Why English is Difficult To Learn...
-
The bandage was wound around the wound.
-
The farm was used to produce produce.
-
The dump was so full that it had to refuse more refuse.
-
We must polish the Polish furniture.
-
He could lead if he would get the lead out.
-
The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert.
-
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.
-
When shot at, the dove dove into the bushes.
-
I did not object to the object.
-
The insurance was invalid for the invalid.
-
There was a row among the row of oarsmen about how to row.
-
They were to close to the door to close it.
-
The buck does funny things when the does are present.
-
A seamstress and a sewer fell down into a sewer line.
-
To help with planting, the farmer taught his sow to sow.
-
The wind was too strong to wind the sail.
-
After a number of injections my jaw got number.
-
Upon seeing the tear in the painting I shed a tear.
-
I had to subject the subject to tests on the subject.
-
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
at all, are meats.
-
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.
-
Sometimes, I think all the English speakers should be
committed to an asylum for the verbally insane.
-
What other reason could there be for saying that people recite
at a play and play at a recital? Or, ship cargo by truck and send cargo by
ship? Or, 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?
-
How can overlook and oversee be opposites, while quite a lot
and quite a few are alike?
-
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, 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...
