Thursday, July 02, 2009

TRUISM


Hello my dear pals. Do you know the meaning of truism? Truism is a statement that is clearly true, so that there is no need to say it. Here are some of my favorite truisms. On the plus side, I like to hear about your favorite truisms. So share them with me.

--Forgive but do not forget.
--Good, high fences make good neighbors.
--Don't make a mountain out of a molehill.
--There's no time like the present.
--You never learn anything from talking.
--When you don't know what to do -Don't do anything.
--Don't tell anyone your goals. None of their business.
--If you don't have something nice to say, keep quiet or change the subject.
--Don't discuss politics or religion - unless you want to lose friends.

Sunday, June 28, 2009

AMBITION

Keep away from those who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you believe that you too can become great. ~ Mark Twain

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

wowio


WOWIO is for those of you who devour books.

Enjoy reading your favorite books there for free.

Wednesday, June 10, 2009

to write something carelessly and quickly


JOT DOWN: to quickly write down ideas, notes, or facts.

Let me jot down the name of that restaurant.

SCRAWL: to write something carelessly and untidily.

Three students were excluded for scrawling graffiti on a school wall.

SCRIBBLE: to write something quickly and untidily.

Andrew scribbled a quick note and handed it to the chairman.

DASH OFF: to write a letter, note, story etc quickly and without thinking carefully about it.

The publishers wanted a summary that afternoon, so I dashed it off in an hour or so.

Saturday, May 16, 2009

wordcount.org

The owner of wordcount laid out the words in a straight line, from the most frequently used to the least frequently used. The only thing you have to do is to look for specific English words you have in your mind to see their rankings.

Interestingly, the line is an 88,000-word-long sentence. If you have time to kill, try to explore the site more and more. Look for obscure words and find their rankings. You may be touched by how fun it is to know the rankings of the words you are interested in.

However, do not expect to find the rankings of new words such as "blog", "webmaster" and "google" there (in this case, my effort had not results). This is the only part of that long unusual sentence that may disappoint you a little. I wish you good luck exploring wordcount.

Thursday, April 30, 2009

confusing words


Confusing Words is a collection of 3210 words that are troublesome to readers and writers. Words are grouped according to the way they are most often confused or misused.

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

book quotes

Books are lighthouses erected in the great sea of time. ~E.P. Whipple

Books support us in our solitude and keep us from being a burden to ourselves. ~Jeremy Collier

Books can be dangerous. The best ones should be labeled "This could change your life." ~Helen Exley

From my point of view, a book is a literary prescription put up for the benefit of someone who needs it. ~S.M. Crothers

Books are not made for furniture, but there is nothing else that so beautifully furnishes a house. ~Henry Ward Beecher

God be thanked for books! they are the voices of the distant and the dead, and make us heirs of the spiritual life of past ages. ~W.E. Channing

Books are delightful society. If you go into a room and find it full of books - even without taking them from the shelves they seem to speak to you, to bid you welcome. ~William Ewart Gladstone

Sunday, March 15, 2009

Pass the Hat



Pass the hat means to attempt to collect money for some project(usually said about money that is given to help pay for something or to reward someone).

--He is always passing the hat for something.
--Ann is passing the hat to collect money to buy a gift for Luke.
--My pal and I decided to pass the hat around to collect money for the janitor but no one gave us a heed in the dorm.

Wednesday, January 28, 2009

To Sleep Immediately Since You are Tired



The Following three expressions all mean to go to sleep very deeply and quickly since you are very tired.

FLAKE OUT
I feel fine in the mornings, but in the afternoons I just flake out at my desk.

GO OUT LIKE A LIGHT
Anita was so tired that she went out like a light as soon as she went to bed.

AS SOON AS YOUR HEAD HITS THE PILLOW
As soon as Jack's head hit the pillow, he fell into a deep sleep.

ESP

Hello my pals. Please do accept my apology for updating my blog with delay. I was up to my head in my projects and books. Moreover, this blogger was danged difficult to sign in.

Here are some links to ESP (English for Specific Purposes) pages available online and for free on the net:


Science Daily

A place where you can read the latest science news.

