darn english...

As if there's not enough confusion in the world today:

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? So tell me, if the teacher taught - why isn't it that the preacher praught? If a horsehair mat is made from the hair of horses and a camel hair coat from the hair of camels - what is the name of the animal that gives us mohair?

Sometimes it makes you wonder if all English speakers should be committed to an asylum for the verbally insane. In what other language do people drive on a parkway - and park on a driveway? Then we recite at a play - and play at a recital? We ship by truck and send cargo by ship? And have you noticed that we have noses that run and feet that smell? How can a fat chance and a slim chance be the same thing? While a wise man and a wise guy are opposites? How can overlook and oversee be opposites, while quite a lot and quite a few are alike? How can weather be as hot as hell one day - and as cold as hell the next? And then sometimes we only talk about certain things when they are absent.

No doubt you have seen a horseless carriage - but have you ever wondered what a "horseful carriage" would look like? And have you ever seen a "strapful gown", or met a "sung hero", or experienced "requited love?" And I ask you, have you ever run into someone who was "combobulated", "gruntled," "ruly," or "peccable"? And where are the people who "are spring chickens," or 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 your alarm clock goes off by going on. English was invented by people, not by computers, and it reflects the creativity of the human race (which, of course, is not really a race at all). That is why, when stars are out they are visible, but when the lights are out they are invisible.

Here's more:

The bandage was wound around the wound.
The farm was used to produce produce.
The dump was so full that it had to refuse more refuse.
We must polish the Polish furniture.
He could lead if he would get the lead out.
The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert.
Since there is no time like the present, he thought it was time to present the present.
A bass was painted on the head of the bass drum.
When shot at, the dove dove into the bushes.
I did not object to the object.
The insurance was invalid for the invalid.
There was a row among the oarsmen about how to row.
They were too close to the door to close it.
The buck does funny things when the does are present.
A seamstress and a sewer fell down into a sewer line.
To help with planting, the farmer taught his sow to sow.
The wind was too strong to wind the sail.
After a number of injections my jaw got number.
Upon seeing the tear in the painting I shed a tear.
I had to subject the subject to a series of tests.
How can I intimate this to my most intimate friend?