english language

gonfishing

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hi all and we complain other l;anguages are hard!!!

Reasons why the English language might be a little hard to learn:
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) After a number of injections my jaw got number.
19) Upon seeing the tear in the painting I shed a tear.
20) I had to subject the subject to a series of tests.
21) How can I intimate this to my most intimate friend?

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. Why, when the stars are out, that means they are visible, but when the lights are out, that means they are invisible.

Confused? I am and Im English!!!


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FergusM

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A little addition for number 12:

There was a row among the oarsmen about how to row along the row of moored boats...

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Gunfleet

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Nice post. produce/produce refuse/refuse are nouns which are back formed out of verbs. If they had the full present participle they would be gerunds. To get to why its mouse and mice but not moose and meece (although it's funny, I've always thought that) you have to understand a bit about the way old English works. This isn't the place for it but believe it or not there are rules.
To refute your general point, English is in fact much easier to use than most other languages. There are few cases (and anyway we don't use them accurately). You can manage with simple tenses. Subjunctives are rare. If you mispronounce things we can usually understand you. That isn't the case with French or German, for example, where a small mispronounciation can make you unintelligible. The robustness is why everyone else loves speaking English... that and the fact that speaking English or Spanish gives you access to dollars!

I don't suppose you expected a serious answer.

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gonfishing

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guess something has happened to your boat??? or is it the weather?? can't think why anyone would want to be so serious otherwise!!!!!!!!!!!

regards
julian

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FergusM

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This reminded me of a piece of grafitti:

Written on toilet wall: In Communist China, the workers take the lead!

Below, in another hand: In socialist Britain, the bastards take the copper tubing!

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hlb

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I think this explains my spelling. I must be far to intelegent to understand english!

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Haydn
 

gonfishing

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in the same predicament as you, only what makes things a little bit more interesting, is avoiding the I.T police, you know acceptable use policy etc !!!!!!!!!

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milltech

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OK...go on then. What's a "gerund"? I remember hearing about them at school, but along with most English grammer it failed to impose itself on my sparse amount of grey matter. I don't seem to remember thinking about anything except sex, food and Rock n' Roll during my entire teenage years.

<hr width=100% size=1>John
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