Food Dictionary
Search the dictionary of more than 4,000 food terms.

English for Work
Very good free online English learning materials for nurses, police, tour guides, food staff, hotel staff, and airline staff.

English for Pharmacists
Exercises designed to improve pharmacists' English.

Saturday, September 20, 2008

take/win/collect the wooden spoon


Have you ever heard this expression before? It is an unusual expression, isn't it? I was looking for a wooden-something word in my dictionary till I came to this term. Taking/wining/collecting the wooden spoon. The expression means coming last in a competition.

There are not enough pages on the web talking about this phrase and its origin. Perhaps, it is an old phrase. My attempt to find a page on its possible origins was not vain, though.
Here is the origin.

I hope none of us win the wooden spoon in our personal and academic life.

etymologic

etymologic
the toughest word game on the web

ETYMOLOGIC is a web site that I have learned about recently. There, ten questions on word origin will be given to you randomly. You have to choose the right answer. It is called the toughest language game since it is totally difficult and mind-boggling to find the right answer as all the choices may seem plausible.

Sunday, September 14, 2008

Grading the final examination



Department of Statistics: All grades are plotted along the normal bell curve.

Department of Psychology: Students are asked to blot ink in their exam books, close them and turn them in. The professor opens the books and assigns the first grade that comes to mind.

Department of History: All students get the same grade they got last year.

Department of Religion: Grade is determined by God.

Department of Philosophy: What is a grade?

Law School: Students are asked to defend their position of why they should receive an A.

Department of Logic: If and only if the student is present for the final and the student has accumulated a passing grade then the student will receive an A, else the student will not receive an A.

Department of Computer Science: Random number generator determines grade.

Department of Physical Education: Everybody gets an A.

Wednesday, July 23, 2008

Applied Linguistics websites

Here are some websites on Applied Linguistics. You may find valuable information or even articles on these websites. Just click on the links.

http://iteslj.org
http://www.baal.org.uk
http://devoted.to/corpora
http://www.aila.info
http://www.thelinguist.org
http://www.cal.org
http://www.aaal.org
http://www.tesol.org
http://www.lingforum.com/forum
http://www.iraal.ie
http://www.appliedlinguistics.org
http://www.linguistics-journal.com

Wednesday, July 09, 2008

distemper, dis-temper, or this temper


I love translation, but I seldom immerse myself in it. But when I decide to translate an article, I translate it with vim and vigor.To be honest, our translation classes at university were awful. Let me tell you a real story about our oral translation class.

One day our instructor brought a tape with herself and asked us to transcribe and then translate it. I listened to the tape and put down everything on my notebook. Something was wrong with a line in that text. The line, which knocked me for a loop, was this:

Her cat had been given its distemper shot.

Unaware of the real meaning of "distemper" and being lazy enough to look the word up in a dictionary, my instructor and classmates translated the word incorrectly. They thought the word meant "behaving badly". Do you get what I mean?

No one in the class paid heed to this mistranslation. During listening to the tape again and reviewing my notes for the exam, a question came to my head. Was it distemper, dis-temper, or this temper? The first one, of course, seemed to be the answer. And my trusty dictionary approved that.

Distemper: a serious infectious disease that affects animals.

Oscar Wilde once said it is always a very dangerous thing to tell a story with a moral. I cannot give the moral of this story a miss, however. Some translators, no matter where they come from or what their native language is, do not take translation very seriously. They do not want to thrash the problems of translation out. Please add the number of some students of translation and their teachers to the list.

Regards,

Zahra

Wednesday, July 02, 2008

My American Accent!

Some people believe that there is a region in the United States which is very unique. Its uniqueness is due to the fact that people from there speak English without any accent.

Do you believe this story? Me? I do not believe it. I cannot believe it. Not for all the gold in the world. It is totally understandable that everyone has his or her own accent. Generally, people's accent shows that which country or part of the country they come from. As a result, the story which has been spread by some rumormongers is an out-and-out gossip. To my mind, those guys must take some courses on linguistics to revise their knowledge.

