MetaChat - "Poke fun of" and Britsh language anomalies

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07 February 2008

"Poke fun of" and Britsh language anomalies →[More:]
A GYOB post by CitrusFreak12, due to him not feeling very well and having nothing else to do

While editing a Wikipedia article just now, I came across the phrase "poke fun of." This strikes me as grammatically incorrect, and a combination of "poke fun at" and "make fun of." Am I correct in thinking this? For some reason it strikes me as being British, though I doubt the two have any real connection at all. But that leads me to my next topic.

Yesterday I was reading this article about waterboarding.

Kuwaiti-born Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is accused of masterminding the 11 September attacks on the United States.

There were 11 attacks you say? I was not aware of that many--OH, my mistake, you meant the attacks that took place on September 11. The day/month/year format strikes again.

7 February 2008. It looks wrong to me, no doubt because I'm American. But for some reason I put more importance on the month, rather than the day, which is extremely short lived by comparison. I see February and I get a large chunk of time which it represents, while the 7 represents a smaller subset of time. To put the day first would be like putting the minute before the hour. "It's 04:12." For time, it makes sense to put the longer lasting increment down first, so why not with dates as well? I know by that logic the year should be first, but since we’re able to omit the year on a regular basis without causing confusion (think of how often you include the year when telling someone the date of an upcoming event), it’s relegated to the end of the format.

But all of that is small potatoes, an inane rant when it comes to this. My #1 pet peeve about British people/reading BBC News:
"Drink driving."

Gah. How hideous is that. What does that even mean? Is someone tooling about town in a glass of milk? Herding bottles of Pepsi across the plains?

Drunk is an adjective. "Drunk driving" clearly means "driving while drunk." Drink is a noun! Grammatically, that term is ridiculous. I've even tried using it in sentences while talking in a British accent*, and it still doesn't sound right.

What say you?

*This strategy worked for "Happy Christmas," actually.

post by: CitrusFreak12 at: 12:26 | 66 comments

I used the "4 July 1776" style long before I moved to the UK. I believe it is what is used in the Chicago Manual of Style. It looks cleaner since there is no punctuation.

posted by grouse 07 February | 12:37

"Poke fun of" is a mistake; it should be "poke fun at".

Drink is a noun, but of course it's also a verb. If you think of drink-driving as a contraction of drinking-and-driving, it makes sense.

I don't think people consistently choose 7 February over February 7 in Britain, but it's always 07/02/08 rather than 02/07/08, for the same reason that it's 17:37.41 at the moment and not 37:17.41. 11/9 NEVAR FORGET, etc.

posted by matthewr 07 February | 12:38

I've never heard anyone here say "poke fun of". It's always "poke fun at".

There are two big peeves that have crept into the language in recent years which really annoy me.

"bored of" - it's "bored with"

and

"fell pregnant" - it's "became pregnant"

"drink driving" is the standard usage here. Nobody calls it "drunk driving".

And you get the date the wrong way round. Day/month/year. That's how it goes.

posted by essexjan 07 February | 12:40

Obviously I grew up with day/month/year, so it feels more intuitive to me, but really? month/day/year? it's just illogical. Either year/month/day or the reverse, but the month/day/year just seems like "middle/down/up" to me.

Which means that unlike with american spelling, I've been unable to adapt. (nowadays I have to concentrate to spell things Brit-style - it was way too easy to drop those extra Us and replace Ss with Zs.)

posted by gaspode 07 February | 12:45

enh, well you could have my level of utter cognitive dissonance. I grew up with a veddeh propah British grandmother who insisted on UK forms, plus she was responsible for me reading (mainly) British literature as I grew up. Not to mention that at last count I've worked for seven... no, wait, eight now if you count our new department director here... British (or German, who use Queen's English) bosses.

so basically I've no clue how to spell. Both Webster's and OED versions look "right" to me and it just depends on how it gets typed in if I'm not actually working on something that needs to be right. I've had to use "backwards" dates anyhows for the past five years owing to the fact that I work in biotech/pharma, meaning mostly in European-owned corporations. and typing things like 'specialise' is quite frankly faster than the "correct" Webster's alternative, and anyway it doesn't set off the spellchecker of the machines I use here, because our doc controls are all done in Euro formats.

posted by lonefrontranger 07 February | 12:46

I've always though of "fell pregnant" as an old Victorian phrase that people use as an affectation.

