Greeting someone, in English, is a horrid experience. Two lovers wake up and say, “Hi,” in each other’s face. That morning breath cannot be a pleasant method to greet each other. For this task, I suggest the word, up. One has to suck in to speak it. No spittle or exhale needs to fall upon the communicatee.
Up can be replaced by arising or raise your eyes. Up is far too valuable to be languishing in bed and then arising. While we are on the subject, some places in Pennsylvania need some work; namely Pittsburgh and Pottstown. One usually needs to wash his/her face after having them spoken nearby.
In the United States, we have a standard household appliance that is sure to confuse and terrify non-English speakers. It is the vacuum cleaner. “What; you have to clean your vacuum?” How did this particular space get dirty in the first place? How does one get filth into a vacuum? Why are there so many “U’s” in vacuum and queue? What happens with displaced “Q’s?” We call one nation, Iraq. How is that possible? We can have a queue but not Iraque.
Why do people say, “I have to use the bathroom,” these days? Bathtubs are becoming a thing of the past. However, they go into this room and neither shower nor bath. They are relieving their bladder or bowels or both. The British get this one right as they declare, “I’m off for the crapper.”
Years ago, the late George Carlin brought to our attention the usage of “driveway” and “Parkway.” Of course, during rush hours, many a Parkway become just that. Why can’t driveways be called garage spurs? This whole issue confuses my Grammarly.
I have never figured out someone claiming, “Your mind is in the gutter.” What is gutter supposed to mean? Are we talking ceremonial disembowelment here? Your mind is on the samurai.” Well, duh! The English meaning of gutter includes the space in a notebook or book between pages. Why would your mind transferring in reading across the binding be a bad thing?” Someone in the back has raised his/her hand. “Yes?” “It means you have a dirty mind.”
I’m thinking, “Oh really? Does that mean I have to flush it or bathe it before I can use it again?”
Which brings us to how does one flush a toilet? What was the toilet embarrassed about other than your bare ass? I have you ever seen the porcelain change color after usage. Is the bottom surface of the toilet flush with the floor? The crapper may have started out that way, but heavy weights gave it a tilt. “Son, did you flush the toilet when done?”
“No Dad; it still sags from Aunt Bessie’s last visit.”
Here is a proposal; Diphthongs and other letter combinations have uniform sounds. Case in point would be bash, cash, dash, hash, lash, mash, rash, stash, and wash. Is the word, wash, a red-headed step-child? How do we look at noodles? English language principles are too much like Golden Child rules. One has to know when to break them.
We have the mysterious thing called breakfast. Oh, so sleeping constitutes a fast? Why do most folks break a fast with juice or a piece of fruit, yet the breakfast meal around the world consists of traditional caloric overload? What a fantastic method to start the day. What are all these meals anyway? We also have brunch, lunch, tea, lupper, supper, dinner, and midnight snack. By the time we’re done eating we go into a four-hour fast. Let’s just stick with Meal Number One. If you have seconds, then it can be Meal Number One-B. You get to work, and someone offers you some pastries. “No thanks; I’m still fasting.”
In the evening, “Okay kids, put away the destructive and mind-numbing video-games and come sit down for Meal Number Three.”
“But we had Meal Number Three at Suzie’s. Her mom sprung for pizza.”
Segue is one of those killer words. Virtually, no one knows how to spell it. Years ago, friends challenged me after hearing me use, segue, in a sentence yet again. They said, “It’s not a word. We looked in the dictionary and couldn’t find it.”
I secured my dictionary, in case this was a trick. Within nanoseconds, the shock and awe of seeing the word, in print, had taken its toll. The situation presented a significant opportunity. I quipped, “I thought that you guys were trying to pull a henway on me.
One foolishly asked, “What’s a henway?”
I didn’t even blink, “Oh, about three; three and a half pounds.”
My point is that infants, first learning to speak, should be so guided to have segue and midwifery as part of their vocabulary.
We have to set the backdrop for the next illness. The word and its roots have been contagious for decades. The disease contracted via a sweat cloth, in the beginning. Russian and Polish women became known by the name of the sweat fabric that they wore on their heads: babushka. Men had scarves around their neck or upon their belts.
The verb form of the scarf is to wolf something down: consume voraciously. In different cultures, scarves were used to denote military rank and the eventual gravitation to elite officers utilizing silk scarves which gave way to women using them as a fashion statement and later as an erotic tool of bondage. With the popularity of soccer football, brightly colored scarves are a necessity for the sport’s devotees. Scarves have other ornate purposes.
The word, scarf, is bizarre enough with its definition range. The moniker became kerchief. A woman wearing one signified her peasant status. However, a man wearing one marked him as a bad-ass. There became a widely-held belief that one was unemployable, as a roadie, without a do rag.
The infestation continued with handkerchief. It is not a hand scarf; it used to gather mucous, wet or dry. The snot rag obtained the nickname, hanky. Before long a brilliant individual took a word, meaning a prude (panky) and welded the two together to refer to having a tryst.
Therefore, multi-purpose textile will eliminate all this nonsense.
If you want to follow our mission and become a Junior-Honorary-Assistant-Language Doctor, then submit the infirmity in the comments so that we can compile an Outpatient-Follow-up-Therapy Prescription for which you will share in the blame.