English is Crazy

Yeah, and how come bow and bough sound the same?

But bow rhymes with Joe?

Here's one I like: "quite" has two opposite meanings.

Examples: #1. I quite like it. (I like it a bit)

#2. Have you quite finished? (Have you completely finished?)

And or course cleave, which means either stick together or be severed...

When your tongue cleaves to the roof of your mouth, it sticks there.

When your hoof is cloven (remember this, Gus) it is split into two parts.

nice contribution

How about...boy, she is pretty ugly!

Here's an entry I made last week:



A stye
Is an eye sore;


A sty,
Is an eyesore.



Ain't English a bitch?!

Letty -- Latvian dogs all say 'vau vau.' (Phonetic spelling.)

Frank -- 'pretty ugly' is an oxymoron. Good and drunk is another similar expression I like.

And moot has two meanings - more or less directly opposite one another.

How about can you hear live music where you live? Wouldn't you think live and live would sound the same?

I would think so, but if I'm willing to believe any, and all, advertising, at least I can stil have food "Fresh from the freezer."

Here's a groaner for you, Rog. How do you get down off an elephant? You don't. You get down off a duck.....

The time-honoured cry of the Glasgow tram conductress, ejecting a reluctant person from the vehicle:

"C'moan, git aff!"

("Come on, get off!")

Loved that one, McTag, I could hear that dialect perfectly.

One may tick a lock or look for Nessie in the loch. Also, a donkey brays while sliding down the slippery slopes of a brae. Auld sounds much better than old, as well. Frankly, I love dialects. Here's an interesting link that reinforces my idea of the difficulty of learning English (both the Mother tongue and those upstart colonists)

http://www.fictionfactor.com/articles/hhhh.html

Did have a small smile out of the expression, "de boat of youse" meaning the both of you.

I found in a short story the following conversation:

"Most of the time I have to conduct these conversations in my head; it is such a relief to have persons I can play them out with"
"Interlocutors. Not persons. Interlocutors."
"Interlocutors I can play them out with."
"Play them out on."
"Interlocutors I can play them out on. i'm sorry, I will stop."


I tried to get the meaning of "play sth out with/out" but failed!
Anyone knows the meaning?

Play with an interlocutor?
I don't know, just wild guesses, but I think it is an expression, "how things play out", sort of like how they work out, and the idea is that from our perspective we can plan things but what happens is something else, the "unpredictable" is factored in. The unpredictable being the rest of the people. So "play" is really more descriptive than "work"...also that idea Shakespeare had about all the world being a stage and people are the "players"...

And it's a lot safer if you can try to get a larger vision just inside your own head, you get to "play" both parts, lol...

But it's a lot like masturbating too, lol.

(Don't even know exactly what interlocutor means...)

I love to talk on the net, it's the same as talking inside your head, but a bit easier to make the Other seem "real"...sometimes the other really is real...people listen and talk back.

Paradise 22 -- think of being an actor. You can read a script, you can read a play and that's all in your head. Or you can actually play it out with another actor. That's what the phrase means -- playing out a conversation, rather than keeping it in your head. (BTW, welcome to A2K!)

Whilst you guys are complaining and talking about English being difficult...does any of you people know a good computer program to improve my vocabulary?
I really could need some help there, especially with all those phrasal verbs where adding or not adding a certain preposition makes a world's difference.

So...any suggestions on that?

Oh and by the way, so I'm not totally off-topic here:
English isn't that hard...as long as you refrain from watching Snoop Dogg and P Diddy on MTV, whoever understands those guys.

hamster -- those guys don't speak English.
(No suggestions at the moment for vocabulary improvement, but I'm working on it.)

[quote="Merry Andrew"]Paradise 22 -- think of being an actor. You can read a script, you can read a play and that's all in your head. Or you can actually play it out with another actor. That's what the phrase means -- playing out a conversation, rather than keeping it in your head. (BTW, welcome to A2K!)[/quote]

That's it..i guess it's the correct meaning I was looking for
Thx Merry..that would help me alot 4 I'm working on translating this short story and the phrase was really strange to me.

And yes.. one day i may think of being an actress..but i would certainly be the worst actress in history !