"crazy" Uncountable Nouns

Hi Everyone!
Let's review countable and uncountable nouns.
COUNTABLE: Things you can count: table, books, people, etc...
UNCOUNTABLE: Things that you cannot count: air, water, coffee....

However, there are certain words that seem to be countable, especially because they are countable in Portuguese. But, surprisingly, they are not. Here is the list:

INFORMATION
EQUIPMENT
LUGGAGE
ADVICE
IDENTIFICATION
MAIL
EVIDENCE

...

Well, I think that these are the most incorrectly used words.

Therefore, you cannot use those words in plural. Informations, equipments, advices... WRONG, WRONG, WRONG! That's why I call these words "crazy", because in Portuguese, they are perfectly countable! In English, they cannot be used in plural.

So, let's see the quantifiers now.

COUNTABLE	UNCOUNTABLE
MANY/FEW	MUCH/LITTLE
A NUMBER OF	AMOUNT OF
FEWER (THAN)	LESS (THAN)
One, two, three....	A piece of, two pieces of, three pieces of...

So, you cannot say: "Let me give you 2 advices", but you can say "Let me give you two pieces of advice". I know, it does sound weird, but if you learn how to use, you get used to it, this new structure of "crazy" uncountable nouns.

I found this video on youtube about "Eminem's 10 pieces of advice for kids" on David Letterman's show:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPm9Q7TjVGo

There's also this video talking about the best piece of fitness equipment:

http://video.yahoo.com/watch/2011959/6430011

So... Keep practicing!

CAN OR CAN'T?

Hi everyone!

What's the difference between CAN AND CAN'T?

CAN- AFFIRMATIVE

CAN'T- NEGATIVE

Of course you know that, that's crystal clear!

I mean, the PRONUNCIATION of these two words?

For example, an American would never pronounce the word "can't":

EX:

1. I can go there

2. I can't go there

For those of you who are used to working with native English speakers, you must have gone through some awkward situations in which you did not know, or was not sure whether the speaker had said CAN or CAN'T, right?

So, how to solve this?

This, my dears, can be easily solved when you learn the importance of INTONATION.

AFFIRMATIVE

When someone says "I can do it", for example, the stress falls upon the verb, not upon CAN itself:

I can DO it.

She can USE it.

They can MAKE it.

You can UNDERSTAND.

NEGATIVE

If you are saying in the negative form, then, the stress will fall upon the word "CAN'T", which will be pronounced "CAN":

I CAN'T do it.

She CAN'T use it.

They CAN'T make it.

You CAN'T understand.

Got it?

I will try to post a video here, giving more examples.