Language Overflow

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

00:24

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. First, it would be helpful if you had a user name that I could ping without having to change from mobile to full site. More importantly, see my comment. For in a tagline describes who the site is for, it's that simple. If native speakers are welcome as valued or even integral members, then it is confusing or weird or plain misrepresentative of who this community is for. — GoDucks 7 hours ago

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. I have to agree with GoDucks on one thing - your nick is really annoying on the mobile site which doesn't suggest user names when you put in @. — ColleenV 5 hours ago

（ノT＿T)ノ＾┻━┻

Jim Reynolds

04:23

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ., like everyone else, is just trying to be different.

Ms boat, Ms @snail boat. A telephone call please.

Well, that's how they used to (and may still) page people at the former MGM Grand Hotel in Reno, Nevada. I used to hang out there and gamble illegally at the blackjack tables starting at about age 16.

Now where was I? Oh! I thought of you for some reason when I was reading this: m.ajcn.nutrition.org/content/79/5/727.full

It was some time ago, before our latest relevant discussion. And I thought of you because I really liked the language of this article.

Damkerng T.

08:54

17

Q: Which pronunciation of 'either' is preferred?

I pronounce 'ei' in 'either' like in German (so, like 'I' in English). This is natural for me. But I've heard people pronouncing it as 'eee', so which version is correct? Or maybe both are correct?

pronunciation

I know I'm an Ee-person.

Damkerng T.

09:22

11 hours ago, by Damkerng T.

When the water has reached 100C, it boils.

I wish I could edit that the water to just water.

CopperKettle

> I wonder how would the meaning change if we add "about"

> I wonder how the meaning would change if we add "about"

I always forget when to use the Penthouse Principle and when not to use it.

Damkerng T.

@CopperKettle I forget that sometimes, too.

And sometimes I want to express it as an in situ question (with a rising tone), but find that it doesn't work well when I write it out.

CopperKettle

nods

Damkerng T.

Ah, 16th 16:16 just passed by some minutes ago. :-)

CopperKettle

It's still 14:33 here. (0:

I'm not marrying today, so I don't care.

Damkerng T.

09:32

LOL

CopperKettle

(0:

Damkerng T.

The math geek in me always finds this kind of stuff cute. :D

CopperKettle

(0:

Damkerng T.

So, tomorrow I'm gonna look forward to 17:17. :P

CopperKettle

The giant glass slipper church of Taiwan

@DamkerngT. I see! (0:

Damkerng T.

09:35

@CopperKettle Taiwan's Cinderella must be very, very tall!

CopperKettle

(0:

Lots of Taiwanese men will wait for her at the site with upward-turned cameras.

Damkerng T.

Hehe!

CopperKettle

(0;

Damkerng T.

The shoe could be a tough job for window washers over there. :D

CopperKettle

(0:

Damkerng T.

09:39

It could be someone's full time job, I think. :P

CopperKettle

It could be made of nanoadditive-treated glass. I read that there are kinds of glass that gather almost no dust.

Damkerng T.

Aww... another technology that kills people's jobs.

CopperKettle

Phil Ochs - Automation Song

►

@CopperKettle If you follow the Ngram Viewer links, you will be able to find the similar expressions. There is no reason to use the present perfect on Damkeng's example. It is not grammatical and doesn't belong to any of the so called conditional sentences. Again, I think it is a matter of writer's style and I need to read the whole book to determine it. — Rathony 38 secs ago

Damkerng T.

I didn't say it's really a conditional sentence, did I? :-)

CopperKettle

Yes.

No.

Damkerng T.

09:44

Now I wonder about the examples in Google Books.

CopperKettle

You didn't.

I'll wait for more answers. Maybe @StoneyB will chip in. (0:

Damkerng T.

nods

I don't think things that are rare to find in corpora are necessarily invalid.

books.google.com/ngrams/…

Something people really use:

> when water has reached its boiling point, it takes some time to transform it all into steam

CopperKettle

10:36

Yekaterinburg after a cyclon (a snow-storm cyclon has passed over the city)

Пролетаем над заснеженным городом

►

Damkerng T.

10:54

@CopperKettle The only color that is needed to paint Yekaterinburg after a cyclone: White!

0

Q: In Shakespeare's time, only a few children 'went' / 'were going' to school. (Which is correct?)

I just came upon this question in a grammar book. At the top of the same page, there is this comparison between simple past and past progressive uses: We generally use the simple past for repeated past actions: My father travelled a lot when I was young. I ran away from school regularly...

past-tense progressive-aspect

> It's not a subtle problem, but maybe there's something I haven't taken into consideration (as I'm always doing). What do you think?

