topic Re: English Isn't As Easy As You Think in Community Spirit

English Isn't As Easy As You Think

illicit69 — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 03:40:44 GMT

English Isn't As Easy As You Think.

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.
😎 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.
20) 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. That is why, when the stars are out, they are visible, but when the lights are out, they are invisible.

Re: English Isn't As Easy As You Think

2106greencat — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 03:48:32 GMT

Seen this before, but it never get's old

and yes - English ain't easy

Re: English Isn't As Easy As You Think

icyfroth — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 03:52:30 GMT

Doesn't matter everyone wants to talk it.

You go overseas and learn a few phrases in the local language, ppl come over and help you straight away in English. You give up.

Re: English Isn't As Easy As You Think

spotweldersfriend — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 03:55:57 GMT

Yes iddis.

Re: English Isn't As Easy As You Think

icyfroth — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 04:04:46 GMT

what's iddis?

Re: English Isn't As Easy As You Think

lakeland27 — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 04:06:09 GMT

i cant dump my refuse because they refuse to open the gate . now my place is a dump rather than the dump. i wound up licking my wounds.

Re: English Isn't As Easy As You Think

polksaladallie — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 04:07:35 GMT

@icyfroth wrote:
what's iddis?

Iddis what iddis.

Re: English Isn't As Easy As You Think

icyfroth — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 04:08:20 GMT

@lakeland27 wrote:
i cant dump my refuse because they refuse to open the gate . now my place is a dump rather than the dump. i wound up licking my wounds.

maybe that's what the Bobalas women are up against in Bondi!

Re: English Isn't As Easy As You Think

2106greencat — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 04:12:07 GMT

@lakeland27 wrote:
i cant dump my refuse because they refuse to open the gate . now my place is a dump rather than the dump. i wound up licking my wounds.

As I look through my ~~window~~ computer pane I feel your pain.

Re: English Isn't As Easy As You Think

lakeland27 — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 04:11:35 GMT

i refuse to discuss the bobolas refuse until they stop refusing me entry to rid myself of my own refuse.

Re: English Isn't As Easy As You Think

2106greencat — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 04:11:51 GMT

and 'have a cup of tea before you tee off, and I have two others who want to play golf too

okay - horrific grammar but you get the pitcher LOL

Re: English Isn't As Easy As You Think

spotweldersfriend — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 04:17:24 GMT

If you're fascinated by the English language.try a get a hold of Bill Bryson's "Mother Tongue". An excellent reed....er read.

Re: English Isn't As Easy As You Think

polksaladallie — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 04:20:56 GMT

air, heir, ere, e'er, are,

all pronounced the same.

Re: English Isn't As Easy As You Think

the_great_she_elephant — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 04:43:21 GMT

ENGLISH PRONUNCIATION FOR FOREIGNERS.

(and no I didn't write this myself I'm not sure who the original author was)

I take it you already know
Of tough and bough and cough and dough?
Others may stumble, but not you
On hiccough, thorough, laugh and through?

Well done! And now you wish perhaps
To learn of less familiar traps?

Beware of heard, a dreadful word
That looks like beard and sounds like bird;

And dead: it’s said like bed, not bead -
For goodness sake don’t call it ‘deed’.
Watch out for meat and great and threat.
They rhyme with suite and straight and debt.

A moth is not a moth in mother,
nor both in bother, broth in brother,
And here is not a match for there
Nor dear and fear for bear and pear,

And then there’s dose and rose and lose -
Just look them up - and goose and choose.

And cord and work and card and ward,
And font and front and word and sword,

And do and go and thwart and cart -
Come come, I’ve hardly made a start!
A dreadful language? Man alive,
I’d mastered it when I was five!

Re: English Isn't As Easy As You Think

2106greencat — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 05:03:42 GMT

'oly krap - I still don' gerrit

Re: English Isn't As Easy As You Think

kennedia_nigricans — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 11:06:01 GMT

english, compared to other languages is one of the easiest.

these texts are designed to make you feel good about the only languge you know (and it's working LOL).

most of the grammar other languages have just does not exist in english which makes it simple and easy to learn. it also makes it difficult to express things precisely, so often i am left with the choice to either use 5 english sentences to describe what (i only would need one in my first language) or just be very unprecise.

Re: English Isn't As Easy As You Think

electric*mayhem*band — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 11:30:24 GMT

If you want to hear mangled English, take a trip to Newcastle-upon-Tyne. On their city Coat of Arms there is the motto:

'Oi yon amma awa eya inny'. Translated = 'Throw that hammer over here my friend'.

No kidding, you'll think you've entered a parallel world.

Re: English Isn't As Easy As You Think

rawr*i*r*dinosaur — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 11:32:45 GMT

yes it is

Re: English Isn't As Easy As You Think

kennedia_nigricans — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 11:47:20 GMT

if i want to hear mangled english i don't need to go any further than the next shop or just talk to the first person i meet on the street.

OR i read here.

Re: English Isn't As Easy As You Think

electric*mayhem*band — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 17:42:51 GMT

@kennedia_nigricans wrote:
if i want to hear mangled english i don't need to go any further than the next shop or just talk to the first person i meet on the street.

OR i read here.

Yes, like a lower case letter for a personal pronoun, ditto for beginning a sentence. *tsk,tsk*