The Nutty English Language

[pipedope]

Four All Who Reed and Right
===========================
(for all who read and write)

We'll begin with a box, and the plural is boxes;
but the plural of ox became 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,
why shouldn't the plural of pan be called pen?

If I spoke 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?

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.

~Author Unknown~

 

[got4boyz]

That was really funny!

 

[d33ps1x]

Brilliant stuff. Love it.

 

[pipedope]

Some from Gallagher, some from George Carlin, both of whom are on my list of heros.

 

[garyfotodiver]

Some from Gallagher, some from George Carlin, both of whom are on my list of heros.

Allen Sherman (Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh) wrote a song about this in the 1960's.

 

[Kim]

I guess you just have to be English to get it.......

 

[miketsp]

I take it you already know
Of tough and bough and cough and dough?
Others may stumble but not you
On hiccough, thorough, slough 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, or brother,
And here is not a match for there,
Nor dear and fear for bear and pear,
And then there's doze and rose and lose-
Just look them up- and goose and choose,
And cork and work and card and ward
And font and front and word and sword,
And do and go and thwart and cart-
Come, I've hardly made a start!
A dreadful language? Man alive!
I'd learned to speak it when I was five!
And yet to write it, the more I sigh,
I'll not learn how 'til the day I die.

 

[mania]

and one more:

A cat has claws at the end of its paws
a comma is a pause at the end of a clause

Mania
PS. Kim Leece - you don't have to be native English to get it. But to be honest Polish is even more complicated, so I find english easier to learn than Polish.
For example - newspaper in Polish is "gazeta".
Plural is more complicated:
two newspapers - "gazety" but five and more newspapers - "gazet".