I spent a whole summer fuming every time I heard "try and".

posted by cillit bang 07 February | 12:54

I think if it were British it would say "Taking the piss out of."
;-)

"fell pregnant" - it's "became pregnant"

Unless she had some kind of accident in bed.

posted by shane 07 February | 13:04

I've never heard "fell pregnant" before but I really like it- very Faulknerian or something. I think I'll adopt it.

My high school English teacher really hated "try and." Now I can't use it without hearing her rants in my head.

Usually I'm all for language mutations, but the advise/advice mix ups really bother me.

posted by small_ruminant 07 February | 13:04

Just today I read the phrase "pregnant of [Baby'sName]". I've always heard "pregnant with [Baby'sName]"...is the former a British usage, technically correct usage or what?

posted by mullacc 07 February | 13:33

Oh, here's where I read it. The author is Belgian.

posted by mullacc 07 February | 13:35

""drink driving" is the standard usage here."

Though it still makes no sense.

"And you get the date the wrong way round. Day/month/year. That's how it goes."

Rabbit Season! Duck season!

Year/month/day makes much more sense to me than day/month/year (which as I've said is like saying it's 24:20:1 in the afternoon"). But since I don't need to be reminded every day that it's 2008, it's not as important, and thus shoved to the end. That's my thinking at least. So, in conclusion, year/month/day makes a lot more sense to me than day/month/year, but I just don't think the year important enough to be up front all the damn time. With that in mind, it's really not THAT CRAZY to shove it at the end, since it's not that important now but it'd probably be good to have it. Anyway, I'm fairly certain that calendar format originated in England.

posted by CitrusFreak12 07 February | 13:39

I find mm/dd/yy frankly silly. Why would a nation choose to use an illogical standard, that is standard only to themselves and confusing to everyone else? Times are different, CitrusFreak12, as they are written sequentially - using the US date format for time (following your analogy) you'd get mm:ss:hh. Silly, huh?

A pronunciation I find hilarious is booey for buoy. How can people say it with a straight face? I have to say it in a funny voice if I pronounce it that way.

On preview: yeah, mullacc, it's not a construction I've heard before and not one I'd expect from a native English speaker.

posted by goo 07 February | 13:41

"Pregnant of [name]" sounds to me like [name] is the person one got pregnant from.

posted by casarkos 07 February | 13:42

Hahah, didn't preview enough! I was looking for info on the origin of the date formats and couldn't find any with a quick google. Do you have any info CitrusFreak12?

posted by goo 07 February | 13:43

A pronunciation I find hilarious is booey for buoy.

Uhhhhh... how else do you say it?

posted by BoringPostcards 07 February | 13:44

'Boy,' I'm guessing.

posted by box 07 February | 13:56

yeah- how are you supposed to pronounce buoy?

posted by small_ruminant 07 February | 13:56

This isn't that closely related, but I've been looking for a place to complain about the new SAAB slogan that's all over their public-radio sponsorships.

"SAAB: Born from jets."

Born from? Born of! Of!

My mother, who's an editor, is driven nuts by an Englishism that has crept into American English: saying someone or something "went missing." For some reason that doesn't grate on me, but it does her.

posted by Miko 07 February | 14:02

Interesting. I say "booey" when talking about the item, but "boi-ed" for something like "buoyed by hope". Though of course I would never say "bouyed by hope," would I?

posted by taz 07 February | 14:09

I think it's as funny as it is only because I don't hear that pronunciation very often - it's not a word I hear very often at all, let alone from the US media.

