For our friends that are having a problem understanding the English Language:

Can you read these right the first time?

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.

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."

< /SPAN>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 UPthe 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.
And this UP is confusing: 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... time to shut UP...!

Man, Swampfox that's messed UP

When my friend and I were teaching English over seas she started making a list like this for her students. Over the years we've added to it. The English language is the most messed UP language we can think of. It's the whole separated by a common language. Nice to see someone found this too.

Yeah that's how I feel when I first learn English..

It's a wonder I could speak English at all...

Gelan

SwampFox

The exuberance of your verbosity is much too copious for my diminutive comprehension...

Tink,
I would think for a teacher, up on English, that is if it is up to them, would find it to be a fun exercise around this time of year to have students perform an up experiment to see just how messed up can the word up get without being up side down or up the creek or up to no good or being up to their neck in up words with different meanings. Of course that is up to you.8)

At one time I was schooled or formally trained, in Lau (Laotian). Lau is similar to English in that the same word can have many meanings depending on the inflection in the voice and its use. As I recall (it has been 40 years) the Lau word for Mother in-law and water buffalo is the same. We were earnestly warned about the use of that particular word.
Ed

I have so many ELL students (those still learning english) that I think it might mess with their little minds. Though when I was tutoring at the college me and my friend got them into a conversation with how many different ways we could use Dude. We dumbfounded them with only using dude with different inflections, it was great.

start with...dude--what's up?

giggling you canadians cant speak it right either..

Its DUUUDE.. waz up??

My my hunterjoe what a virile way of utilizing your vocabulary, here I thought you were just another good ole boy. my apalogizes.
I do know of another in here with a voracious way of speaking with a cornucopia of witty phrases. in english and cunuckastanian.

well now I know which ones really know a thing or two?

always surprised in here.

regards
keetoowah

WHY SPEAK ENGLISH?

A U.S. Navy Admiral was attending a naval conference that included Admirals from the U.S., English, Canadian, Australian and French Navies.
At a cocktail reception, he found himself standing with a large group of officers that included personnel from most of the countries.
Everyone was chatting away in English as they sipped their drinks but a French admiral suddenly complained that, whereas Europeans learn many languages, Americans learn only English. He then asked "Why is it that we always have to speak English in these conferences rather than speaking French?"
Without hesitating, the American Admiral replied "Maybe it's because the Brits, Canadians, Aussies, Kiwis and Americans arranged it so you wouldn't have to speak German."
You could have heard a pin drop.

:-D:-D:-D:-D:-D

Dimitri

Gelandangan...Aussies speak English??? And all this time I thought you and Vince were bilingual...

Good point Dimiti

Last time I tried to talk to a Scot I had to have a Canadian translate for us.

The Scottish accent is also called the "Eastern" accent here, as many in the Maritime provinces have it.

Alexander Keith's is a Nova Scotian beer, its quite good actually, here are some commercials playing with the Eastern Scottish accent, they were pulled from TV based on the reasons that were listed on YouTube.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=H15xBHqPDZE
www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZiabUfQT1g
www.youtube.com/watch?v=YPMAm3Un8bk

Dimitri