English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

But here's the thing. You could pull it off if you can bribe some tour-bus companies to bring the tourists around to your flat. Give them like 25% of the action.

Matt E. Эллен

@Robusto oh! good idea. not many of the tours come this far out of the city

eventually I'd be able to move closer to the centre

Robusto

"You've seen the old Oxford. Now see what's happening today!"

I'll write you some jokes. Like you could hold the door for people and say "I'm the door Matt." And when you welcome them you could introduce yourself as the "Welcome Matt." I've got more.

Matt E. Эллен

lol. I'd be worried about getting groupies. they can be a bit scary

Robusto

"I'm having too much sex," said nobody ever.

Matt E. Эллен

and when they're leaving I can say "and that's a Matt finish"

Robusto

1:17 PM

rimshot

Wait, I miscounted. I still have 11 lessons to go.

Matt E. Эллен

no time for slacking off then ;)

terdon

@Robusto You don't want the un : No soy turista. Otherwise, you are suggesting that while you're not one tourist, you might be two.

Robusto

@terdon Occupational hazard.

@terdon Would it be soy or estoy then?

I mean, soy if you were a professional tourist, say.

terdon

@Robusto It's soy but I can't really tell you why.

Robusto

A better question might be, "Would you pay 50p to see @MattE.Эллен eating breakfast in his flat?"

terdon

1:21 PM

In general, what you are is soy unless it is short term thing slike estoy feliz.

Matt E. Эллен

:D

terdon

@Robusto 1) What would he be eating and 2) what would he be wearing?

I'd pay 50p if he shared. I'm hungry.

Robusto

@terdon You'll have to ask him. I don't produce his act.

terdon

@Robusto You're just the agent yeah?

Robusto

I just write some jokes for him.

6 mins ago, by Robusto

I'll write you some jokes. Like you could hold the door for people and say "I'm the door Matt." And when you welcome them you could introduce yourself as the "Welcome Matt." I've got more.

Matt E. Эллен

1:22 PM

In the summer I am naked. In the winter I wear pyjamas and a dressing gown. Spring and autumn are anyone's guess.

Robusto

A dressing gown? Who the hell are you, Noel Coward?

Matt E. Эллен

Arthur Dent, perhaps :D

Robusto

I'd pay a whole pound if he puts his clothes on.

Matt E. Эллен

lol

Robusto

Still, if you did offer two shows daily, you'd have to work out something besides breakfast.

Matt E. Эллен

1:25 PM

second breakfast?

Robusto

I wonder if you have enough material.

Matt E. Эллен

I might run out of cereal, that's true

Robusto

@MattE.Эллен That might induce people to think you were a hobbit. Not a bad thing, necessarily, but you'd need to be prepared for people wondering why you're so tall.

Wait! That's it! Bill yourself as "Matt Ellen, the Tallest Hobbit in the World!"

Matt E. Эллен

perhaps I could offer "watch me watch netflix"

@Robusto lol. Instant hit. I'll be asked to go on tour

Robusto

You could name your price.

And you could talk about how you would have been in The Lord of the Rings but Peter Jackson thought you were too tall. Instant emotional resonance!

Matt E. Эллен

1:29 PM

He just doesn't understand my people. We were caricatured!

Robusto

Treated worse than the Munchkins in The Wizard of Oz! Hobbit slavery! Forced to work for second breakfasts!

Matt E. Эллен

we had to eat at the kiddies table

Robusto

Discrimination!

Jez

yo you two, what did you think of my story idea? ever read something like it?

Robusto

I posted a reply. See above.

Jez

1:30 PM

it's weird that i get a dream i feel like turning into a full story

Robusto

Well, don't talk about it, write it.

If you talk about it you'll just dispel the energy you have for writing.

Matt E. Эллен

yeah! first draft. 50,000 words by the 5th April. go!

terdon

I found the soundtrack!

Pink Floyd - Alan's Psychedelic Breakfast (1970) [Full]

►

Matt E. Эллен

but the royaltees! I'll never get away with it :D

tchrist

@Robusto Spanish uses the zero article more than we do.

Robusto

1:50 PM

@tchrist Kind of the way the Brits say "in hospital" instead of "in the hospital"?