For a counterpoint, the British (RP) HARrisment for haRASSment grates like fingernails on a blackboard - one r, two esses, haRASSment.

posted by goo 07 February | 14:18

Umm... just about everyone but the Americans do the 8 February 2008 format for dates. So we're the odd ducks.

Of course, just about everone on the planet uses the metric system. I had to learn that shit in grade school and valuable Saturday morning cartoon time was taken up with "a meter is a little more than a yard" because we were going to make the big switch and join the rest of the world in the 20th century. But no, we're still using primitive units of measurement.

And many places in the world will write $2.03 as $2,03 or 10,000 is 10.000.

Enough with numbers, I love how Brits will pronounce the H (they even pronounce the letter H similarly to how Anne Heche pronounces her name). Of course the H in honor isn't silent in the UK, it is pronounced (to paraphrase Eddie Izzard because there's a fucking H in it).

I like how they say aluminum and urinal differently.

I love the expression "fancy a shag" or "fancy a snog" or just using "fancy" as in "I really fancy that bird".

Of course Brits go to hospital, while we go to the hospital. Their cars have bonnets, ours have hoods. We have cookies. They have biscuits. We have stoves, they have cookers. We have tomatos, they have tomatos.

We drive on the right side of the road, they drive on the ~~wrong~~ left side of the road.

posted by birdherder 07 February | 14:20

Oh, and yeah - box has it. Boy.

posted by goo 07 February | 14:22

"Drink driving" (or drink-driving) makes a lot more sense.

How are you going to talk people out of drunk-driving? Everyone's just going to think "well, I've had six pints but I'm not actually drunk, may as well drive home."

Whereas drink driving makes it clear that you shouldn't even have a few drinks and then drive.

posted by TheophileEscargot 07 February | 14:24

I found a forum post corresponding with my belief that the "American" style (Month DD, YYYY) was once just as valid in British English. The DD/MM/YYYY order, the same site speculated, comes from French. But nothing substantive (the relevant Wikipedia articles describe the current situation well enough, but without citations or any history). At least the map shows that the US isn't an odd man out here the way we are with the metric system -- there's no real global standard, actually.

There are Briticisms that I adopt. I've used British-style "logical" quotation marks -- a quirk common to programmers, and advanced English majors -- for a long, long time. The U.S. convention of "moving the short punctuation marks and not moving the tall ones" makes little sense to me. Either you're quoting the punctuation mark from the original, or you're not.

I tried using British date format for a while but went back to American. In a corporate environment it can be treated as an affectation. I was also a proponent of writing U.S. phone numbers like xxx xxx xxxx instead of (xxx) xxx-xxxx, or with period separators like xxx.xxx.xxxx, until I did it on something for my boss to present to someone else and got yelled at.

"Drink driving" just sounds ungrammatical to me. Is it a contraction of "-ing and"? Dunno. On the other hand, the U.S. can't standardize on one of:
* driving while intoxicated (DWI)
* operating while intoxicated (OWI)
* operating under the influence (OUI)
* driving under the influence (DUI)
...which seems like something we ought to be able to do. (Then again, we can't agree on bureau/department/division of motor vehicles ... and Illinois even puts it with the "Secretary of State"!)

I would have to say that the Briticism I dislike the most, off the top of my head, is "boob tube". In the US, it means "television". In the UK, a tube top. What, you didn't need a word that emphasized the idiocy of slack-jawed television addicts? Also, "fanny" is completely misapplied.

Wikicruft: List of words having different meanings in British and American English is fun, as are List of British words not widely used in the United States and List of American words not widely used in the United Kingdom

posted by dhartung 07 February | 14:28

I like how they say aluminum and urinal differently.

Well, to be fair, we say aluminium differently because we spell it differently. Same with jewellery.

posted by gaspode 07 February | 14:29

Of course the H in honor isn't silent in the UK, it is pronounced

Is it? I suppose it's a bit of a grey (gray?) area, but I don't think I would pronounce the H.

posted by matthewr 07 February | 14:35

No, I wouldn't pronounce the 'h' in 'honour' either.