No, it is a subtle problem.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

11:41

@JimReynolds I'm not different. Everyone else is.

Damkerng T.

@DamkerngT. Sorry, I still don't agree that "last year in July" is less of a boundary than "in shakespeare's time". — Fard 24 secs ago

And that is why it's so subtle.

But that would be as far as I wanted to go in that question (or the discussion under the question).

If only we tried to understand each other more...

there wouldn't've been a bomb near my home a couple days ago!

(BTW, near is relative. It's as near as some thousand km. :-)

Damkerng T.

12:30

> Note that the "apical vowels", often represented as [ɿ] and [ʅ] by sinologists, that appear after apical dental and retroflex fricatives/affricates. Notice that those two IPA symbols are now considered Obsolete and nonstandard symbols in the International Phonetic Alphabet.

> en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_vowel_diagram

Obsolete? What?!

How should we transcribe them, then?

Damkerng T.

14:53

I found it's used here: en.eywedu.net/tools/zw3. At the bottom of the page it's written: 说明：由于国际音标有些怪，本书有些国际音标有误，要一个一个修正确实比较难，大家就凑合着用吧。 (Google Translate: "Note: Due to some strange IPA, IPA book some mistake, a correction to be a really difficult, we will make do with it.") — Damkerng T. 18 secs ago

"We will make do with it." :D

> Cheung Kwan-hin has been advising me how best to write them in IPA, for a possible future revised edition of LPD. (The symbols [ʅ,ɿ], used by sinologists, are not recognized by the IPA.) After discussion, we have finally decided to transcribe them as you see here.

> phon.ucl.ac.uk/home/wells/blog0703a.htm

1

Q: "What did she think as she walked in the park?" vs. "What was she thinking as she walked in the park?"

What did she think as she walked in the park? What was she thinking as she walked in the park? I wonder what is the possible difference in meaning between the two sentences. I wonder also how the meaning would change if we add about: What did she think about as she walked in the park? What ...

questions progressive-aspect

Hmm... What { did she think | was she thinking } as she walked in the park? -- was it a one-time walk or was it repeated again and again.

5

Q: Definite article in "the work that requires just as much skill as any technical procedure"

From "Palliative Care" by Stephen Miranda: While the field has become known for its life-saving procedures, neurosurgeons are called just as often to preside over the end of their patient’s lives – work that requires just as much skill as any technical procedure. Could we add a definite ar...

articles

Two native speakers agree that adding the makes it sound wrong.

So it's supposed to be wrong, I think.

> While the field has become known for its life-saving procedures, neurosurgeons are called just as often to preside over the end of their patient’s lives – ~~the~~ work that requires just as much skill as any technical procedure.

I thought the could be okay, because it's the only such work, considering all kind of work in the context in the book.

But yes, I'd use work, too.

Anonymous

15:11

@DamkerngT. I think me either speakers all pronounce it with /i/ rather than /aɪ/.

Anonymous

But me neither can have either pronunciation.

Damkerng T.

I'm a Nee person anyway. :-)

Anonymous

Me too. :-)

Damkerng T.

Except when I read some poems.

Anonymous

Oh!

Anonymous

15:15

separatedbyacommonlanguage.blogspot.com/2007/02/…

Anonymous

This page says that me neither should have /i/ too, even if speakers pronounce neither with /aɪ/ in other contexts.

Damkerng T.

Hah!

Anonymous

Maybe I got confused since I'm a me either speaker :-)

Damkerng T.

I think some actors really say "nai-ther" in movies.

Oh, you meant only "Me neither".

Anonymous

People in both the US and UK use /aɪ/ in neither. Lots of people use both pronunciations for neither.

Anonymous

15:18

But yes, I meant in me neither.

Anonymous

Apparently some speakers use /ɔɪ/ too :-)

Damkerng T.

nods -- I think most of those who normally use "nai-ther" may use "Neither do I" instead.

Anonymous

A-ha! This commenter claims they use /aɪ/ in me neither, so maybe that's true for some people: separatedbyacommonlanguage.blogspot.com/2007/02/…

Damkerng T.

It's complicated! (but I shouldn't expect anything less from any language. :-)

Anonymous

One problem is that people's intuitions about their pronunciations are often different from their actual pronunciations.

Anonymous

15:24

We might be able to figure out how we're pronouncing something right now, but because we're putting our own pronunciation under a spotlight, we might end up pronouncing it differently than we usually do!

Anonymous

This comes up with the pronunciations of (n)either, in which it seems many speakers have an intuitive feeling that they favor one pronunciation or the other, even if they actually use both!