@MattE.Эллен That brings up a good point. We need tee shirts. Royaltee shirts, in fact. "My brother saw Matt Ellen, The Tallest Hobbit In The World, and all I got was this lousy tee shirt"

Matt E. Эллен

and eau de toilette. "Scent of the hobbit"

Robusto

@tchrist Also less: Me gusta la música moderna where we would just say "I like modern music" (no article).

tchrist

@Robusto Not quite. There are just a lot more places where they don't use it.

Robusto

@MattE.Эллен Something for the ladies, yes.

Matt E. Эллен

keyrings and bumper stickers

tchrist

1:54 PM

@Robusto True enough.

Robusto

@MattE.Эллен Plush toys for the kids.

Kaching!

Matt E. Эллен

I'll be rolling in it!

Robusto

@MattE.Эллен Eventually you'll have to raise your prices. 50p just won't cut it, especially if you're giving 25% to the tour operators.

Matt E. Эллен

maybe I could put up adverts

eat a certain type of cereal

tchrist

> * 2015-03-02: Modernized close vote and close flag aging logic. Aging votes and flags starts after 14 days, regardless of view count. Allowed re-casting votes and flags that've aged away after 14 days.

@AndrewLeach RC just wanted to draw more upvotes to his own answer on this question. :)

terdon

2:34 PM

@Robusto Caching?

agtoever

2:45 PM

Can I drop a quick question about the English language here, please?

tchrist

Everyone is permitted one a day. And that one was yours. If you come back tomorrow, you may ask another question. :)

agtoever

You linguists! ;-)

Ok. Here it is: in dutch we have a word ("grensgeval"), which indicates that a certain situation is in a gray area; It's neither black nor white, so to speak. Is the literal translation: "borderline case" valid?

tchrist

Seems like it.

Hard to say without a more encompassing context.

Matt E. Эллен

@Cerberus can you help your countryman out?

tchrist

It’s too early for him to be awake.

Matt E. Эллен

2:49 PM

ah, yeah :D I thought I saw him earlier, but maybe that was just before bed

agtoever

It was about a stack exchange question on Super User, but it could be on the Ask Different Apple stack exchange as well. I wanted to discuss this (because it could be one or the other). That's the context I wanted to use it. Like: "It seems that this is a borderline case."

Jim Reynolds

If you're talking about your own gender, it's ok to give the full context. This is a safe space.

tchrist

Youchers.

agtoever

I hesitated because I associated "borderline case" with some that has borderline syndrome (a psychological condition).

Jim Reynolds

That sounds fine. But is it better just to say, this question could go on either X or Y.

You can use it to mean gray area.

I mean, people will understand borderline with that meaning, and won't feel distracted by the psychiatric term.

agtoever

2:54 PM

That helped. Thanks!

(bows)

tchrist

Few know the psychiatric term.

Jim Reynolds

It's a toss up between X and Y...

less formal.

My psychiatric term is very, very long.

I'm just glad for the internet access and you lovely new friends.

terdon

@agtoever Note that unless the question is about Apple's mobile devices it is on topic on Super User. They deal with any OS and have even changed their stance and will accept things about tablets. Phones are still off topic.

Don't suggest that a question be migrated just because the OP is using OSX.

Robusto

3:24 PM

@terdon If by caching you mean the sound of a cache register, no.

tchrist

What’s wrong with this picture? :)

Eh? :)

Matt E. Эллен

the baby stealing the drink? the person smoking indoors? none of the people have eyes...

all the drinks are empty

maybe the cocktail shaker isn't empty, I can't tell

tchrist

Martinis are invisible.

Matt E. Эллен

oh and the wine on the piano is only half drunk

tchrist

Unlike the singer atop it.

Matt E. Эллен

3:35 PM

:D

tchrist

The answer is ties.

Matt E. Эллен

what's wrong with the ties?

tchrist

They’re wearing them.

Matt E. Эллен

ah

terdon

OOOookay

tchrist

3:36 PM

From Dave Barry

1

Q: Polite or unrectified placement of the word please

I would please prefer to take both parts of the test on Monday. Is the placement of the word please in this sentence grammatically correct?

Question seems a bit anal.

@terdon I’m sure that guys having THAT much fun could find far more “creative” uses of their colorful neck-napkins.

