English is the most widely used language in the history of our planet. More than half of the world's books are in English. And of all the languages, it has the largest vocabulary - perhaps as many as 2 MILLION words. Nevertheless, I still think English is a crazy ass language. Lets take a look at a few examples -
There is no egg in eggplant nor ham in hamburger and neither apple nor pine in pineapple. English muffins weren't invented in England and neither were french fries in France. Sweetmeats are candies while sweetbreads (which aren't sweet at all), are meat.
All of us take English for granted. But if we explore its paradoxes, we find that quicksand is something that works slowly, boxing rings are actually squares and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig actually.
Isn't it a little crazy that you can make amends but not one single amend?
And isn't it a little weird that you can comb through annals of history but not a single annal?
What if you have a bunch of odds and ends and get rid of all but one of them, what do you call it?
And why is it that writers write but fingers don't fing? Shouldn't grocers groce and hammers 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? How?
If you wrote a letter, perhaps you bote your tongue?
If teachers taught, why didn't preacher praught? If a vegetarian eats vegetables, then 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?
Isn't it a little weird that a slim chance and a fat chance are the same, while a wise man and wise guy are opposites? How can overlook and oversee be opposites, while quite a lot and quite a few are alike? How can the weather be hot as hell one day and cold as hell another?
Also one of the other funny things about English is that we talk about certain things only when they are absent! Have you ever seen a horseful carriage or a strapful gown? Met a sung hero or experienced requited love? Have you ever run into someone who was combobulated, gruntled or ruly? And where are all those people who would ACTUALLY hurt a fly?
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 clock 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. And why, when I wind up my watch, I start it, but when I wind up this essay, I end it.