Damkerng T.

Especially when they use each of them in a different phase of life. Someone like me. :-)

Anonymous

My default assumption is that there is a lot of interesting stuff happening there I don't know about.

Anonymous

In the first place, I don't have a really keen ear for that sort of thing like some people do, and I'm not sure my intuition is especially reliable either. But isn't it an interesting topic? :-)

Damkerng T.

I normally say Ee-ther, but when I read "either ... or" in a grammar book, there are good chances that I'll say "Ai-ther"!

@snailboat It is!

Anonymous

15:28

By the way, did you ever read Thinking, Fast and Slow?

CopperKettle

Good evening, @snailboat, Damkerng!

Anonymous

We could probably relate some of this stuff to Kahneman's system one and system two.

Damkerng T.

Probably not really, but I sure have heard the title.

A-ha!

Good evening!

Anonymous

Hi, Copper Kettle!

CopperKettle

I wonder if this sentence would work without any determiner before "red flowers"

> To make a flower bouguet for my girl, I pick red flowers in the field.

Anonymous

15:29

You got your 'g' and 'q' mixed up

CopperKettle

oops

Damkerng T.

I think it works, but I'd use "some".

CopperKettle

Minding my G's and Q's

Anonymous

It's fine. If you used the, the meaning would change.

Anonymous

Some is good.

CopperKettle

15:30

I used it as an example sentence here:

2

A: why there is a definite article before "desired"

The meaning is: To register your courses, select the sections that you desire to choose at that particular moment in the Find column and click Submit. The noun sections is "modified" by desired, and this modification makes the noun definite in this particular context. You can say "your de...

@snailboat Yes, some is good. I just wanted to come up with a determinerless example..

determinerless

Adjective: determinerless ‎(not comparable)

(linguistics) Without a determiner....

Wow there IS such a word.

Damkerng T.

Poor determiners!

CopperKettle

(0:

Anonymous

-less is productive, so even if no one else had ever used that word, you could form it and use it yourself.

CopperKettle

@DamkerngT. Destitute determiners in dire danger

Anonymous

In some theoretical frameworks, there's a 'zero article' or 'zero determiner' there.

Damkerng T.

15:34

looking up 'destitude'...

Anonymous

And some linguists even distinguish a 'zero article' from the lack of an article!

Anonymous

@DamkerngT. s/ude/ute/

Anonymous

Of course, zero articles are imaginary, so the question is whether it's worth our effort to do the imagining :-)

CopperKettle

(0:

It surely is not worth it. Zero articles do not bring presents, like Santa Claus. So why imagine them?

Anonymous

Quirk et al 1985 is an example of a grammar that distinguishes the zero article from the lack of an article. But Huddleston & Pullum 2002 tries to analyze the language without inventing such things.

Anonymous

15:38

So I mention this because you often use Quirk et al 1985 as a reference.

CopperKettle

nods Probably they say that before generic noun phrases there is a zero article, and before proper nouns there's no article

or vice versa

Anonymous

But see Berezowski's The Myth of the Zero Article.

CopperKettle

Boris Berezovsky (businessman)

Boris Abramovich Berezovsky (Russian: Бори́с Абра́мович Березо́вский, 23 January 1946 – 23 March 2013) was a Russian business oligarch, government official and mathematician. He was a member of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Berezovsky was politically opposed to the President of Russia Vladimir Putin, since Putin's election in 2000 and remained a vocal critic of Putin for the rest of his life. In late 2000, after the Russian Deputy Prosecutor General demanded that Berezovsky appear for questioning, he did not return from abroad and moved to the UK, which granted him political asylum in 2003....

Anonymous

Leszek Berezowski's :-)

CopperKettle

(0:

Anonymous

15:39

I am as always a lazy typist.

CopperKettle

No need to type his name, I was just being silly. (0:

Damkerng T.

Word of the Day: driftboard

CopperKettle

Two Wheel Electric Scooter Drift Board

►

Anonymous

What is a driftboard?

Anonymous

A-ha, answered before I could even finish typing!

Damkerng T.

15:41

^with picture :P

CopperKettle

I first thought it was a piece of wood torn off a ship and drifting in the ocean.

Damkerng T.

I just heard it on TV. :D

CopperKettle

And it reminded me of planking

Planking (fad)

Planking (or the Lying Down Game) is an activity consisting of lying face down—sometimes in an unusual or incongruous location. Both hands must touch the sides of the body. Some players compete to find the most unusual and original location in which to play. The term planking refers to mimicking a wooden plank. Planking can include lying flat on a flat surface, or holding the body flat while it is supported in only some regions, with other parts of the body suspended. Many participants in planking have photographed the activity in unusual locations and have shared such pictures through social media...

