From the Very Apropos Series
by Jake Taylor
English
Jack: “Manny, lest I forget, the list that included the sin of lust was lost last night.”
Manny: “What?”
Jack: “What what?”
Manny: “What’s with the ‘almost identical’ five words?”
Jack: “Oh, I’m playing English.”
Manny: “Playing English?”
Jack: “Yeah.”
Manny: “There’s no such thing as a game named English. You can’t play English.”
Jack: “Yes there is, and yes I can.”
Manny: “Who invented the game of English?”
Jack: “I did.”
Manny: “When?”
Jack: “The other day, in the afternoon.”
Manny: “Okay, how do you play English?”
Jack: “There are several variations of the game.”
Manny: “Fine, tell me a few.”
Jack: “Well, in one you need to find words that are different by only one letter. For example: last, lest, list, lost, lust; however, you need to make a sentence that makes sense. The more sense the sentence makes, the more points you get.”
Manny: “Can you give me another example?”
Jack: “Of course: ‘The cat and the rat chased the fat bat around the mat’ or ‘The bat told the cat to eat the fat rat’ or ‘The rat sat and, while wearing a hat and eating a grain of oat, gave the cat a pat’ and this last sample has six words.’”
Manny: “Jack, let me ask you something: Do you have a social life?”
Jack: “I believe so.”
Manny: “What do you do all day?”
Jack: “I think of ways to play English.”
Manny: “Jack, again, there is no such thing as a game of English.”
Jack: “I’ve just shown you one variation of the game! What do you mean there is no such thing?”
Manny: “Fine, I stand corrected. Show me another variation.”
Jack: “In this variation the idea is to find words that are identical but have completely different meanings and pronunciations. For example: “Someone told Job to go to Nice to find a nice job.”
Manny: “Are there more variations?”
Jack: “Yes.”
Manny: “Give me an example.”
Jack: “In this variation you need to use the same identical word but with different meanings, for example: hot.”
Manny: “Hot?”
Jack: “Yes, for example: It was a hot day and the patrolman was looking at a very hot lady standing at the entrance of a building when he received a radio transmission telling him to be on the lookout for a hot car, which was last seen passing by the nuclear plant, near the forbidden ‘hot’ area.”
Manny: “What?”
Jack: “The first hot refers to ‘temperature.’ The second means ‘attractive,’ the third ‘stolen’ and the fourth ‘radioactive.’”
Manny: “I know that Jack, so?”
Jack: “Well, how come we know which is which?”
Manny: “The context, Jack, the context.”
Jack: “Changing topics, shouldn’t we go to see Paul?”
Manny: “Oh my! You are right. But if we are going to go, I better turn right, right here; right?”
Jack: “Right.”
Manny: “What did I say?”
Jack: “You’ve just started playing the game of English!”
© Jacob A. J. Taylor 2011
