* Paynes Prairie
* Notes from the Office

The FJ I Weekly

Paynes Prairie
Outdoor Fun

Join us for a morning of walking
through nature trails at Paynes Prairie
Preserve State Park. The park is
known for its outstanding wildlife
viewing opportunities including bison,
cracker horses and cattle, alligators,
sand hill cranes, and over 270 bird
species. The principal physical feature
of the preserve is a 16,000 acre
freshwater marsh/wet prairie.

When: Saturday, February 20th

Where: Meet at Norman Hall garage
at 10:00am. The Language Assistants
will drive you to the park.

Bring: $2 for the entrance fee,
comfortable shoes for walking the
trails and a camera for taking pictures
of the amazing wildlife!

r Spring Break and I-20s
Spring break is only two and a
half weeks away! If you plan to
leave the US at all during the
break-even on a cruise or a day
trip to Canada or Mexico-please
remember to come to the office
to have your I-20 signed so that
you won't have trouble getting
back into the country!

> Student Mailbox-Don't forget
to check the student mailbox in
the main office from time to
time. There is mail for some
returning students already.

Next weekend, we will be headed for
Wall Climbing at Lake Wauburg
South right here in Gainesville.
Details will be on the Activities Board
and in next week's Weekly.

The following are ELI Birthdays for
the week of February 19-25:

Students:
February 23: Hamdan AlAmeri
February 23: Ilane Silva
February 24: Fahad Alghamdi

Staff:
None this week!

Q: Other than scrambled, how can I order
my eggs in a restaurant?

A: Fried, sunny side up (not turned
and yolk unbroken and liquid); fried,
over easy (turned and lightly cooked
on the yolk side); fried, over medium;
fried, over hard; hard boiled; soft
boiled; poached (broken open and
cooked in a little bit of water); and
various types of omelets.

Q: Why is pubic transportation poor in
mostAmenrcan cities?

A: With the exception of the very
large cities in the Northeast and
Upper Midwest (which for the most
part have excellent transportation
systems), our cities are very young.
They didn't really grow to be large
until after the invention of the
automobile. And in some cities that
had streetcars at the turn of the 19th
into the 20th century, it was actually
cheaper to build roads than to
maintain the streetcars at that time.
So, our cities grew up around the use
of the automobile, and the vast
distances were easiest to cross by
superhighway once that was
established. Now, we are discovering
the need to change the system!

Q: I'm curious about commercials, I often
see one brand compared with the other rival
brand and they mention the exact rival brand
name and I think kind of ignore them.

* Birthdays
* Manners

I he Weekly Newsletter o
the English Language Institute
Volume 111, Issue 5
February 19, 2010

Highlights I

How it can bepossible? Does anybody
get upset about it?

A: Quite possibly. But it's perfectly
legal. The only rule within the law is
that you can't make false or unproven
claims about either your own product
or the rival product. For example,
you can say that in a blind taste test,
your product was tastier than the
other product-but you have to
actually have the test results to back
that claim up.

Q: Why don'tpeople here use an umbrella
when it's raining

A: A lot of us do. Heck, I even
bought an extra big one because this
winter has been an unusually rainy
one. However, there are a lot of
optimists and forgetful people and
people who just don't check the
weather before they leave their
homes. And, I'm sure there's even a
small minority of people who simply
like to get wet.

Q: Is the rumor true that Amen'can girls
don't lkeforeign gys?

A: I don't know for sure from
personal experience. I'm an
American guy, so I can't quite put
myself in either shoe. I can tell you,
though, that over the 16 years I've
been here at the ELI, I have seen
American guys dating female ELI
students, I have seen American girls
dating male ELI students, and I've
even seen a couple of examples of
American guys dating male ELI
students and of American girls and
female ELI students dating. All of
this is in addition to the many ELI
students I've seen dating each other!
So, I'd say from observation alone
that it's just a rumor, or at least an
incorrect overgeneralization.

Q: Which one is correct, "It's me" or "It's
I"? When I am knocking at the door, should
I say "It's me" or "It's I"?

A: This is one of my favorites. First
of all, we would never, ever make the
contraction with "I". It would be "It
is I." However, this conundrum gets
to the heart of what we call

prescriptive grammar vs. descriptive
grammar and how silly the arguments
can get.

The correct statement, according to
the strict older rules of grammar, is
"It is I." However, the vast majority
of native speakers of English have
abandoned that structure, in favor of
"It's me." What this means is simply
that it is an example of how language
changes over time. The error
eventually becomes the rule. Sure,
you can say, "It is I." But you're
going to sound like there's something
wrong with you unless there's a very
strict older grammar person on the
other side of that door.

We are the music makers. And we
are the dreamers of dreams.
--Roald Dahl

IU i English Language Institute
I UNIVERSITY of FLORIDA
English Language Institute
PO Box 117051
315 Norman Hall
Gainesville, FL 32611-7051, USA
Phone: (352) 392-2070
Fax: (352) 392-3744
Email: StudyEnglish@eli.ufl.edu
Webpage: www.eli.ufl.edu