English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

9:00 PM

Look at Apple.

@Robusto How is that possible? Don't you want to look cooler than your pals, and have more people read your "OMG I eats dog treats tonite @ ugly trendy bar"?

Robusto

I already look cooler than my pals. Why do you think I chose them as my pals, so I could look less cool? You're not thinking this through.

Cerberus

@Robusto Yeah, it sort of does. Although I must say Google has been pretty OK so far, or so it appears to me.

@Robusto So you have only loser pals? I see.

Should I be concerned?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus It also depends on what FB shares without your knowledge, and what other people put into FB about you that FB doesn't tell you about, etc.

Robusto

@Cerberus I didn't say that. I just said I look cooler than they do.

You can't spell FBI without FB.

Cerberus

9:02 PM

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Yes, I suppose. But let's assume my real friends won't post sensitive stuff about me on Facebook.

Robusto

Haha, I almost wrote "You can't spell FBI without VB."

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus "post"? or share with the "Find friends" app?

Cerberus

@Robusto But if you look cooler than those people, what must they look like?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus warmer

Robusto

@Cerberus They're all quite good looking, of course.

Cerberus

9:03 PM

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 That might include address information, yes, hmm. Never thought about that. Let's hope FB won't pull address info off people's e-mail accounts? What do you think? It would be terrible.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus I don't know if they do or not.

Cerberus

@Robusto Good-looking losers. Well, I won't object to that. I would rather be called this than a loser in general.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 The only thing is that people have been able to get phone numbers and addresses from phone books for ages.

All you need to know is someone's city.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus Some people put a lot of info into their "contact list". addresses, phone numbers, emails, birthdays, notes, etc. Plus it lets FB correlate all that info together; it lets it see who lives together, what names go with which phone numbers and emails, etc.

Robusto

Beautiful Losers

Beautiful Losers is a novel by Leonard Cohen. Published in 1966 by McClelland and Stewart, it was the Canadian writer's second novel, and precedes his career as a singer-songwriter. The story of the 17th century Mohawk Saint Kateri Tekakwitha is interwoven with the story of a love triangle between an unnamed anglophobe Canadian folklorist; his Native wife, Edith, who has committed suicide; and his best friend, the mystical F, a member of Parliament and leader in the Quebec separatist movement, who dies after being imprisoned in an institute for the criminally insane. The complex novel m...

Not just good looking ...

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus yes. That is true, but many directories don't have full name listings.

Cerberus

9:06 PM

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Yes, I do that. I put as many addresses in my Gmail contacts as possible.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 They do here.

Except that mobile numbers are normally not listed, so we have actually gained some privacy with the switch to mobile.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus really? always? Here they can be first initials.

Cerberus

@Robusto Hmm I am not an anglophobe Canadian folklorist, so far as I can tell.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Yes, okay, initials.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

Here, the phone company charges an annual fee to keep the phone number out of a listing. I said "why do I have to pay? Because you're selling the directories to marketers?" The person I spoke to got SUPER offended when I said that, but it must be true. what other possible reason is there?

Cerberus

But initial + last name is usually enough.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Haha, she was seriously offended? What did she say?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus maybe for Dutch last names. My wife used to have a phone listing that said (something like) "M Wong". A telemarketer called and said "Can I speak to Mary Wong please?" and she was like "There's no Mary Wong here". "Sorry, Maxine Wong. Merriam Wong? Maudette Wong?" etc etc.

@Cerberus I forget. She just denied vehemently that they were enabling telemarketers.

Cerberus

9:10 PM

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Haha. I suppose that is the case here for some names in larger cities. Like Jansen, De Boer, De Vries...

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus I had a girlfriend named De Vries once.

Robusto

Back in the days of no cell phones, I had a two-line number, which had phone numbers in sequence, e.g., 355-1000 and 355-1001. One day I got a robo-call from a telemarketer on the first line, told him I didn't want what they were selling, and hung up. Then the second line rings. I pick up the phone and say, "We don't want any either."

Cerberus

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Ellis, perchance? Have you seen the film Zwartboek?

Black Book.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Funny.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus No, and no.

Cerberus

@Robusto Haha, nice.

So what are robo calls exactly?

Literally a recorded voice calling you up?

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Too bad, it is a pretty good film.