Anyway, language and conventions aren't supposed to make sense. CitrusFreak12, your justification of the American date format is just that: a justification. You can just as easily justify the British format. They both have pros and cons. You can't go from that to arguing that one of them inherently 'makes more sense' than the other. Your one makes sense to you because you've grown up with it. Simple as that.

posted by chrismear 07 February | 15:46

Goo: I too have nothing. I'm not sure where I heard it, so it can't be very reliable just coming from me. Then again I can't find anything on how the US arbitrarily decided they didn't like dd/mm/yy, so it seems THE WORLD SHALL NEVER KNOW. And yeah my time format comparison was crap, haha. It's just a matter of preference.

TheophileEscargot: huh? Drunk Driving refers to "driving under the influence" or "driving while intoxicated." When one is "under the influence" or "intoxicated," you might also say that one is "drunk." You would not say that one is "drink."

We also call the act of drunk driving "drinking and driving," which also makes it clear that you shouldn't drive if you've been drinking.

If you're going to tell me, as matthewr did, that "drink driving" is a contraction of "drinking and driving," I ask why don't you just bloody well refer to it as such instead of making a grammatically incorrect phrase?

Miko: Wait what's wrong with "went missing?"

Chrismear: "You can just as easily justify the British format."
Yep, and I figured somebody would by now (perhaps using some form of "well in the US you'd say you're from Warwick, Rhode Island, United States of America. By your own logic it should be Rhode Island, Warwick, USA. Halfwit."). I'm very much aware that everything I wrote about the date format is ethnocentric nonsense (if I knew how to properly use the phrase "taking the piss," I'd do so).

The drink driving bit, however, that one I take seriously. Makes no sense.

posted by CitrusFreak12 07 February | 17:37

I too would refrain pronouncing the H in honour.
But then, I also tend not to pronounce the H in happy either.

As for dates, I've no idea how anyone can justify M/D/Y. It's a crazy nonsense, and as a programmer, it's caused me no end of grief.

posted by seanyboy 07 February | 17:41

"Went missing"

More "went missing"

And still more of that wacky "went missing"

The above article theorizes that it was Chandra Levy's disappearance in 2001 that caused the expression to begin appearing in the American press. Since then it's become much more common.

Here's William Safire's take.

It doesn't grate on my ears, but I definitely recognize that as American usage, it's of recent vintage.

posted by Miko 07 February | 19:02

Wait so, "went missing" is apparently British? Odd, I never would have thought twice about the phrase, sounds completely normal to me...

posted by CitrusFreak12 07 February | 19:12

We also call the act of drunk driving "drinking and driving," which also makes it clear that you shouldn't drive if you've been drinking.

Total sidetrack coming up, but it's always struck me that as a slogan, "don't drink and drive" is completely backwards. If you arrived in a car, you're probably going home in a car. Especially if you live in some suburban or rural part of the US or Canada where there aren't good alternatives.

So. If you arrived in a car, you'd better be very careful about drinking. Like, not do it. (Realistically, that's likely to mean drink just a tiny bit, then eat something and wait a very long time. But still.) So what you want not do do is drive and drink. Don't drive and drink, people.

posted by tangerine 07 February | 19:14

I always imagined it was just a shortened form of 'don't drink and then drive.'

posted by Miko 07 February | 19:19

I'm late to the party, but that odd American pronounciation of boooo-eeey for bouy really spins me out. I've only ever heard it from that guy on Survivor.

How would such a speaker pronounce the property of a floatey thing? Is it "boo-eeyancy"? That's just way too many syllables.

So what you want not do do is drive and drink.

Haven't you heard the old saw:

"Never drink and drive, you might hit a bump and spill some."

posted by pompomtom 07 February | 19:38

The drink driving bit, however, that one I take seriously. Makes no sense.