Damkerng T.

Oh, planking is good for your back.

CopperKettle

really?

Damkerng T.

15:43

Perhaps power planking.

CopperKettle

Plank (exercise)

The plank (also called a front hold, hover, or abdominal bridge) is an isometric core strength exercise that involves maintaining a position similar to a push-up for the maximum possible time. == FormEdit == The most common plank is the front plank which is held in a push-up-like position, with the body's weight borne on forearms, elbows, and toes. Many variations exist such as the side plank and the reverse plank. The plank is commonly practiced in pilates and yoga, and by those training for boxing and other sports. The "Extended Plank" adds substantial difficulty to the standard plank exercise...

Damkerng T.

Yup!

CopperKettle

My cousin once removed slept on planks for some years after breaking her back..

Damkerng T.

Ouch!

CopperKettle

I mean, on a hard surface.

Damkerng T.

15:45

That sounds serious!

CopperKettle

As a child, she was jumping from one garage to the next. They played this way. And she fell.

Damkerng T.

Aww

Anonymous

@DamkerngT. I do planking! The exercise, I mean, not the thingy Copper Kettle linked to. Planking, like pretty much every other word ever, seems to be polysemous.

CopperKettle

Not "garage" in the sense of "repair shop" but in the sense of "small shed for one car".

Damkerng T.

@snailboat Yay!

Anonymous

15:46

@CopperKettle I think that's the default meaning in my idiolect.

Anonymous

So I understood it as meaning what you said.

CopperKettle

@snailboat This is great! I would do such things too, if not for my transplanted cornea.

Damkerng T.

@CopperKettle How unfortunate

Anonymous

@CopperKettle Does your cornea prevent you from doing pushups?

CopperKettle

@snailboat I just looked at Wikipedia, and there "garage" is glossed as "repair shop"

Anonymous

15:48

@CopperKettle That's another common meaning, but I think for most people it's secondary.

CopperKettle

@snailboat Yes, when I try to do pushups or some other kinds of exercise it starts aching. And I was told not to overstrain in "head down" position.

Anonymous

The car hole meaning is probably primary for a lot of us.

Anonymous

@CopperKettle That makes sense!

Damkerng T.

Ahh

Anonymous

Does that position cause more blood to pool in your head?

Damkerng T.

15:49

Let's see...

CopperKettle

@snailboat I was meaning for a long time to ask a question on Biology SE about this.

Pull-ups also cause eye pain and redness.

Anonymous

Oh! My hypothesis fails to explain that one!

Anonymous

I guess I have to take back my 'that makes sense'.

CopperKettle

Probably eye pressure rises? I am amazed why bicycling does not affect it. (0:

Damkerng T.

A little, perhaps, but not much. (I just planked twice!)

Anonymous

15:50

Although it probably does make sense, just not the sort I thought it did :-)

Anonymous

@DamkerngT. Woo hoo!

Damkerng T.

Hehe!

CopperKettle

@snailboat Lol at car hole. (0:

Anonymous

@CopperKettle I keep laughing every time I watch it, no matter how many times I do so :-)

Anonymous

I am easily amused.

CopperKettle

15:52

@snailboat So in reality people do say "garage"?

Anonymous

@CopperKettle I don't think anyone says car hole unless they're being silly!

Anonymous

But being silly is fun.

Anonymous

Garage is the normal word in the US, as far as I'm aware, for a car hole.

Damkerng T.

Somehow, garage is collocated with Jobs in my brain.

CopperKettle

I see. (0: "Car hole" does sound strange.

Damkerng T.

15:54

Wait, isn't it car hall in the video?

Anonymous

@DamkerngT. Maybe you have a garage → Garage Band → Apple → Jobs associative cascade.

CopperKettle

@DamkerngT. And "car hole" with Gates?

Damkerng T.

@CopperKettle LOL

CopperKettle

(0:

Damkerng T.

@snailboat A nice hypothesis!

Anonymous

15:55

@DamkerngT. It's definitely car hole. Another character uses the phrase as a callback later in the episode.

Anonymous

And his pronunciation is a less ambiguous.

Damkerng T.

Ahh

Anonymous

But I do think Moe's pronunciation there is a little tricky to transcribe unambiguously on its own.

CopperKettle

Is "pie hole" a mouth?

Yes, it is. Found it.

I thought it was a hole in a pie.

Die Garage - Moe

►

Damkerng T.

@CopperKettle I think it could be a good pun!