Almost too violent.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

9:12 PM

@Robusto my brother used to do that when we had two landlines at home. The one for him and me was alphabetically before the main household line, and telemarketers used to call the listings alphabetically (small town). So he'd toy with the telemarketers on the first call, and then again when they called the other line.

Robusto

@Cerberus Actually they were robo-dialed. They just dial every number in every exchange, from 0000 to 9999, sequentially.

I misused the term "robo-call" ... sorry.

It's really an auto-dialer that feeds numbers to a telemarketing employee.

Cerberus

Ah OK I see.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I can't find anywhere how task switching works on IOS 6.

Neither websites nor videos can tell me.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus I'll ask an iphone user tomorrow

Cerberus

Ugh.

That it must come to this!

Robusto

►

Hugo

9:25 PM

Yikes! Check out this typesetting... books.google.fi/…

The democratizing of self-publishing of the e-future of literature...

Robusto

And there's this:

►

0

Q: Line drawings or line-drawings?

Line drawings or line-drawings? Are you allowed to use line-drawings with a dash in between line drawings. Please advise?

OMFG. Look at what she says in her comment. facepalm

Cerberus

@Hugo Oh, that's just Finnish typesetting. They find it more comfortable that way.

MετάEd

@Cerberus Looks like it is unfinnished to me.

Cerberus

9:41 PM

@Robusto Oh wow, that's good. You think it's real, not two actors?

@MετάEd Just a tiny bit, yes.

Robusto

@Cerberus It's a real put-on, yes. The telemarketer didn't know what was happening.

Cerberus

@Robusto What if the telemarketer was in fact a friend of Mabe's?

MετάEd

9:58 PM

@Cerberus What? A humorous broadcast involving actors? That never happens.

Cerberus

Yes, yes.

A cogent argument.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

I am going to try it on the next telemarketer that calls here

Cerberus

Do it!

I don't have a landline any more, so I don't get any such calls.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

i get telemarketing calls even on my cell

time to boogie.

boogies

Cerberus

Right.

I'm looking up the etymology of caput.

Hugo

10:06 PM

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Tip for that, when it shows the number, add them all to a single "spam" contact so it says spam the next time they call

@Cerberus Etymology: Latin; = head.

Cerberus

@Hugo Yes, but I am looking at the etymology of the Latin forms...

0

Q: What rule governs the vowel alternations in Latin "caput"?

In different forms, the Latin root caput "head" appears with different vowels: a-u: caput (nominative singular); a-i: capitis (genitive singular), capitī (dative singular), capita (nominative plural), and so on; i-i: praecipitem (accusative singular) "headlong", and so on; praecipitō "I throw h...

phonology indo-european vowels latin optimality-theory

Ernout tells me little.

Matt Эллен

10:30 PM

oh man. you guys were quite rowdy after I left

Mitch

0

A: Biden Got Out ‘Over His Skis,’ Says Obama

I AM NOT SURE IF I WAS THE ORIGINATOR OF THE PHASE BUT IN A CONVERSATION 25 YEARS OR SO AGO WITH A COWORKER I WAS EXPRESSING THE FEELING I HAD OF NOT BEING IN CONTROL AS A SKIER IS WHEN HE IS LEANING TOO FAR FORWARD AND FEELS A LACK OF BALANCE AND CONTROL AND KNOWS HE IS ABOUT TO LOOSE ALL CONT...

No, I think it was me. I was the first to say it.

And goddamn you if you claim otherwise.

Matt Эллен

I claim you weren't the second to say it

Mitch

Well nuts to you and the horse you rode in on.

Matt Эллен

more fool you! my horse loves nuts

Mitch

Probably hazelnuts. Horses love that stuff.

jinx

Matt Эллен

10:34 PM

jinx!

metajinx!

Mitch

um...

double jinx

gah

Matt Эллен

lol

Mitch

jinxety jinx!

ha HA! you don't know that one.

Matt Эллен

too late!

Mitch

late as your horse's patootie.

I got you on the first jinx

timing you know.

Now that I think about it...

...I'm not sure what you would do with a horse's patootie.

@MattЭллен you don't know it cuz I just made it up. My game..my rules. I win. (that's the first rule).

The second rule? I can't hear you through your horse's you-know-what.

