Lemonade means lemon juice and orangeade means orange juice but
cannonade is not cannon juice.
Undo is the opposite of do and unfit is the opposite of fit. Is Uncle
the opposite of cle?
There's no egg in an eggplant, no ham in a hamburger, neither apple nor pine in a pineapple, English muffins weren’t invented in England, nor do French fries come from France. Sweetmeats are candies but sweetbreads aren't sweet but meat. Quicksand works slowly, a boxing ring is square, and guinea pigs are neither pigs nor from Guinea.
Singers sing but fingers don’t fing. If the plural of tooth is teeth,
goose geese and foot feet, why isn’t the plural of booth, beeth? You can make
amends but why can't you make one amend? If you get rid of all your odds and
ends save one, what do you call it?
If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat? People
recite at plays and play at recitals, ship by car and send cargo by ship, and
have noses that run but not 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?
Your house can burn up as it burns down, you fill in a form by
filling it out, and alarms go off when they go on. And when a car slows up, it
slows down! When the stars are out, they are visible, but when the lights are
out, they are invisible. How can inflammable and flammable mean the same thing?
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.