Let me tell you something weird and somehow interesting. I took a small quiz to realize what American accent I have. Here is the result:

What American accent do you have?
Your Result: The Northeast

Judging by how you talk you are probably from north Jersey, New York City, Connecticut or Rhode Island. Chances are, if you are from New York City (and not those other places) people would probably be able to tell if they actually heard you speak.

The Inland North
Philadelphia
Boston
The Midland
The South
North Central
The West
What American accent do you have?
Quiz Created on GoToQuiz


You, too, give it a try. The quiz and its result are indeed off the hinges.

Regards,

Zahra

Saturday, March 29, 2008

Go Climb A Tree!

Go climb a tree is an expression which means go away and stop annoying me. This expression has several synonyms in English. Read the following expressions:

-- Take a walk!
-- Go jump in the lake!
-- Go fry an egg!
-- Go fly a kite!
-- Take a hike!
-- Go chase yourself!
-- Go to grass and eat hay!

Notice that the last expression is an old one. Thus, all of them have the same meaning and connotation: Go away, leave me alone!

Friday, December 21, 2007

Sports Glossaries

football glossary

soccer glossary

A glossary of ski terms

Badminton Glossary

Boomerang Glossary

Basketball Glossary

Monday, September 17, 2007

5 be yourself quotes

If you cannot be a poet, be the poem. ~David Carradine

There is just one life for each of us: our own. ~Euripides

You were born an original. Don't die a copy. ~John Mason

We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be. ~Kurt Vonnegut

We all wear masks, and the time comes when we cannot remove them without removing some of our own skin. ~André Berthiaume, Contretemps

Wednesday, August 15, 2007

Some new links:

Press Tv

creative writing prompts

read print

Cambridge dictionaries

Thursday, July 19, 2007

Gold Expressions:

Hello. Honestly, I planned to make this post the final post on this blog. But, for a couple of reasons I changed my mind. I hope you enjoy reading this new piece after not reading anything new for nearly a long time on my blog. I am waiting to read your comments.

Today, I want to talk about expressions that have a precious word in them. That word is GOLD. Read and memorize these golden expressions. Do not forget to make your own examples with them and use them in your daily conversations and the notes that you write down in English.


Have a heart of gold: It means to be very kind and helpful.
Jack's mom has a heart of gold. She will do anything for her children.

As good as gold: Authentic; genuine.
Mary's promise is as good as gold.

Dripping with gold: To be wearing a lot of gold.
She came to my friend's party dripping with gold.

Be like gold dust: Valuable and difficult to find.
I could not buy any tickets. The tickets of this football game are like gold dust.

A gold mine of information: Someone or sth full of information.
The newly published dictionary is a gold mine of information.

Black gold: Oil.
It was not gold we were trying to find but black gold or oil.

Worth your/its weight in gold: Extremely useful or valuable.
User-friendly software is worth its weight in gold.

Gold-rimmed: Having a gold edge.
Gold-rimmed glasses.

Wednesday, June 13, 2007

feathers

Did you know that a small thing like "feather" is an important part of a few idioms in English? No? So read these useful idioms and do not forget to make your own sentences with them in order to learn them more effectively.

a feather in someone's cap
something very good that someone has done

be as light as a feather
if something is as light as a feather, it is very light

feather your own nest
to get money by unfair and dishonest methods

ruffle someone's feathers
it means to annoy or upset someone

birds of a feather
you use it to talk about guys who have similar interests, tastes, etc.

Monday, June 04, 2007

speak the same language

If people speak the same language, they have similar ideas, tastes, etc.

Examples:

Liz and her sister are like friends. They mostly speak the same language about everything.

Ben and his father do not speak the same language when it comes to politics.

Friday, May 11, 2007

words about elections

Here is a list of words about elections. I hope you enjoy reading and learning them. Just remember, you will lose those words if you don't use them.

Monday, April 30, 2007

words for expressing dark colors

rich: dark and giving a pleasant feeling of comfort and warmth
example: I admired the warm, rich colors of her Persian rugs.

deep: deep colours are strong, dark, and attractive
example: She looked into his eyes. They were deep blue.

dark: dark colours are closer to black than to white
example: If you're going to have such dark walls I really think you should have a pale carpet.