease, and please sound alike?
* Why isn't "palindrome" spelled "palindromeemordnilap"?
* Why are Chinese fortune cookies written in English?
* What does ignorant mean?
* How do you write zero in Roman numerals?
* Why is 'abbreviation' such a long word?
Find out where English is headed these days!
Spelling lesson:
Correctly Spelling 'Potato'
If GH can stand for P as in Hiccough
If OUGH can stand for O as in Dough
If PHTH can stand for T as in Phthisis
If EIGH can stand for A as in Neighbor
If TTE can stand for T as in Gazette
If EAU can stand for O as in Plateau
Then the right way to spell POTATO should be:
"GHOUGHPHTHEIGHTTEEAU"
