Poem of English

Dearest creature in creation,
Study English pronunciation.
I will teach you in my verse
Sounds like corpse, corps, horse, and worse.
I will keep you, Suzy, busy,
Make your head with heat grow dizzy.
Tear in eye, your dress will tear.
So shall I! Oh hear my prayer.

Just compare heart, beard, and heard,
Dies and diet, lord and word,
Sword and sward, retain and Britain.
(Mind the latter, how it's written.)
Now I surely will not plague you
With such words as plaque and ague.
But be careful how you speak:
Say break and steak, but bleak and streak;
Cloven, oven, how and low,
Script, receipt, show, poem, and toe.

Hear me say, devoid of trickery,
Daughter, laughter, and Terpsichore,
Typhoid, measles, topsails, aisles,
Exiles, similes, and reviles;
Scholar, vicar, and cigar,
Solar, mica, war and far;
One, anemone, Balmoral,
Kitchen, lichen, laundry, laurel;
Gertrude, German, wind and mind,
Scene, Melpomene, mankind.

Billet does not rhyme with ballet,
Bouquet, wallet, mallet, chalet.
Blood and flood are not like food,
Nor is mould like should and would.
Viscous, viscount, load and broad,
Toward, to forward, to reward.
And your pronunciation's OK
When you correctly say croquet,
Rounded, wounded, grieve and sieve,
Friend and fiend, alive and live.

Ivy, privy, famous; clamour
And enamour rhyme with hammer.
River, rival, tomb, bomb, comb,
Doll and roll and some and home.
Stranger does not rhyme with anger,
Neither does devour with clangour.
Souls but foul, haunt but aunt,
Font, front, wont, want, grand, and grant,
Shoes, goes, does. Now first say finger,
And then singer, ginger, linger,
Real, zeal, mauve, gauze, gouge and gauge,
Marriage, foliage, mirage, and age.

Query does not rhyme with very,
Nor does fury sound like bury.
Dost, lost, post and doth, cloth, loth.
Job, nob, bosom, transom, oath.
Though the differences seem little,
We say actual but victual.
Refer does not rhyme with deafer.
Foeffer does, and zephyr, heifer.
Mint, pint, senate and sedate;
Dull, bull, and George ate late.
Scenic, Arabic, Pacific,
Science, conscience, scientific.

Liberty, library, heave and heaven,
Rachel, ache, moustache, eleven.
We say hallowed, but allowed,
People, leopard, towed, but vowed.
Mark the differences, moreover,
Between mover, cover, clover;
Leeches, breeches, wise, precise,
Chalice, but police and lice;
Camel, constable, unstable,
Principle, disciple, label.

Petal, panel, and canal,
Wait, surprise, plait, promise, pal.
Worm and storm, chaise, chaos, chair,
Senator, spectator, mayor.
Tour, but our and succour, four.
Gas, alas, and Arkansas.
Sea, idea, Korea, area,
Psalm, Maria, but malaria.
Youth, south, southern, cleanse and clean.
Doctrine, turpentine, marine.

Compare alien with Italian,
Dandelion and battalion.
Sally with ally, yea, ye,
Eye, I, ay, aye, whey, and key.
Say aver, but ever, fever,
Neither, leisure, skein, deceiver.
Heron, granary, canary.
Crevice and device and aerie.

Face, but preface, not efface.
Phlegm, phlegmatic, ass, glass, bass.
Large, but target, gin, give, verging,
Ought, out, joust and scour, scourging.
Ear, but earn and wear and tear
Do not rhyme with here but ere.
Seven is right, but so is even,
Hyphen, roughen, nephew Stephen,
Monkey, donkey, Turk and jerk,
Ask, grasp, wasp, and cork and work.

Pronunciation -- think of Psyche!
Is a paling stout and spikey?
Won't it make you lose your wits,
Writing groats and saying grits?
It's a dark abyss or tunnel:
Strewn with stones, stowed, solace, gunwale,
Islington and Isle of Wight,
Housewife, verdict and indict.

