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Why English Is Such A Difficult Language.

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Old May 14, 2006 | 01:26 PM
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Reasons why the English language is so hard to learn:

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.

8) 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?

Author Unknown



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, 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.

How about when you want to shut down your computer you have to hit start.
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Old May 14, 2006 | 02:20 PM
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that was funny lmao.gif lmao.gif

especially:

QUOTE
Have noses that run and feet that smell?


haha.gif haha.gif haha.gif
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Old May 14, 2006 | 02:32 PM
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lmao. nice

some of those are taken from Gallagher
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Old May 14, 2006 | 02:56 PM
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Haha,... NICE
lmao.gif
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Old May 14, 2006 | 09:10 PM
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Don't forget... We park IN a driveway and drive ON a parkway. tongue.gif
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Old May 15, 2006 | 12:13 AM
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^^ oh yeah i heard that somewhere.
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Old May 15, 2006 | 12:43 AM
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LMAO that shitt is so funny!

Yah english is very hard to perfect, but the easiest to speak roughly. Since we are so forgiving with all the slang and accents.

We (english speakers) might get confusing because of the first english speaker's lack of imagingation when words were generated but at least we dont conjugate our verbs to represent the person doing them as ive quickly found out in the trends of the two other languages that i know roughly. Spanish and Polish.

Its easy

He ran
She ran
We ran
They ran

English is such a plug and play language where most of the time you can change one of the words and it still works.

When trying to speak polish if i f*ck the word a little bit or use the wrong conjugation Selina (Swift) will have no idea what im trying to say

but in english you could totally butcher the word (as Selinas dad tends to do) and we still understand whats being said
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Old May 15, 2006 | 01:07 AM
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^lmao, yea my dad butchers a lot of words but its funny!! lmao.gif

I think English is such an easy language compared to others. Other languages like the ones I know, Polish and German, are more complicated. Conjugations are always needed otherwise what your trying to say wont make sense. Luckily, Polish was my first language so learning how to write it etc. was easier. When i started learning German though..it took a little more effort..stupid conjugations.

There are some things that dont make sense in Polish too though, i.e., like "czesc" (hey) can also be used to say goodbye. Alex finds this weird lol.

I think its harder for immigrants to learn English for the first time because they are not use to not conjugating words.
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Old May 15, 2006 | 02:00 AM
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In English there are also a lot of wierd tenses, like Future Perfect Continuous with some Passive Voice, lol...

Yeah conjunctions are PITA, I know some people that learn Russian and it's hard for them to understand and use correctly all conjunctions, male/female words etc...

BTW, Swift and Alex, Polish is a bit similar to Ukrainian, so I can understand it a bit wink1.gif
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Old May 15, 2006 | 02:05 AM
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^^Yeah Dmitry I know. fing02.gif

One of my girl friends in high school spoke it and there were some words I understood; the similarities are pretty cool.
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