Irregular verbs

The stormy love triangle between Mrs Lay, Mr Lie and Miss Lie, the compulsive liar

Mrs Lay and Mr Lie were once married. Mrs Lay was a good housewife, a hard-working woman: she laid the table everyday, she made the beds, did the washing up, dusted the furniture…she actually did every job around the house. She was also a working woman: she worked in a restaurant, layingtables, serving customers, clearing up…

On the contrary, Mr Lie was a really lazy man: he lay in bed till noon and then lay in the sofa for the rest of the day. However, he sometimes went out. On sunny days he loved to go to the park and lie on the grass and in the summer he usually went to the swimming pool, where he lay on a hammock by the water (swimmimg was just too much effort). Other times he went to the beach and lay on the sand for hours, sometimes forgetting to go back home for lunch, where Mrs Lay had laidthe table hours before.

One hot summer day Mr Lie was lying on the sand on the beach, reading a magazine, when suddenly he looked up and saw Miss Lie looking gorgeous in her new bikini. Miss Lie saw him too. It was love at first sight (after all they had the same name) and from that moment on they started their illicit love affair. That’s how Mr Lie, apart from being lazy, also became a liar (it was all Miss Lie’s bad influence, who wasn’t such a bad girl after all, but couldn’t help being a compulsive liar). So now Mr Lie lied to Mrs Lay all the time: if he was with Miss Lie, he told Mrs Lay that he was at a friend’s house or looking for a job.

Mrs Lay thought all this was very suspicious (especially the job part) so one day she followed him and found him with Miss Lie, kissing passionately. She was outraged and asked him for a divorce immediately. But Mr Lie, who apart from being lazy and a liar, had also become very nasty, didn’t want to give divorce to her. Later on, however, he accepted but with a few conditions: he would keep the house and more than half of the money, and not only that, he would also take Mrs Lay’s first name and use it as his middle name. Mrs Lay was indignant but in the end she accepted: she didn’t want to have anything to do with that nasty man again.

So that is the reason why Mr Lie’s first surname is Lay and his second surname Lain, that ‘n’ at the end reminding everyone how nasty he is.

(Luckily, soon after this Mrs Lay, who had always been an excellent employee, got promoted in her job and started earning a lot of money. Miss Lie dumped Mr Lie in a few months and Mr Lie spent all his money in unnecessary things. After that, he was forced to look for a job, which he found in Mrs Lay's restaurant and there he spent the rest of his life washing dishes).

deal, dealt, dealt

dream, dreamt, dreamt

mean, meant, meant

hear, heard, heard

read, read, read

blow, blew, blown

fly, flew, flown

grow, grew, grown

know, knew, known

throw, threw, thrown

dig, dug, dug

stick, stuck, stuck

spin, spun, spun

sting, stung, stung

swing, swung, swung

Always remember:

lay, laid, laid

Mrs Lay lays the table every day. She laid the table yesterday. She has laid the table every single day of her married life.

lie, lay, lain

Mr Lie usually lies in bed till noon. However, yesteday he lay in bed till one o'clock. He has lain down for a week.

lie, lied, lied

Miss Lie, lies all the time. She lied to me, to you and to everyone. She has liedever since she learned to speak.

I've dreamt something very strange. What does it mean? Have I heard it or read it before? I don't know how to deal with it!

The lady threw some magic seeds into the air. The wind blew, the seeds flew, and nobody ever knew where the plants grew.

The insect watcher

I was digging a hole in my garden when I stopped to watch a spider spinning its web.The spider worked laboriously, swinging from side to side, and in no time the web was finished. A fly soon stuck to it, the spider slowly approached...and I don't know what happened next because a wasp suddenly stung me! Ouch!