Andrew Leach

@tchrist The whole picture looks rather Fifties to me, when ties were normal.

tchrist

@AndrewLeach That’s exactly correct.

Andrew Leach

So there's nothing wrong with the picture, apart from the whole party is living in the past.

tchrist

The Dave Barry article is amusing in his typical albeit longish way: it talks about our parents’ generation “having more fun”. Well, or grantparents’.

Andrew Leach

Aha! There are no rose-tinted glasses!

terdon

3:45 PM

@tchrist Never had much use for one myself, I'll give you that.

And that was a wonderful little article! Thanks for sharing.

tchrist

So, it turns out that llamas make better guards against canine incursions for livestock than do geese. Well, like duh. The goat-dairy down the road from me uses them even.

Set not the gander to guard the henhouse against vulpine rapacity.

> What they do is put themselves in between the problem and whatever they’re guarding,” he said. “They make a kind of nasty sound that’s supposed to scare a predator away.”

They also spit at and will use their hooves to kick and injure predators.

Llamas are often used to guard sheep and other commonly preyed-upon livestock because of their natural instinct to nurture. They are specifically useful as deterrents to coyotes because they have no fear of dogs, Hasbrouck said.

I can still see a lion stealing in to grab a kid, though. When I asked them about it, they said so far, so good.

But no more coyote parties at the goat-farm.

Goats used for milk production are wee things.

Of course, to keep all the nannies lactating, you need a couple of rams around to um, prime them now and then. This naturally produces kids. The females you keep for more milk production, but what do you do about the males? They already have two rams for the entire herd of nannies. So what you do is make wethers of them and then rent out the wethers en masse to serve as pack-goats or for weed-eating.

I asked them which one was the belwether. They laughed.

Llamas are Big Business in the American West.

I also know people who’ve tried raising them, and found them anything but docile and pleasant creatures.

One fine Easter Morning, unnaturally warm for that season, I saw two young ladies in long and pretty dresses with two llamas leisurely strolling behind my house in the public open space, all four adorned with the most outlandish Easter bonnets.

tchrist

4:17 PM

Whoa, they just changed the ELU CSS out from under us!

Behold! Comments are now Georgian!

In the wink of an eye, all is made new again.

@ELU_Mods Did you know this was coming? I have no complaint, mind you. Just curious.

Robusto

@tchrist I just noticed that.

tchrist

It looks like it’s now inheriting all the way down from body.

Robusto

We'll see if we can get it in the English 2.0 spec. — Robusto 57 mins ago

tchrist

I don’t have a cached copy of the old CSS so I can’t diff ’em.

Wait, maybe I do.

Something else has changed as well.

Robusto

@tchrist It probably was doing that before. Maybe it was overridden for the comment container before.

tchrist

4:23 PM

@Robusto Yes, exactly my thought.

The favorite star is different now.

Something. Not quite sure.

But over by where you vote, it has a different fit.

Jez

the up and down vote buttons?

they seem bigger in relation to the vote score

Kurtis Beavers

0

Q: Updates to the site

My name is Kurtis and I'm a designer with Stack Exchange. You may have noticed some minor updates to the design of the site. The updates are part of a SE network-wide update to a new base css framework. The updates allow us to: Use .svg sprites for retina displays Fix layout bugs globally More...

discussion design

Robusto

@tchrist Someone just cleaned up the CSS. I went back in my history and discovered that the selector is no longer in their all.css stylesheet.

tchrist

@KurtisBeavers Wow, they really do come when you call them! :)

Robusto

@KurtisBeavers Did you intentionally trash some selectors, or is that just an accident.

Like the ones for comments, etc.

tchrist

4:30 PM

Changing the base CSS network-wide is interesting.

Kurtis Beavers

We're trying to normalize CSS across sites, so cleaning was on purpose. But did I possibly miss something that should be integrated in the updates, that's possible. If you'd add your comments to my question above, we'll collect all the feedback and do a round of updates soon.

tchrist

@KurtisBeavers O Designer, does this mean that ELL is now one step nearer to having its site design complete, that it might at long last graduate from beta? :)

Kurtis Beavers

@tchrist I see it in the queue. But I can't make any promises on the date.

Robusto

After and before.

tchrist

Super!

