DO YOU KNOW ENGLISH IS A CRAZY LANGUAGE?

English is the most widely spoken language in the history of our planet, used in some way by at least one out of every seven human beings around the globe. Half of the world’s books are written English, and the majority of international telephone calls are made in English. English has acquired the widest vocabulary of all the world’s languages, perhaps as many as two million words, and has generated one of the noblest bodies of literature in the annals of the human race.

Nonetheless, it is now time to face the fact that English is a crazy language– the most lunatic and loopy and wifty and wiggy of all languages. In the crazy English language, the blackbird hen is brown, blackboards can be green or blue, and blackberries are green and then red before they are ripe. Even if blackberries were really black and blueberries really blue, what are strawberries, cranberries, elderberries, huckleberries, and raspberries supposed to look like?

To add to this insanity, there is no butter in buttermilk, no egg in eggplant, no grape in grapefruit, no bread in shortbread, neither worms nor wood in wormwood, neither mush nor room in mushroom, neither pine nor apple in pineapple, neither peas nor nuts in peanuts and no ham in a hamburger. Sweetmeat is made from fruit, while sweetbread, which is not sweet is made from meat.

We find that hot dogs can be cold, dark rooms can be lit, homework can be done in school, nightmares can take place in broad daylight while daydreaming can take place at night, tomboys are girls and midwives can be men. Hours, especially happy hours and rush hours can last longer than sixty minutes.

Why is it that a woman can man a station but a man can not woman one, that a man can father a movement but a woman cannot mother one, and that a king can rule a kingdom but a queen doesn’t rule a queendom?

If we conceive a conception and receive at a reception why don’t we grieve at a greption and believe in a beleption?
If adults commit adultery, do infants commit infantry? If Olive oil is made from olives, what do they make baby oil from? If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what do humanitarians eat?

Sometimes you have to believe that all English speakers should be committed to an asylum for the verbally insane. If not, in what other language do people drive in a parkway and park in a drive way?
English is indeed a crazy language.

WELCOME BACK TO CLASS! HAVE A PRODUCTIVE AND FRUITFUL NEW YEAR!
Henceforth, our lectures come in only on Mondays but you can be sure they will be worth a week’s lessons.