Nevermind that most English words come from laziness.
We call it a car because carriage is too long...
Parking has nothing to do with parks. French Stationnement makes more sense. On the other hand "Fruits of the sea" sounds weird compared to "seafood".
And don't forget about wind and wind.
You can rewind a tape, but wind blowing a second time isn't rewind.
We call it a car because carriage is too long...
Parking has nothing to do with parks. French Stationnement makes more sense. On the other hand "Fruits of the sea" sounds weird compared to "seafood".
And don't forget about wind and wind.
You can rewind a tape, but wind blowing a second time isn't rewind.
I went to a private high school for a year, circa 1975, there was a teacher from Europe, he was a polyglot, a holocaust survivor, and I had a year of Latin under him. Some student in class made the mistake of saying "Geez, this Latin sure is hard."
The teacher went into a tirade. "Latin is hard? You should learn English! Let me show you!" he wrote on the board the singular and plural of some common English words:
Horse Horses
House Houses
Mouse Mice
The teacher went into a tirade. "Latin is hard? You should learn English! Let me show you!" he wrote on the board the singular and plural of some common English words:
Horse Horses
House Houses
Mouse Mice
How about when acronyms become words -- nobody says "the NASA". But we do say "the IRS". Laser is another odd one "the laser" is correct, but saying "the Light Amplification by the Stimulated Emmission of Radiation" would imply we should say the "the laser device" or "the laser equipment". Same for "MRI".
Or odd abbreviations
pounds- -> lbs
ounces --> oz
Or odd abbreviations
pounds- -> lbs
ounces --> oz
Another good reason to use the metric system.
Although you are not even safe there because some people seem to want to describe rainfall in mls [millilitres] instead of millimitres.
Although you are not even safe there because some people seem to want to describe rainfall in mls [millilitres] instead of millimitres.
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One of the weird things in English. Just like thread, bolt/nut/tool sizes in odd fractions like 3/8 or 7/16, length/height expressed in body parts, battery "+" going to chassis in cars, always a deviation from what is accepted as standard elsewhere. The old money system was not decimal and appeared complex mathematics.
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And a US gallon isn't equal to an Imperial gallon.
I don't mind our fractions system too much -- its base 2 - they go in powers of 2.
2^-(-1) = 1/2
2^-(-2) = 1/4
2^-(-3) = 1/8
2^-(-4) = 1/16
...
I don't mind our fractions system too much -- its base 2 - they go in powers of 2.
2^-(-1) = 1/2
2^-(-2) = 1/4
2^-(-3) = 1/8
2^-(-4) = 1/16
...
Miles and sea miles. Doing difficult because of the difficult we say.
Yes the fractions are simpler than just calling them 8, 9, 10 etc. like elsewhere 🙂
Yes the fractions are simpler than just calling them 8, 9, 10 etc. like elsewhere 🙂
"Bass" isn't derived from basis, bus bassus, it seems:
bass (adj.)
late 14c., of things, "low, not high," from Late Latin bassus "short, low" (see base (adj.)). Meaning "low in social scale or rank" is recorded from late 14c. Of voices and music notes, "low in tone" from mid-15c. (technically, ranging from the E flat below the bass stave to the F above it), influenced by Italian basso.
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A German lady aware of my longtime single status said to me when looking at my puny French car: "Du wirst nie ficken in Deutschland".
Ah, germans do have a sense of humour!! 🙂
At school I tried to avoid languages and stick to sciences. But I had to do one, so chose german as it looked like a nice logical language. Except I soon discovered that the most common words were all in the "ah, but that's an exception" category... Sigh!!
At school I tried to avoid languages and stick to sciences. But I had to do one, so chose german as it looked like a nice logical language. Except I soon discovered that the most common words were all in the "ah, but that's an exception" category... Sigh!!
It took me by surprise but yes they have. Always thought the thinnest book in the world was about German humor but alas.
We learnt the same when being taught English so there are some similarities.
Bolt sizes in the U.S. started off based on the sizes offered by the steel manufacturers (US Steel) now called “National Coarse” and the sizes preferred by the Society of Automotive Engineers, called “National Fine.” Anything else in common use becomes “National Special.” Now to confuse things just a bit for a 1/4” bolt to fit in a 1/4” hole, the bolt needs to be a bit smaller as neither is perfectly round. So the bolts are from .005” to as much as .015” undersized!
To make things a bit more confusing is the old machine tool specification to not use bolts with a diameter less than 5/8”. The theory was with hand tools a workman torquing the bolts can accidentally shear in half anything smaller. When working with structural steel holes are often 1/8” larger diameter than than the bolts used. This allows for things such as temperature changes along the length of a beam to still allow passable hole alignment.
Surprising to many Metric bolts are now for most here a new standard. Virtually all automobiles manufactured today are all metric. With loudspeakers 8mm is pretty much used with all the smaller professional loudspeakers and 10mm for the larger ones such as line arrays.
As to automobiles, they originally had negative to the chassis, thus the term grounded applied. However it was found that corrosion of the car body decreased significantly when the positive terminal was connected to the chassis. This would not be an issue if the electrical system was not connected to the chassis at all, however it seems no one wants the additional costs.
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