That's Cool. Kids can really make you think can't they?

Get a cat.  The problem of plural mice will soon resolve itself with no need for an expert in linguistics.

And well done to your daughter for recognising that "mice's" was unusual enough to worth asking about.

A.

If the plural of goose is geese, shouldn't the plural of mouse be meese  (I know it doesn't make sense it's just an old joke).

Anyway I'm with zeusfaber, at the tender age of 7 she may have a firmer grip on this language we call English than most adults, including possibly me.

KENAT, probably the least qualified checker you'll ever meet...

Hey, Everybody knows Meese is the plural of Moose...right??

If thats the case wouldn't 'Meese' make quite a big hole in the skirting board?

Alternately, if the plural of mouse is mice, shouldn't the plural of spouse be spice?  Gives the phrase "spice up your marriage" a new meaning...

If the plural house is houses, why can't mouse be mouses?

"Art without engineering is dreaming; Engineering without art is calculating."

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swearingen

It seems your daughter has a future in stress analysis...

(Von Mice's stress)

tg

Someone once told me that the plural of a computer mouse is mouses and not mice (although I can't seem to find any evidence to back that up). Fortunately there is probably even less reason to be searching for a posessive plural for a computer peripheral, than a rodent, especially as mouses' is such an ungainly word.

you can always rearrange the sentence to make it easier:
instead of "the mice's favorite sandwich" you can say "the favorite sandwich of the mice."

CSLufkin,

Yes kids keep us on our toes. My 4 year old son asks lots of questions, but the humbling thing is that now he's beginning to correct me on things!

http://www.painintheenglish.com/post.php?id=534
http://alt-usage-english.org/excerpts/fxmouses.html

Basically, the argument for "computer mouses" is that "mouse" in that context is really an acronym for "manually-operated user-select equipment".  But that argument doesn't really work--the "mouse" nickname came first because of how it looks with the cord coming out like a tail, and they invented the acronym (backronym) later to be cute.

One of the sources I listed above references a 1995 version of Microsoft's in-house style manual, which instructs its writers to avoid the whole question by saying "mouse devices" instead.  Things may have changed since 1995, though; MS's website now calls 'em "mice".

Hg

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Ah if only we'd stuck to the original "X-Y Position Indicator for a Display System"
Catchy.

Many of the electronics distributors have them under rodents.  Now try working out how someone would find tracker-ball or light pen under rodents.

Mouse  - Mice -  Mouses - Meeces
House  -         Houses
Spouse - Spice - Spouses
Rouse  - Rice -           Reeces (Peanut Butter Cups) lol
Louse  - Lice -  Louses
Douse  - Dice -  Douses

Die    - Dice -  Dies

Radius - Radii
Elvis -  Elvi

OK what's correct?  LOL

Don't forget some of the other English
Dive
Dove
Fell in

It's only a complete day when you Learn something and Teach something!

Talking about smart kids.... I remember how, at a similar age, my niece set back parenting for about 50 years.

Visiting them in LA and seated for dinner there was the usual fuss with the kids about eating a sensible diet or any food at all. She, at this time and left to her own devices, would eat enough for a very small bird in hibernation.

Dad was very insistent that she eat all on her plate.
Like most kids she was experimenting with how to hide the food on the plate through re-arrangement. Like all parents he had tried the "just eat some of the peas" approach but she was having none of it, she already knew all about "mission creep".

As the dinner progressed her father and she were becoming increasingly dangerous.
Rebellion was in the air and tempers were building. Nervous guests shuffled their chairs away from the two in the hopes of escaping the worst of the fallout.

Suddenly (one could almost see the light bulb appear above her head cartoon-like and burst into brilliant light) her whole demeanour changed.
An angelic sweet smile played on her face and she got out of her seat, came round and wrapped both her arms around her dad's (if he had been given to beating children it would have been his hand of choice), smiled up adoringly and said:
"Daddy, " pause while daddy readjusted from the bleak Dickensian disciplinarian to a doting parent and smiled in return, and, as if asking a great boon in a chocolate factory, "Can I eat as much as I like?"
Without benefit of legal advice and before any could intervene and caution him he promptly replied:
"Yes, of course you can."
"Oh good." she replied sweetly. "I've finished." and with a Joan of Arc air of invincibility, proudly walked away to watch cartoons on TV leaving behind a somewhat destroyed parent.