(voldemort is what the bad boys say)

Matt Эллен

10:37 PM

@Mitch your fingertips smell like anus

Mitch

@MattЭллен I'm safe, just the tips.

Matt Эллен

I knew you could hear me :D

Mitch

@MattЭллен Yeah? well you drink water... from the other side of the glass.

Matt Эллен

I don't want to catch your cooties

Mitch

You just poured water down your shirt.

Matt Эллен

10:39 PM

I like the fresh feeling. you should try it. or at least shower

welp, that was fun. CU I must sleep.

Hugo

11:00 PM

Strange mix of past and future: "... announced the findings in next month’s issue of The Yale Alumni Magazine"
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/27/books/the-whole-nine-yards-seeking-a-phrases-origin.html

tchrist

11:20 PM

Sorry, but this is a dupe:

0

Q: Is it customary or grammatical to drop ‘to’ in “I’m not going to go look for it”?

There was a scene a thirty-something wife refuses to go for looking for the wedding ring her husband lost in a courtyard when she was asked by her husband over phone, in the fiction titled “The lost order” appearing in New Yorker magazine (January 7). “I think I l lost it when I was in the co...

word-usage

8

Q: Should I always insert "and" between two verbs in imperative mode?

As far as I understand, the word and is usually inserted between two verbs used in imperative mood in English. For example, “Go and make me a drink.” How obligatory is this? Can I claim that it is ungrammatical (or at least less typical) to have to consecutive verbs in imperative mood? Also, ...

verbs imperative

Also related:

4

A: Usage of infinitives in this sentence

EDIT: Added modals including quasi-modals; added examples and exceptions; note that these lists are only “complete” for the modals and quasi-modals. That’s because make does not take a to-infinitive. It takes a bare infinitive, without the to particle. Not all infinitives have a to attached ...

Sorry, Yoichi.

cornbread ninja

:(

tchrist

It’s not like those have useful tags.

I am about to fix that.

Cerberus

Oh God.

The words head / have / give / caput / habeo / capio / cuppa give me a headache.

They may or may not be all related.

cornbread ninja

I dislike nosh.

Cerberus

Hi.

I like it ironically.

tchrist

11:31 PM

@Cerberus Well, you have them in the wrong order. Perhaps this is the problem.

cornbread ninja

ohai, @cerb :)

Cerberus

They aren't in any particular order.

tchrist

@cornbreadninja Much gnashing of teeth.

cornbread ninja

@tchrist ha! indeed.

Cerberus

It is so complicated!

So much information, so many uncertainties.

Do you like etymology?

tchrist

11:32 PM

I used to collect them.

Cerberus

Are you an etymological dictionary?

How does one collect them?

tchrist

Bugs.

I seem to find them everywhere.

Cerberus

If you can help me summarise the etymology of caput, capio, habeo, head, and have, I will be thankful.

cornbread ninja

How are you feeling, @tchrist?

Cerberus

Etymology is bugs?

cornbread ninja

11:34 PM

thought was kaput

tchrist

@cornbreadninja Kinda headachey, but less sick.

Cerberus

Oh, good.

cornbread ninja

etymonline.com/…

@tchrist excellent. tents fingers

@Cerberus entomology.

tchrist

@Cerberus Explaining a joke is like vivisecting a frog: it’s painful and messy, and by the time you’re done, the frog is dead.

4

Cerberus

@cornbreadninja Ah.

@cornbreadninja Luckily that is not related.

cornbread ninja

11:36 PM

@Cerberus my apologies.

tchrist

@Cerberus Close your moth, you’ll catch too many flies that way.

Cerberus

No need.

Meanwhile, I am stuck with this.

sigh

My OCD is telling me in caps TO RESEARCH THIS FURTHER, REREAD ALL THE ETYMOLOGICAL DICTIONARIES, SUMMARISE, POSTULATE, EXTRAPOLATE...

tchrist

You’re looking for some Grimm application of a c <=> h change?

Cerberus

I'm not going to redo the work the dictionaries have already done.

I just want to make sense of what they say and combine their findings.

The OED is pretty useless when it comes to prehistoric etymology, luckily.

tchrist

Hard to supply prehistoric citations.

Cerberus

11:39 PM

It also doesn't help that all etymological dictionaries think they are above lists and overviews and readable formatting. And paragraphs, often.

tchrist

Oh, I know why that last part is.