But everyone in Britain understands what is meant by drink-driving, and if you grow up with it, it sounds perfectly natural. Whether or not a phrase is understood is the only important thing, not how well it 'makes sense' or how (subjectively) grammatical it is.

posted by matthewr 07 February | 19:42

Brits (and Canadians) pronounce the H in herb(s), U.S. people don't. Went missing is fine with me, but I think most U.S. people use gone missing. Not sure what's used in Canada.

And yes, it's hard getting used to the different way to do dates; Canadians use the European format.

posted by deborah 07 February | 19:55

That's great that everyone knows what it means. Really. But it doesn't make sense, for the reasons I've already stated, and it will continue to bug me perhaps until someone tells me a hopelessly convoluted explanation of how it came to be called "drink driving" in the first place. If it turns out that it truly is a contraction of "drinking and driving," I will meet with Gordon Brown to work out a deal to cut The British™ some slack. Until then, I will carry on my cringing every time I read the phrase in my BBC news feed.

posted by CitrusFreak12 07 February | 20:01

I think most U.S. people use gone missing

But even we didn't until just a few years ago.

posted by Miko 07 February | 20:25

Why does language have to "make sense" if everyone knows what it means?

If you start cringing every time you encounter language that is understood but doesn't seem to make sense, eventually you'll have no time left in the day to do anything else. Why do we say "I'm on the bus", when we are in no sense on the bus - we are in it? Why do inflammable and flammable mean the same thing? Grammatical rules are determined by what people actually say, not what seems logical and consistent.

posted by matthewr 07 February | 20:41

Know what? It does make sense.
When you are driven to drink, you are not driven to the action, but the whole culture of drink as a concept. You must have drink to be a drunk but you're not a drunk just because you drink, nor do you have to be a drunk or drunk to be caught driving once having drunk a drink
drink drunky drinky drink drunk

No, what's really beyond the pale is this pressie brekkies peasy lemon squeezy gobshite.
Someone needs to clamp down on that incoherence.

posted by ethylene 07 February | 21:31

Also, dd/mm/yy makes the most sense, goddammit, but damned if i'm not use to the US version, dammit.

It's driven me to drink, for my onor and my erbs.
Damned if i'll say Herb. That's some guy in a white belt and Martha Stewart's affectation.

posted by ethylene 07 February | 21:33

We say we're "on the bus" because that is an accepted definition of the word. "On" can be used to indicate the location of something, it doesn't just mean that something is resting atop another object.

It's really strange you bring up inflammable vs flammable because that came up in one of my journalism classes last semester. Apparently the two words are derived from two separate but very similar Latin words, with a few hundred years between the creation of the two. I'm not sure how accurate that is though.

As it stands now, to the best of my knowledge, "drink driving" is a combination of the noun/verb "drink" (an alcoholic beverage/to have an alcoholic beverage") and "driving." "An alcoholic beverage operating a motor vehicle" doesn't make much sense to me. "To have an alcoholic beverage while operating a motor vehicle" would be great, but you'd need something to join the two together. Like... "and" at the very least.

When I say it doesn't make sense I mean I don't understand how they combined the two words and came up with a term that refers to driving while intoxicated. If there was some step involved (such as getting rid of "ing and"), then it would make sense to me ("oh, I get it now, they just shortened "drinking and driving," ok... sure...").

I just want it to make sense.*

ethylene: You must have drink to be a drunk but you're not a drunk just because you drink, nor do you have to be a drunk or drunk to be caught driving once having drunk a drink
drink drunky drinky drink drunk.
(Warning: Sound)

*Screw it, I'm going to send languagehat a MeFiMail. I'll see if he can help my plight.

posted by CitrusFreak12 07 February | 21:54

You new to the state of existence types and your dawgs.
Spend a few decades with language before you start gibbering about sense without it.

posted by ethylene 07 February | 22:03

And you can be "on" a ride or mode or transportation, no "on" a location (yet "on location"), you are "at" a location, even "in", but not "on" unless it's Avon or some such. Keep it straight!
Don't get me started!