Ah, the power of language, the danger of children and the fallibility of age and experience. Was it WC Fields who said "Anyone who hates animals and small children can't be all bad."?

JMW
www.ViscoAnalyser.com

Some plurals show some lack of language logic:

goose --> geese, then
loose bolt --> leese bolts?

mouse --> mice, then
house --> hise?

foot --> feet, tooth --> teeth , then
tool --> teel?

LOL

English is a fantastic study of various grammatical rules from various language in various eras.

Hg

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"English is a fantastic study of various grammatical rules from various language in various eras."

I you mean English is a fantastic study of various grammatical rules from various languageS in various AREas (eras?), I fully agree with you (just joking) :)

Regards,
GonzaloEE

Yes, various languageS.
No, various ERAS.

Hg

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"hise" is a word often heard in the posher parts of SE England.  It's not plural though.

- Steve

That's "hice" as in nice not "hise" as in wise.

JMW
www.ViscoAnalyser.com

No, that's 'hise' as in 'house'?  Confused yet?

Received pronunciation? I've always heard that as "hice".

JMW
www.ViscoAnalyser.com

that reminds me - when I did not know English very well I translated John Steinbeck's book title -  About mouses and people...

I agree with jmw, I've only ever heard it pronounced hice as in nice.  BTW, another received pronunciation for "I quite agree" is "Eggwettergree". :)

What is plural for roof?

http://www.askoxford.com/concise_oed/roof?view=uk

roofs, often pronounced "rooves"

A bit like 'have' being pronounced 'of' as in "I could of done that".

The pronunciation leads to a lot of misspelling/use of the wrong word.
 

KENAT, probably the least qualified checker you'll ever meet...

a hoof on a roof?

hooves on the roofs?

Didya ever wonder about the first guy who said, "Mouses just sounds funny -- it won't do.  The plural of mouse is henceforth offically mice."

What a legacy he left!

Nice stories about y'all's kids, too...

Goober Dave

I suppose no one wants to hear about vowel shift...

Hg

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Is that like phase shift?

KENAT, probably the least qualified checker you'll ever meet...

Isn't English a wonderful language. If it followed sensible rules we would have nothing to discuss

Ahh vowel shift, that reminds me of some great fun I had in New Zealand, anyone like fush and chups? Whats five plus one, why sex of course!  

And that's what keeps Earth in it's concentricical orbit

It's only a complete day when you Learn something and Teach something!

Sex is what posh people have their coal delivered in.

- Steve

Kenat,

Phase shift is what happens to somebody after Captain Kirk has blown them away with his little hand held device

Kev

PS I'm back after a rather longer than anticipated absense, and I see I have mountains of reading to do!!!!! Pat's Pub for a few sleepless nights and I should be up to date!!!

Kevin

"It is a mathematical fact that fifty percent of all doctors graduate in the bottom half of their class." ~Author Unknown

"If two wrongs don't make a right, try three." ~Author Unknown
 

What's coal?

JMW
www.ViscoAnalyser.com
 

An old king, who called for his fiddlers 3 or something like that.

Or do you mean the stuff whose miners upset the UK conservative government in the 80's so the government (including the following pseudo labour party) got revenge by basically running down the industry?

KENAT, probably the least qualified checker you'll ever meet...

Kenat,

They haven't run down the coal industry. It's all a clever economic plan.

Close the mines in the 80's/90's, become highly dependent on foreign fuel sources and exposed to the economic volitities in a market famous for price hikes and then when the prices of fossil fuels have gone thru the roof, re-open the mines and make global financial killing.......

Sounds reasonable to me
 

Kevin

"It is a mathematical fact that fifty percent of all doctors graduate in the bottom half of their class." ~Author Unknown

"If two wrongs don't make a right, try three." ~Author Unknown
 

A cunning plan, if they've kept the equipment/mines in care & maintenance, the miners on retainer...

 

KENAT, probably the least qualified checker you'll ever meet...

Nah, they were sold to the French. LOL

Kevin

"It is a mathematical fact that fifty percent of all doctors graduate in the bottom half of their class." ~Author Unknown

"If two wrongs don't make a right, try three." ~Author Unknown