Finally, which rhymes with enough --
Though, through, plough, or dough, or cough?
Hiccough has the sound of cup.
My advice is to give up!

Finally At Home!!

Soo, yeah, it's been like a week since I last posted. How are you? How was Thanksgiving? Ours was pretty good. We finally did Thanksgiving correctly by only going to two houses instead of three. The last couple years we've gone to my parents, her parents, and my grandparents. You end up with a stomach waaaaaay too full of turkey and stuffing, and a strong hatred of everything that is Thanksgiving. I dunno, it was pretty good this year - we got my parents to come to her parents house. The get together at Nana and Papa's was great as usual, about 25 people, and lots of Mimosas. That's champagne and orange juice. Yyyyyuuuuummmmmmm. Time off was great too, went shooting on Tuesday, played Halo 3 for six hours on Wednesday, ate and had fun on Thursday, and hung out with Melissa's family on Friday. Saturday was good too, we spent like five hours getting new tires put on the Impala, went out to lunch at Ninfa's, and then went home and watched Die Hard 4 followed by like five hours of Grey's Anatomy. Wait, did I say that Saturday was fun?? Well, yeah, I did enjoy spending time with my wife - We really don't get enough time to just be together. Sunday was pretty nice enough even though we had to watch more Grey's, but James and Lynne came home from their trip, so we got to hang out with them for a while, and that was fun cuz we hadn't seen them in like five days.

It felt soooo weird to go back to work today. It's not every day you get a week off work. Didn't have a bad day at all - it went by quickly and actually went pretty well, but it seemed strange to not be home with my wife. Didn't really get to ride my bike this weekend either. Of course, that's not really surprising because it either rained or just was freezing cold all weekend.

Can you believe it's less than a month til Christmas? Just think, one month from today, we will have all taken back all the Christmas presents we didn't want. Actually, I should change that to all you people instead of "we" because I neeeeever take presents back. Yeah, I had two presents on my birthday that I was gonna take back, and I didn't ever take one of them back, and the other one took me almost a month to exchange for something else. Is it a bad thing to take gifts back? I don't really think so, but sometimes it can be very awkward if the gift was meant to be seen by the gift-giver. For example, if someone gives you a watch, you can't go get a different watch or just go exchange it for cash. If you are given a CD or a book, that you can usually get away with exchanging because what, are they gonna come over and ask for proof that you still have that thing? Well, they might, but that would be rude and you could call them out on that. Seriously, do it. Later!

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Back to Work

I'm hoping to post sometime today!! Keep checking!!

Day Off Number One

So what's up people? I have today and tomorrow off from work because, well, it was now or never. I had two days of PTO (paid time off) left for this year, and we're not allowed to use it in December and we can't roll it over to next year, aaaand we can't use it during month end, so this literally was the last chance i had to use it! And you thought I was exaggerating. So you know what I'm doing with my free time so far? I'm watching videos on You Tube and posting to my blog! Yay so exciting!! It's really not so bad, I'm gonna go shooting later, and I'm having lunch with my wife. Other than that, I really don't have anything planned. Maybe I'll go for a ride. I usually wish that I could when I can't, and now I can, so maybe I will. Yeah, I'm so not making any sense right now. I just figured that I should post since I have time. This is a short and boring one though because I'm ending it now. Later!

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Sympathy

Aww poor Morgan. You are sick and away from your family. How was Paris? Enjoy the Transpo. strike? So sorry you're sick - that's never a fun feeling. Hope you get better soon!

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What's Happening to America?

