# English is a crazy language

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-is-a-crazy-language/65827>\
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\
**Created:** [May 18, 2001, 2:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-is-a-crazy-language/65827 "2001-05-18T14:29:45Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![curious\_george](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b487fb/32.png) [@curious\_george](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/curious_george)\
**Post date:** [May 18, 2001, 2:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-is-a-crazy-language/65827/1 "2001-05-18T14:29:45Z")

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LET’S FACE IT - ENGLISH IS A CRAZY LANGUAGE.

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?

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, is not a race at all.  
That is why, when the stars are out, they are visible, but when the  
lights are out, they are invisible.

P.S. Why doesn’t “buick” rhyme with “quick”?

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**Author:** ![Terminus\_Est](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terminus_est/32/3087_2.png) [@Terminus\_Est](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terminus_Est)\
**Post date:** [May 18, 2001, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-is-a-crazy-language/65827/2 "2001-05-18T14:46:49Z")

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You really should cite [Richard Lederer](http://www.geocities.com/CollegePark/6174/english_crazy.html), who wrote it. Check out [his web site](http://pw1.netcom.com/~rlederer/index.htm) while you’re at it.

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**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\
**Post date:** [May 18, 2001, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-is-a-crazy-language/65827/3 "2001-05-18T16:03:01Z")

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Which came first, Richard Lederer’s essay or Gallagher’s routine?