Silly Words

As a representative of my people, speaking to those of you learning English, “We're (not were) sorry!”

The English language can be a bit annoying what with “There, they're, their” and “Two, too, to” and so on and so on (and doobie doobie doobie). And that's just the homophones. Yes, the English language is “homophonic” and I am so sorry to those of you just now learning this.

But then there are all of the words with more than one meaning. THE HOMONYMS!!!! These can also be homophones, or even Homographs, Polysemes or Capitonyms.... you know, like bow, anchor, Polish vs. polish, etc.... IT'S nuts!

I've been speaking this language for the better part of 41 years and I am still confused.

What brought this tirade on you may be asking. Well....

As we were driving on some back country roads recently, my lovely child saw some cows in the field and belted out “Daddy, look at those baby cows!!!”

Being the ultimately boring yet surprisingly educational Daddy that I am I said something like “Oh very cute baby. And what do we call baby cows?”

As if I had flipped my lid, she looked at me quite seriously in my rear view mirror and replied “Baby cows Daddy, we call them baby cows.”

Dammit, she was right!!!! They are baby cows and should be called such. I was going for “calves” of course, but those are freakin' legs!

How many foreign men have been knocked unconscious for walking up to a beautiful girl on the beach and paying her the compliment of “you have the most lovely baby cows!”

I feel for you foreigners. I am sorry for what you have to endure. Thank you for your attempts to learn my language.

Oh yes, and for future reference, once a baby cow is weaned, they're called “weaners.” Yup... another homophonic word. You may now wish to look up “double entendre.”