Only the English could have invented this Language. by Gren 24


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Gren 24
Had this sent to me and thought it quit good, sum may like it others not .But to me sum quit true.
Made me Smile.

ONLY THE ENGLISH COULD HAVE INVENTED THIS LANGUAGE!!! :-)

We'll begin with a box, and the plural is boxes,
But the plural of ox becomes oxen, not oxes.
One fowl is a goose, but two are called geese,
Yet the plural of moose should never be meese.
You may find a lone mouse or a nest full of mice,
Yet the plural of house is houses, not hice.

If the plural of man is always called men,
Then shouldn't the plural of pan be called pen?
If I speak of my foot and show you my feet,
And I give you a boot, would a pair be called beet?
If one is a tooth and a whole set are teeth,
Why shouldn't the plural of booth be called beeth?

Then one may be that, and three would be those,
Yet hat in the plural would never be hose,
And the plural of cat is cats, not cose.
We speak of a brother and also of brethren,
But though we say mother, we never say methren.
Then the masculine pronouns are he, his and him,
But imagine the feminine: she, shis and shim!

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 ..
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?
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 folks who grew up speaking English
should be committed to an asylum for the verbally insane.

In what other language do people recite at a play and play at a recital?
We ship by truck but send cargo by ship.
We have noses that run and feet that smell.
We park in a driveway and drive in a parkway.
And 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.

And, in closing, if Father is Pop, how come Mother's not Mop?


Les :)

Posted 08 Sep 2010, 19:29 #1 

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Zeb
Lovely! I could tell you the answer to most of those questions....but it'd probably kill me....the short reason is..The English did not invent the language...you'll have to blame all the migrants and colonial expeditions over the centuries.. :lol:

Oh and 'Pop' is an American term... :?

Posted 08 Sep 2010, 19:42 #2 

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Duncan
Interesting though, that many 'Americanisms' are actually older English than we use now. Apprently things like color are the old way of spellling it in English, we added the U later.
Image

Posted 08 Sep 2010, 21:17 #3 

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Zeb
Duncan wrote:Interesting though, that many 'Americanisms' are actually older English than we use now. Apprently things like color are the old way of spellling it in English, we added the U later.



Quite so....t'is a complicated thing etymology... :D

Posted 08 Sep 2010, 21:19 #4 

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Bermudan 75
Duncan is correct,

Samuel Johnson re-wrote the English Dictionary and put a French bias on the wording and pronuctiation. American wording is in fact more in line with the original spelling and pronunctiation pre Samuel Johnson, of the English language.

Cheers

Mike
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Posted 13 Sep 2010, 16:40 #5 

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Zeb
I used to live near his house in Lichfield.... :D

Posted 13 Sep 2010, 16:47 #6 

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Bermudan 75
Zeb wrote:I used to live near his house in Lichfield.... :D



Hi Zeb,

I bet he removed the t from Lichfield...............

Litchtfield

:cheers:

Mike
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Posted 13 Sep 2010, 17:19 #7 

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Bernard
Zeb wrote:I used to live near his house in Lichfield.... :D


Did you go round for tea? :gmc:
I don't like signatures, they take up too much screen space.

Posted 13 Sep 2010, 17:20 #8 

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SpongeBob
Zeb wrote:I used to live near his house in Lichfield.... :D


I still live near him ;) Or well, where he did live. In fact, it's 100 yards from where I work :D The trust still hold birthday celebrations each year in the town centre often performing period plays and serving cake and refreshments in the museum. Fountain of information is me :gmc: :mrgreen:

Posted 13 Sep 2010, 18:28 #9 


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