You know what I like? Idioms.
Idioms separate the native speakers from those that learned English from a book or in a classroom. Idioms are often illogical and fly in the face of reason, but they stick around because of their sheer charm.
If a person could live like an idiom, what a world this would be.
You know what I enjoy more than idioms? Foreign people who use idioms slightly incorrectly or too often, because they’ve just learned them and want to show off their knowledge of the language.
I enjoy this partially out of the complex linguistic niche that idioms fill and how hard it is to describe when learning English. But I think I also enjoy it partially because I wish I could use idioms that often, that I could get away with it. As it is, I’m relegated to using them only when they are one of the most popular (“let’s call it a day”) or in the rare occasion when I want to sound obtuse (“long in the tooth”). How I wish I could sprinkle them in conversation as if I had just learned them, beaming with pride and satisfaction for mastering a complex turn of phrase.
When all is said and done, though, I’m all talk and no cider anyway.