Cerberus

Not citations, but proper etymologies down to Proto-Indo-European.

tchrist

Paper costs.

Cerberus

Yes.

But it doesn't help.

tchrist

Same reason the print version of the OED is so painful compared with the online one.

Cerberus

11:40 PM

And I believe the latest Etym. Woordenboek van het Nederlands was always meant to be available online.

That is, it isn't even finished yet.

They have A–R.

It's good, but it is still not very well formatted.

gtb.inl.nl/iWNTLINKS/DATADIR/paginazy.html?EWN+/iWDB/…

Look at this.

tchrist

I looked.

It’s fucking broken.

Cerberus

Broken?

tchrist

That’s just pure assholery.

Cerberus

It is better than most of the OED's etymologies!

tchrist

It’s a distressing abomination.

No.

First, they need to learn how to write a fucking paragraph.

It is not just a new line.

Cerberus

11:43 PM

The OED doesn't even try. No paragraphs at all.

tchrist

You must either indent the first line of each new paragraph or else use a blank line between them.

They do neither.

Cerberus

I agree.

Still better than the OED.

tchrist

This is the fucking stupid Microsoft heresy of people who cannot make a paragraph to save their lives because they think a line is a paragraph.

And they are wrong.

Cerberus

Yes, yes.

tchrist

It gets reformatted and you cannot tell where things end and others begin.

Cerberus

11:44 PM

I know.

tchrist

It’s also too many picas long, but that is a separate problem.

All the SE sites have the same bug.

Cerberus

Picas?

tchrist

Makes it hard to read.

Printers’ measurement.

Cerberus

I'm not sure the length can be fixed...

tchrist

Related to x-height, or maybe pixels or DPI. I’d have to look it up.

They can.

Cerberus

11:46 PM

But I want all the infoez.

tchrist

Sequihuh?

The eye gets lost.

Oh, let me look it up.

Cerberus

What?

Sequiwhat?

No need to look anything up.

tchrist

It should be around 66 characters wide.

In multicolumn work, 50 is ok.

Cerberus

Yes, it shouldn't be so wide.

They should put it in two columns if you have a big screen.

tchrist

Those lines are 155 characters wide.

Cerberus

11:49 PM

I sometimes down-size my browser window for such sites, can you believe it?

tchrist

That is 250% optimal size.

It is because these dickfors have no idea how to set type.

Or a page. Or a book.

Cerberus

Anyway, I can get over that, it doesn't slow me down too much; but the lack of a proper structure does.

tchrist

It is wrong-structured in two dimensions. Just a bunch of oatmeal.

Cerberus

I want headings.

One being "Ultimate root".

Another "cognates".

tchrist

And I want leading.

Cerberus

11:51 PM

And I want the etymology in a vertical diagram.

As in:

*kap-

\/

*hab-

\/

have

Something like that.

tchrist

These people cannot even format text. You expect them to format diagrams, too?

Cerberus

Yes, please. Kthxbai.

tchrist

Good luck with that.

Cerberus

They can produce an excellent article on etymology. Why can't they hire someone to do the formatting?

Oh, and the in-line notes are also excruciating.

tchrist

Insensate boobery. Wordblind foolery.

Cerberus

11:54 PM

It is so hard to follow the main sentence if it stretches over two pages, a word here and there between countless notes and lists.

tchrist

They gave you the information. How dare you expect to be able to read it?

Cerberus

tchrist

Paperprices.

Cerberus

For example, tell me whether they think a relation because capio and caput is likely.

Notes could be footnotes, that would help a lot.

I do like the notes.

tchrist

Notes should be sidenotes. That would help even more.

Cerberus

11:56 PM

Yes!

But then you would need huge margins.

No.

Two columns.

No again.

Because oftentimes the notes are larger than the main text.

tchrist

I shall quote.

Cerberus

11:57 PM

Why not?

Quoth.

tchrist

Oh.

Cerberus

(That's probably not the imperative, meh.)

tchrist

That is different.

Cerberus

You should see my first Cicero syllabus.

I think notes were 75 % of the page, and they were in smaller type too, and with less spacing.

A standard Greek or Latin commentary has such proportions, the good ones are even larger. The main text comes first in, say, ten pages, then a hundred pages of commentary, by line number.

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English Language & Usage: Multi-Layer…