I told you the vote-block changed!

Robusto

4:33 PM

Now it's before and after.

Jez

they made the logo less bold

Robusto

Nah, I think it's just a screw-up.

Jez

i prefer the original

Robusto

Whenever you go in and clean out CSS, weird shit happens.

@KurtisBeavers: Are you guys using Less or Sass?

tchrist

The stuff in the right sidebar is different, too. I understand the desire to lighten the weight, but now the bold seems too heavy compared with everything else.

Andrew Leach

4:38 PM

Add criticism to the meta post. I've just updated my answer.

tchrist

Clever to leave Ask Question in bold so it looks different from the others in that line.

Andrew Leach

I really really dislike the new logo font.

Robusto

0

A: Updates to the site

I appreciate that you want to clean up your CSS. That's always the job I try to fob off onto someone else. ^)^ Here is a before-and-after look at what happened with ELU. Comments are now in Georgia, not Hevetica Neue, and the voting box has changed. There are some spacing and alignment issues as...

Kurtis Beavers

We're using Less. These changes won't be constant once we finish the conversion and it's unlikely will make another round of changes this big in the future.

tchrist

@AndrewLeach Too spindly? It is especially troubling because since you now more than likely need to zoom a level, you’ll get scaling artifacts on the image.

Robusto

4:39 PM

@KurtisBeavers Yeah. Less purports to make changes like these easier, but I've worked with both Less and Sass, and I've never seen anything that made site-wide changes easy and fun.

tchrist

Yeah, the star is way different.

We should look for things we like better, too.

Robusto

I don't see any but things that look like mistakes.

tchrist

That just means one has to look harder. :)

The Chaos Team thing or whatever is really weird.

Mitch

Everything is slightly off center now.

tchrist

Mitch

4:44 PM

Even the title graphic, the 'H' is a couple noticeable pixels higher than the 'L'

tchrist

Regard Kurtis’s name!

It has a grey sumthun behind it!

Robusto

@tchrist I saw that. Thought it might be intentional.

tchrist

I think it means dev not community manager.

Interesting, though.

Robusto

@tchrist This looks like Sprites Gone Wild.

tchrist

@Robusto Oh, is that it?

Robusto

4:46 PM

Yeah, there is probably a sprite in there but no background-position information, so it's showing the whole thing.

They said they were using SVG sprites now, and probably some CSS rules got marooned at high tide.

You know, it is probably both a blessing and a curse to do UI work for SE sites. A curse because so many people know this shit and will call you out for your least flaws, and a blessing because those people know this shit and will point you toward solutions.

It's like free QA and diagnostics.

Enough working on their shit. I'm between jobs and loving it for another . . . ten days.

Andrew Leach

The name background is surely an error (too many .owners)

terdon

Am I wrong here?

I would please prefer... is not used in any dialect I know of. While I did find a hit on Google Books for it, it is from a book whose prose can only be described as horrible and which should not be taken as indication of regular usage. — terdon 57 mins ago

tchrist

@Robusto SVG sprites? Could they make an SVG header for us then too?

infinitesimal

You are correct @terdon

tchrist

@terdon I think "I would please <verb>" is an oriental pattern.

Andrew Leach

4:55 PM

@tchrist The logo is SVG. That's probably the reason the font changed; they couldn't find the original.

I think my unhappiness is leaking out.

tchrist

@AndrewLeach Poor Andrew!

I think I am not understanding SVG.

Shouldn’t it be free of zoom artifacts?

Johan Larsson

yes

tchrist

Click on that and look at the artifacts.

infinitesimal

The "please" should be in front or at the end.

Mitch

@Robusto I have a recording ready:

VW Advert - Don't forget its a diesel (Bollocks)

►

Andrew Leach

4:59 PM

@tchrist There aren't any. It's a corroded font. But it's not as good as the original.

tchrist

@AndrewLeach I’m definitely confused.

terdon

@tchrist A, so it might well be used in Indian English then?

Mitch

@tchrist those are tracing lines so the calligrapher can keep things neat. Only needed for special names.

tchrist

@terdon Or wherever cows are towed.

Andrew Leach

@tchrist Perhaps we're talking about different things. The logo is from cdn.sstatic.net/englishmeta/img/logo.svg?v=0300ffc6e35b

tchrist

5:02 PM

No me apetece.

