#1074 Teem Thank

The English language is a funny thing indeed. The other day I was listening to a commercial on the radio and the announcer said that one group was teaming up with another to do something good.
And I thought, is there any other way to team? We don’t team down. We certainly don’t team around, but we do team up. And the reason for this is, if we just team, it sounds like we’re saying team spelled t-e-e-m- and not t-e-a-m-.
When you t-e-e-m- teem you are swarming. The gnats teemed in a cloud over the cesspool. They didn’t team up, even though they were floating upwards in the air. They just teemed.
When things teem, it sounds so much more scary. Locusts teeming over the crops. The enemy teeming on the opposite shore, ready to attack.
It’s confusing, but our language is teeming with weird words that deal with plurals. For example, greater minds than mine have wondered why pants only appear in pairs. I suppose a pair of pants makes some sense, as there are two legs on it. But we also say a pair of panties. And you can have a singular panty, but almost never can you have a singular pant.
“Give me my pant,” is not an acceptable phrase.
A similar confusion reigns with thanks. Thanks are always plural. Even the stingiest appreciator can not give one thank. You can be thankful. You can shower a person with thanks. But you cannot dole out a carefully measured single thank.
No matter how many pants you are wearing.
Funny too, since a similar word, bank, which can be both verb and noun, has no such restriction. If I was rich enough, I can give someone banks. I can use one of those banks when I go to the bank and bank my money for a later withdrawal.
I can be banking money at the bank but I can’t be thanking someone with a thank.
Even if I team up in a teeming swarm of thankful bankers.
America, ya gotta love it.