language

The English language is frustratingly confusing, and seems to make zero sense at times. The following list of definitions, sayings, terms, etc. serve as a solid testament to the fact. For such a widespread language, it has an uncanny knack for confusing the shit out of people. If you're looking for more language struggles, it's worth checking out the following times people utterly failed at their spelling attempts.

This rude Chinese customer assumed from a point of ignorance that their white cashier wouldn't understand what they were saying, if they spoke in Mandarin Chinese. That's where they couldn't have been more wrong. Don't go judging a book by its cover, and better yet, assume that someone in the room always understands what you're saying. 

Call the burn unit! This linguist took a Tumblr user's post, and absolutely destroyed. And they did it with the cold, hard logic from the linguistics field. A job well done, indeed. 

Wouldn't it be simpler to have a single word that encapsulates the concept of getting drunk in your underwear? Wouldn't it be amazing to be able to call someone an "orthopedic walking cane" out of hate? These options and many more lie waiting to be discovered in the world's many wonderful languages. For some English wins and fails, here are some incredible uses and misuses of the English language.

English is a complex and weird language, made out of sutured together bastardizations of dozens of other languages. It's got confusing tenses and conflicting rules all over the place. Here are some fun applications of English, as well as a few miserable but funny misapplications of the language. For more interesting stuff about the English Language, here's a tumblr thread deconstructing the actual meanings of popular figures of speech.

This one will leave you with some burning questions! 

Scientists and technicians go through a lot of time and effort in order to make their reports sound as science-y and official as possible. However, that doesn't undo the fact that people screw up every day. What's left is people trying to come up with official sounding statements for "I dunno, I screwed up man." Chalk it up to tumblr to overcomplicate things. Check this out for a Tumblr report on how cute humans are.

Just a quick reminder that you're great, and the english language actually supports that theory! 

We're a fan of any story where a rude customer fails to get away with being miserable to a retail employee who's done nothing wrong. We're also fans of surprises and drama where people get super pissed, double-down and make even bigger asses of themselves. For a strikingly similar story where a customer bad-mouthed an employee in a different language before having the tables turned, check this out.

When you move into a new neighborhood, there's a choice everyone has to make. That choice is whether you decide to get to know your neighbors, or commit to a lie that involves faking a French accent for WAY longer than you intended. For another interesting story about a lie, here's a lazy student who actually got away with their lie.

We're not exactly experts in child rearing, but this story about a mom who refuses to use negative language around her kid kinda set off some alarms. Like, isn't replacing one word with another one kind of defeat the purpose of not having the first word? There is octopus way this strategy worked out. Check out some awesome twitter jokes about parenting here.

Life is full of moments and feelings that we seem to have trouble explaining in one word. Luckily, someone has come up with one. For example, if you've ever been lost in a big loud anecdoche and all of a sudden you're overcome with rubatosis, you might find yourself having a jouska.

Some of your favorite sayings may have actually been invented to say exactly the opposite of what they now mean. Hey, you learn something new every day, right? Here's another enlightening thread on something that might be near and dear to you.

We're huge fans of Scottish Twitter. We love the jokes, the stories, the indecipherable language, and the liberal use of four-letter words. It's all great. And if you want to see more of these gems, check them out right here.