Andrew Leach

All the letters in the logo are supposed to be imperfect.

tchrist

I thought SVG images scaled better.

Oh.

I see.

If they are trying to imitate an original humanist face, and I believe they are, they might do well to actually use one. :(

Cerberus

@Robusto Perhaps tener means something different in that (idiomatic?) context?

@agtoever I agree with the others: a borderline case would be a fine translation of grensgeval.

Also a very literal one.

terdon

@Cerberus Actually, it's the general case of we won't have a home as opposed to we won't have a house. Both tengo una casa and tengo casa are correct but slightly different.

It's like I have money vs. I have some money.

Cerberus

Ah, OK.

So my hunch about home was not so far off.

terdon

5:16 PM

@Cerberus Right on actually.

Cerberus

Yay!

I'm glad we speak so many languages here.

One or two is just so boring.

tchrist

5:39 PM

@Cerberus Tener just doesn’t take an indefinite article so often as it would in English. You do have to look at these cases individually, though.

Después del verbo tener algunos sustantivos comunes se usan sin artículo para indicar un tipo de cosa en general.

The zero article marks generality.

@Rob ^^^^^^

All three of ¿Tienes lápiz? ¿Tienes un lápiz? ¿Tienes el lápiz? mean something different.

agtoever

@Cerberus thanks (or among dutch: dank je!)

Cerberus

5:55 PM

@agtoever Geen dank!

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

6:30 PM

@Rob ¿Encontraste mi mano atractivo?

BBL lunch.

Robusto

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 Es el más atractivo mano de todos los manos que he visto en YouTube.

@tchrist Thanks.

Stack Exchange

7:02 PM

Limerick Machine: We’re singing a song about socks The socks have been filled up with rocks Swing them...

posted on March 05, 2015 by sgdi

We’re singing a song about socks The socks have been filled up with rocks Swing them around Knock your foe down Then step over them in your frocks

crl

Y los uñas... Son los mas attractivissimos del youtube

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 Usted es zurda (left-handed)?

diestro = right-handed ftr

Robusto

Ella juega un papel importante en nuestra organización. Funny that papel means both "paper" and "role" . . .

crl

estos sientificos publican un papel (o articulo?) importante

Robusto

> You can now read 76.6% of all real Spanish text

crl

7:17 PM

For "academic paper" se dice mas 'articlulo'

For un examen se dice una prueba

Johan Larsson

@Robusto How much Finnish can you read?

Robusto

Jul 10 '14 at 23:25, by Robusto

@JohanLarsson I only know one word of Finnish: kiitos.

crl

Un avion de papel

Robusto

We've been over this.

Johan Larsson

pathetic

You are learning Finnish next right?

crl

7:21 PM

I'll be learning Scandinavian, a language mix of the Swedish, Fin and Norvegian

tchrist

@Robusto Um no. mano is always feminine.

crl

ah, me equivoco tambien entonces, cornbread tiene la mano la mas attractiva del Youtube

Robusto

@tchrist Oh. I knew that. It was the -o ending that deceived me.

tchrist

Es la mano más linda en todo el mundo.

Robusto

I hate noun genders. They are a useless excrescence.

Johan Larsson

7:23 PM

mano is hand right?

tchrist

La mano is virtually unique in that it ends in -o but is feminine.

Robusto

@JohanLarsson Sí.

tchrist

Blame Latin.

Johan Larsson

do you know what a gato is?

Robusto

Sure.

Do you?

Johan Larsson

7:24 PM

I think: cat.

crl

mano = main (fr), I wonder why main = principal in English

Y un gatito es un "kitten"

Johan Larsson

@crl why a mix? Swedish & Norwegian are very similar. Finnish is very different.

tchrist

> Etymology: OE. mæʒen, = OS. megin, OHG. magan, megin, ONor. magn, megn, megin, f. root mag-: see **may *v., might sb.

Robusto

@JohanLarsson Right.

tchrist

Unrelated to French.

Assuming ONor is here Old Norse not Old Norman. :)

crl

7:27 PM

@JohanLarsson just joking, learning them would be too intensive for my small atrophied schizophrenic brain

manu militari (is manu related with hand?)