I have read something this morning that-- well, I'm not sure how I feel about it. I'm shaking my head as I type this, because I'm thinking the idea is just so pitiful. It's a good example of how lazy and yet impatient Americans are getting. Yes I might mean you, but you are American, are you not? Anyway, Papa John's Pizza now has a new ordering option: TEXT MESSAGING!!! Is it really that much of a hassle to call the place? You say "well I don't have the number," but if you've called before, then you have the number in your phone, and you can call information and get the number too. Besides, in order to text the order in, you have to go to their website. If you're at the website, you can get the phone number. I'm ranting, and no one really cares about it as much as I probably do, so I'll stop.

Anywho, how's your life going? It's funny when I ask questions like that, cuz I'm really interested to know even if I don't necessarily know you. Sometimes people tell me, and sometimes people completely ignore the question. We'll see what happens now that I've pointed it out...

So I got my first insult about my motorcycle day before yesterday. One of our service techs walked in the door and says, "Why'd you buy a training bike? Where are your training wheels?" Now, a regular person would be insulted by that. I am a words person (See Five Love Languages (it's a book)) and that really burns. You have insulted my bike, my riding skill, my financial decisions, and I now loathe your existence!! The person insulting me then proceeded to say that he used to have a 90cc bike in college. 90. Mine is 234cc's and you're insulting me because you had a 90cc. Whaaaat the heck. I'd say this person has no room to talk! Bottom line, don't insult people because then they talk bad about you on their blog. No no no, don't insult people because it's not nice, and they get defensive, and they shouldn't have to defend themselves to you unless you are their spouse or accountability partner.

So how's the week going? It's over half way finished! YAY! I'm excited about next week cuz I only have to work Monday. I get to catch up on sleep! Hooray!!! Well, need to get back to work, just thought I'd put something up cuz it's been a couple days. Later,

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IT'S A GIRL!!!!!!

Yup yup! We found out yesterday that the baby is a girl!!! She's so gorgeous. She's about ten inches long right now, and weighs about 11 ounces, but she's getting bigger! It's so wonderful to finally know for sure! There's like no chance that it's a boy - you can tell in the ultrasound. We can finally stop saying "he or she" and "it." Scary thing though, now people are gonna start buying stuff. I am SO excited to be having a girl because I love girls, but I'm gonna have to make sure our whole apartment doesn't go pink! I'm so excited for my little princess to be here.

So what's goin' on with the weather? First they said the cold front would be here like Monday, and it was HOT. Then they said it was gonna rain on Tuesday, and it was dry. Now the cold front is here and good grief is it COLD!!! The low tonight by 8 pm is 48 degrees! BRRRRR!!! You can say "oh it's not that bad," but on a motorcycle, it feels like 42!!! You gotta admit, that's cold. Oh well, at least it's starting to feel more like a holiday-ish season. I like it to be cold for Thanksgiving and Christmas. Yeah, that took like two minutes just to color the words... So what? You like it cold, too. Who wants it to be t-shirt weather while you're eating turkey dinner or opening presents? Yeah, it stinks. Granted, once the holidays are over, I like it to heat back up a little bit. I'm thinking my perfect day in temperatures would be upper 50's in the morning, mid-70's in the afternoon, and lower 60's at night. A light jacket at most during the day, and snuggle weather with the wife at night. How about you? What would your perfect temperature be? It's different for everybody.

So I guess that's all for now - I'm trying to stay more current with my posting like I used to be, and I'm trying to post on all three blogs today. If you don't know the other links, they're http://brokenandrebuilt.blogspot.com and http://bikesilike.blogspot.com so check 'em out if you want. Later,


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MEEP MEEP!!!

Yeah, so I learned something today - don't drink two cups of SUPER strong coffee in the morning without eating something first. I am WIRED. If you read this stuff out loud as quick as you can, you'll have an idea how I'm feeling. Woo Hoo!! To add on to that, our system is down at work, so I can't do ANYTHING. I've only got like 2.5 minutes left till lunch, so I'll have something to do then. So how was your Halloween? Do anything? We didn't. Well, we hung out with people I think - I dunno, it was like five whole days ago, so that's hard to remember at this point. Had a pretty good weekend. What's up with the weather, huh? I mean, I thought a cold front was coming through, but the high today is like 85, and that is NOT cold. It's not anywhere near cold. It's like almost hot. That's just not cool. Sooooo yeah. Oh, we saw American Gangster on Friday, it was a really good movie, but don't take your children to see it. Violence and language and stuff, but the story line itself was pretty good. So anyway, it's lunch time now so I''m gonna go. Later!

