So I’m making friends with the pizza man across the street. He speaks a bit of english, and I go in tonight, he makes the pizza and as we’re waiting for it to cook, he decides to ask me an english question..
He rips out his phone and plays an mp3 for me…then asks me what the first line means. I didn’t get what he was asking at first so he plays the song again…The first line was something like “I can’t stand to fly”…He wanted to know what “can’t stand to…” means.
So I hem n’ haw as I do when I don’t quite know how to answer. I gave the example of – “If I said I can’t stand pizza it means I don’t like pizza”. He’s happy with the explanation…
After taking my pizza and eating I realize that – as is common in english songs – there is probably more than 1 meaning…How does one explain double entendres?
BTW – What exactly is the opposite of standing?
I can’t stand to sit.
I can’t stand to walk.
I can’t stand to dance.
I can’t stand to rickshaw.
So now I guess I have to re-explain everything next time I go in….This happens all the time. I’m always unprepared and screw up when answering a question for the first time.
I’d take a stab and say it comes from with’stand’ing something. Good luck explaining that one though. Then you can go and try and explain notwithstanding and its relationship to standing…
yeah…next time I order a pizza I’ll be sure to bring this up 🙂