Message #12: English

(Message sent Fri, 10 Nov 2006 02:59:22 -0700)

Everyone you meet speaks some English, and most people are fluent, so it comes as something of a surprise to find that written English invariably uses curious, quaint, or just plain wrong forms of expression. For example, one business I noticed has a sign above its door that announces, "Technosoft: Team of IT Dissolvers."

My favourite example of this comes to us from the good people of the Border Roads Organisation. Every now and then on the open roads you encounter hand-painted signs they have erected offering useful advice to motorists. One reads, "Be Mild on my Curves."

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