posted by ethylene 07 February | 22:18

Well yyyymmdd makes the most sense, but no-one uses it.... which might provide a hint to the rest of this argument, and it's relationship to 'sense.

posted by pompomtom 07 February | 23:00

FWIW, we use YYYY/MM/DD to date engineering documents, depending on the required format. It could be the other way around, too, but rarely MM/DD/YY

posted by muddgirl 07 February | 23:02

The reason i say dd/mm/yy/ makes the most sense is the one you're least likely to know is the day (or most probably need clarification on), then dimly possible, the month. If you don't know the year, well, it's another story.

posted by ethylene 07 February | 23:25

That accidental slash is because i fell in the drink.

posted by ethylene 07 February | 23:29

TheophileEscargot: huh? Drunk Driving refers to "driving under the influence" or "driving while intoxicated." When one is "under the influence" or "intoxicated," you might also say that one is "drunk." You would not say that one is "drink."

We also call the act of drunk driving "drinking and driving," which also makes it clear that you shouldn't drive if you've been drinking.

If you're going to tell me, as matthewr did, that "drink driving" is a contraction of "drinking and driving," I ask why don't you just bloody well refer to it as such instead of making a grammatically incorrect phrase?

So, how do you feel about...

Dog walking. Would you put an ad on craiglist about your "walking with a dog" services?

Baby sitting. Ditto with "sitting with a baby"

Ice skating. Do you say "goodbye darling, I'm going skating on the ice?" Or "icing and skating"?

I wonder if you're getting confused because "-ing" words can function as verbs ("I was driving"), or as nouns ("driving is easy"). Or even adjectives ("that driving man").

Drink driving is "noun verbing" which is very common, as in the above examples. Maybe you're thinking of -ings as always being nouns.

Otherwise, if it's grammatically incorrect, what rule is it breaking?

posted by TheophileEscargot 08 February | 01:23

A dog walker is one who walks dogs.
A baby sitter is one who sits babies.
An ice skater is one who skates ice.
A drink driver is one who drives drinks?

As I said before: Is someone tooling about town in a glass of milk?

I'm no language expert. All I'm saying is, the word rubs me the wrong way, and I just don't get it.

1. Drink
2. Driving
3. ?????
4. A word that means "drinking and driving" or "drunk driving."

posted by CitrusFreak12 08 February | 02:27

A dog walker is one who walks dogs.
A baby sitter is one who sits babies.
An ice skater is one who skates ice.
A drink driver is one who drives drinks?

In all those cases, the noun refers to an object not the subject. Why do you want to change it in the case of drinking to make the noun the subject?

For instance, try putting drunk driver in your terms:

A drunk driver is one who drives drunks.

A drunk driver would be the taxi driver who takes everyone home after the bar closes.

posted by TheophileEscargot 08 February | 03:24

The word drunk in the case of "drunk driver" isn't a noun, it's an adjective, describing the driver,(or in the case of "drunk driving," describing the driving itself). Drink, ice, baby, and dog are not adjectives describing the verbs, they are nouns. You would not say "a bad driver is one who drives bads."

If you are a drunk driver, it means you are driving a vehicle while drunk.
If you are a drink driver, it somehow doesn't mean that you are driving a vehicle while drink, but while drunk. How the heck...?

posted by CitrusFreak12 08 February | 09:29

An ice skater isn't one who "skates ice", CitrusFreak12. That makes no sense. An ice skater is one who is skating while on the ice.

Hence, a drink driver is one who driving while on the drink.

I SOLVEDS IT.

posted by chrismear 08 February | 13:17

*is* driving. Dammit.

posted by chrismear 08 February | 13:19

Yeah, the drink, not a drink or go drink.

posted by ethylene 08 February | 13:29

btw, the chance i'll ever say drink driving is so ridiculously small, i'll just say never

posted by ethylene 08 February | 13:30

To skate means to slide across. While not a normal usage by any means, I've a good feeling that "skate ice" does indeed make sense, though it's a crappy pairing.