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Top Seven Office Pet Peeves

Got this off Yahoo! today.

7. Misuse of work email. This includes pressing "Reply All" just to say "ok!." (22%)
6. Overuse of personal communication devices in meetings, i.e. cellphones, blackberries, PDA's. (28%)
5. Loud talking and obnoxious cell phone rings. No, we do not want to hear your cell phone's sound limit! (41%)
4. Odius food, perfume, or smoking smells. I could almost swear my last boss bathed in cologne. (42%)
3. Messiness in the breakroom, i.e. dirty dishes. (45%)
2. Poor time management while on the clock. That would be me right now! (54%)
1. Gossip. Or at least that's what I heard... (60%)

I'm Back

My friends, my acquaintances, and all you other people who read this blog, I apologize that I have been gone for so long. Not that it really ruined your day to find the same post up for the last nine days, but sorry anyway. I have been very busy at work, and when I have been home I've been far too tired to post. I am therefore taking time out of my work day to post so that you won't feel forgotten.

Like I said, life has been very busy - I'm loving my motorcycle (duh). Melissa is doing well and the baby inside her is growing. We're supposed to find out next Tuesday if it's a boy or girl! Yay! Seriously, it's about time. Seems like forever. We've started going to Bradley birthing classes, and boy howdy do you learn a lot in there! For those of you that don't know, the Bradley Method is an all natural approach to childbirth. It's a whole lot better than using tons of drugs and crap that the hospital loves to hand out. Not bashing anyone who does it that way...necessarily, but just saying that naturally might be the better way...moving on. Yeah so these classes, the lady can TALK. She talked for three hours without barely breathing! Wow. She is very knowledgeable about this stuff. We then watched a video from the 80's on someone giving birth naturally, and yes, we got to see the whooooooole thing. (Shudder). It was cool cuz it's a miracle from God, but it's definitely not...entertaining or something to watch while eating. Like I said though, learned a lot.

So how bout this weather, huh? It's awesome! Granted, it is a little cold riding to work in the morning, but by lunch time it's absolutely gorgeous! I'd love it if it were always in the 60's-70's around here. Clear blue skies, no rain, all that wonderful stuff that some states not next to the Gulf can have. Only thing about this weather is that it's thrown my allergies for a loop. I've been stopped up really bad ever since it cooled down. That's the price I pay to enjoy it so I'm not complaining much.

How is school going for those of you in school? I'm making it and keeping good grades, but it's semi-exhausting. I'll be glad when it's over. Hoping and praying that once I have my 60 hours I can call HPD and get in! Seems like such a long time ago since we first started talking about doing that. Well, it was last year, so yeah, long time.

So here's something I can't believe - it's November 1 on Thursday! And Daylight Savings ends on Sunday! Why is it that the days crawl by, but the year is gone before you know it? I can remember- well ok I can't remember January that well, but I remember February and March like they were last week! On the other hand, November means Melissa's little brother is turning 15, so he can start driving with us, and it also means Thanksgiving dinner and the one football game of the year that I actually watch. Not that I care who wins, but I watch because Melissa's family bleeds orange and I have to watch.

So it's only Tuesday, but I'm approaching it believing that it's going to be a good day. Yesterday was one of the first truly enjoyable work days I've had since starting here! Sad I know. So I should get to work, but I hope you've enjoyed this post. If you have things to be addressed or discussed, leave a comment and I'll try to get to it tomorrow. Later,

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