Johan Larsson

they are all pretty useless as they only let you communicate with ~0% of the population on this planet.

crl

@JohanLarsson I bet you all speak English

Maybe Russian too

Johan Larsson

Mori means hand in Japanese I think. I operated a Mori Seiki one summer.

käsi is hand in Finnish, knew it but had to check with google translate.

Jez

@ABeautifulMind hey what do you think of my story idea?

crl

Yes manu militari is litterally the military hand

A Beautiful Mind

7:31 PM

@Jez Sorry, what story idea?

Jez

see chat.stackexchange.com/transcript/message/20380802#20380802

Robusto

@JohanLarsson No. Hand is te (手).

Johan Larsson

ok thought it meant strong hand

crl

I'm gonna try to tackle checkers AI next

A Beautiful Mind

@Jez I don't read any fiction, so I have never come across this idea.

Robusto

7:34 PM

@JohanLarsson I can't think of any way that would work. Mori usually means "forest."

Johan Larsson

I'm probably plain wrong then.

Jez

@ABeautifulMind im amazed at how much fiction sells. i was in a Waterstones bookstore a while back, and the places was packed to the hilt with new books. how all of them can even sell 1 copy a month i don't know!

and that's just the physical books; nowadays one has eBooks too

A Beautiful Mind

@Jez I only get math books these days, and all from amazon.

Robusto

@JohanLarsson It can also mean a serving of food, and there are other things I see in the dictionary but none means "strong hand."

Jez

i recently bought Object Driven Design. it's predictably dry stuff, but we use it at work

Johan Larsson

7:37 PM

not domain driven design?

Jez

oh

yeah thats what i meant.

crl

dry as Don't Repeat Yourself?

I don't really like Design Patterns, I like to do intuitive things rather

Of course not repeating myself.. or doing stupid things, with global variables everywhere

Jez

nope. dry as in dry.

boring.

Mitch

7:52 PM

@Jez It sounds like a lot of ideas from different stories put together in a new way. Run lola run/sliding doors for different time lines based on a small change, Memento for a reverse time exposition. The pregnancy thing sounds only slightly similar to the PK Dick movie The pregnancy thing sounds like a recent PK Dick story line. But all this rearranged with the Korea thing sounds new.

Don't be worried about every piece being new. The Matrix was just a bunch of pieces of other movies all mish-mashed into one, but it was great.

Jez

8:11 PM

i did think it was a rather cool dream

usually my dreams are so bizarre they're beyond words

crl

8:39 PM

When I was younger I could solve some exercises in my dreams

crl

8:53 PM

I forgot a bit, in checkers, it's a 10x10 grid, but you can only move on black squares, white ones are never occupied right?

> the bottom left square must be dark

The white queen really cleaned the board...

I don't get why the white queen let herself get taken, she could go further right?

That's gonna be a hell to program

@crl I assume that in absence of anything to eat, the queen can just move 1

If you can choose between capturing 3 pawns or 2 queens, then you must opt for the 3, the rule of maximization

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

9:20 PM

@Robusto oh my!

@crl No sir. But I had to hold the camera with something.

make the white queen run so fast / she hasn't got time to make you a wife

crl

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 hehe ok

@crl Oh get it! He wants to avoid the black being a king too. Yes I like to ping myself..

Afraid of a 2 king confrontation

beer!Should I try to program checkers?

@crl All signs point to no

beer!Why? What are those signs?

@crl I expect so

beer!What are you saying? You're not making sense?

@crl No

beer!Uh no?

@crl That didn't make much sense. Use the !!/help command to learn more.

crl

9:54 PM

@ABeautifulMind Wanna play draughts in a new room?

A Beautiful Mind

@crl Don't feel like playing, sorry.

crl

. o . o . o . o . o
o . o . o . o . o .
. o . o . o . o . o
o . o . o . o . o .
. . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . x . . .
. x . x . x . . . x
x . x . x . x . x .
. x . x . x . x . x
x . x . x . x . x .

Cerberus

10:15 PM

@crl Yes, she was stupid.

I like the verb "dament", by the way.

crl

10:28 PM

damer la neige

Jez

is interrogee a word?

like, "one who is interrogated"?

crl

As askee/interrogee in this situation, I'd say yes