Hence, a drink driver is one who [is] driving while on the drink.

And a dog walker is one who is walking while on the dog?
And a baby sitter is one who is sitting while on the baby?

posted by CitrusFreak12 08 February | 15:52

And a dog walker is one who is walking while on the dog?
And a baby sitter is one who is sitting while on the baby?

No, of course not. That's my point. There's just no rule for this stuff; it comes down to just 'feeling right' or not.

I really don't know what you're looking for anymore. You seem to acknowledge that language is all about convention not rules, and yet you continue to ask for a justification for 'drink driving' that will make it 'make sense' to you. You're not going to get one, and you're not going to be able to prove yourself right about this.

So why are we continuing to go round in circles about this? The phrase feels wrong to you, and feels right to another large corpus of (British) English speakers. That's all there is to it.

posted by chrismear 08 February | 15:57

To skate means to slide across. While not a normal usage by any means, I've a good feeling that "skate ice" does indeed make sense, though it's a crappy pairing.

And if you want to argue on rules, then you should look up the verb 'skate' in your dictionary. It's intransitive, except in the sense of skating a particular figure. I challenge you to find anyone who thinks "to skate ice" is an acceptable construction.

posted by chrismear 08 February | 16:00

For some reason "drink driving" bothers me more than any other strange combination of words in the English language, and I'm just going to have to deal with it, as it's obvious there is no actual rhyme or reason to "drink driving," no more so than there is to "sleepwalking" (I was waiting for someone to bring that one up and demand I try and explain it, which I cannot. Damn you, English!).

Languagehat got back to me, and here is what the darling fellow had to say:

Heh. That thread is hilarious -- I should really start visiting MeCha again. But you know where you said "I'm very much aware that everything I wrote about the date format is ethnocentric nonsense"? That was well said (and admirably self-aware), and it pretty much applies to everything else as well. The fact is (and I know this is very hard for people to accept), idioms don't make any sense. They don't. Why "hard up" for money? Why do "slow up" and "slow down" mean the same thing? Why do you park in a driveway and drive... oh, never mind. You get my point. We all accept our own idioms without a second thought, but when we hear somebody else's, we get all verklempt and want an explanation, by god. But all that's going on is that the Brits say "drink driving" and we say "drunk driving," and there's not really much else that can be said about it. For all I know, in Australia they might say "wombat driving" to mean the same thing, and we'd just have to accept it. (Warning, overloud sentence approaching:)

LANGUAGE ISN'T LOGICAL.

Th- th- that's all, folks!

So there you have it. Plain as day: Your crazy moon language doesn't make any sense. And neither does ours :(
Either way, drive safely everyone.

On preview:
I really don't know what you're looking for anymore.
A cookie and a tall glass of milk.

On second preview: Challenge not accepted. You really think I can keep this up? I barely understand how English works, and I've run out of straws! I'm a journalist, man, not a writer! And either way, that's what editors are for. ;)

posted by CitrusFreak12 08 February | 16:08

Thank goodness, I thought you were trolling. ;)

posted by chrismear 08 February | 16:23

i hate you, Milkman Dan12.

posted by ethylene 08 February | 16:50

Nope, just stubborn and really really inquisitive. I was that kid who always asked his parents and teachers "but why?" until they ran out of answers. Does it show much?

posted by CitrusFreak12 08 February | 16:50

Also, 'lego' is its own plural.

*runs away*

posted by pompomtom 12 February | 23:55

Although I don't see why you'd ever need to use the plural of 'Lego', since it's an abstract noun referring to a line of toys.

Oh, you mean 'Lego bricks'?

posted by chrismear 13 February | 02:17

"Timmy left his Legos all over the floor." Nobody seems to know that it is its own plural here. I know, but don't care, in the same way that I know "Google" isn't a verb.

posted by CitrusFreak12 13 February | 09:52

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