CopperKettle

16:01

Los Simpsons | El Garage

►

I found no Russian version of the same. (0:

@DamkerngT. Could be. (0:

CopperKettle

16:14

> To make a flower bouquet for my girl, I pick the red flowers in the field.

That might mean "all the red flowers".

> To register my courses, I select (the) desired sections in the Find column and click Submit.

Does not work without the.

Anonymous

@CopperKettle Yes, it might.

Anonymous

Or it might just mean you're selecting the red flowers specifically, not any of the others.

CopperKettle

Oh.

"Red flowers" and "the red flowers" might be generic noun phrases then.

Quite unlike "desired sections"

So it's a poor example. But let it stay.

Anonymous

@CopperKettle I think it would have to be in reference to specific flowers.

Anonymous

"There are white, yellow, and red flowers in the field, but I don't pick the white or yellow ones. I pick the red ones."

Damkerng T.

16:28

English articles are tricky.

We don't know if we have the zero article, even!

Anonymous

Well, there's theory and practice.

Anonymous

The zero article can't be observed, so it seems to be stuck in the theoretical realm.

Anonymous

And since it is, we don't have to care about it :-)

Anonymous

(We can if we want! We just have to conclude that it makes our life easier to do so.)

Damkerng T.

Some may want it difficult. :D

Anonymous

16:31

It's not grammar unless it's hard? :-)

2

Damkerng T.

Probably! :D

CopperKettle

16:51

@snailboat Oh, yes.

> You kept me from having dinner by keeping me waiting for you.
> You prevented me from having dinner by keeping me waiting for you.

These two sentences seem to be different in meaning due to differences in lexical aspect.

1

Q: Difference between "keep sb from doing" and "prevent sb from doing"

Do these sentences have a different meaning ? You kept me from having dinner by keeping me waiting for you. You prevented me from having dinner by keeping me waiting for you.

difference

Damkerng T.

You prevented me from having dinner by keeping me waiting for you sounds rather odd! It sounds like the dinner was poisonous!

CopperKettle

17:07

(0:

My knowledge of poetry has just proved mildly useful.

1

Q: If God wishes, an enemy can become a source of good

Suppose a malicious partner cons you and takes away lots of money from you; you bring up this matter to a wise person who has experienced ups and downs of life and want to consult him; that individual tends to give hope to you; in these situations there is an adverb among the religious people in ...

proverbs

@DamkerngT. "prevented" seems to mean "completely prevented" while "kept" might mean the guy was still able to have his dinner after a delay.

Damkerng T.

@CopperKettle Nice!

@CopperKettle nods -- So, semantically, it's strange to use "prevent (from having dinner)".

CopperKettle

Cowper is a very nice poet..

He has a poem about Snail

Damkerng T.

Oh! Please post it here!

Anonymous

@CopperKettle Oh, that's a good point! In some situations there may be a difference in meaning from keep X from doing something and prevent X from doing something.

CopperKettle

@snailboat Yes. The lexical aspect is different.

Anonymous

17:14

In what sense do they differ aspectually?

CopperKettle

@snailboat "kept" is atelic

> She kept me from having dinner, but in the end I managed to have dinner.

Anonymous

Yay!

CopperKettle

(0:

Anonymous

The example sentence is tricky because it uses keep two different ways.

CopperKettle

?

Anonymous

17:16

> You kept me from having dinner by keeping me waiting for you.

CopperKettle

Ah. Yes.

Anonymous

I'd avoid using two different keeps twice in one sentence, personally, although there's nothing ungrammatical about it.

Anonymous

Just my personal preference :-)

CopperKettle

> "The only thing I knew how to do was to keep on keeping on."

(0:

A comment by a Japanese guy to "My Melancholy Baby":
アップありがとう！

大好きな曲のひとつです🎵
アレンジも好みです。

でも、この曲名も英語で検索する時、
『メランコリー』のスペルで
苦労するんです (^_^;)

He says he struggles with the spelling of "melancholy" (0:

Damkerng T.

Unrelated: Melancholia (2011)

CopperKettle

17:27

Melancholia (2011 film)

Melancholia is a 2011 Danish drama art film written and directed by Lars von Trier and starring Kirsten Dunst, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Alexander Skarsgård, Cameron Spurr and Kiefer Sutherland. The film's story revolves around two sisters, one of whom is preparing to marry, as a rogue planet is about to collide with Earth. Von Trier's initial inspiration for the film came from a depressive episode he suffered and the insight that depressed people have a tendency to remain peaceful during catastrophic events. The film is a Danish production by Zentropa, with international co-producers in Sweden, France...

@DamkerngT. Oh. I remember marking it "to check out" at IMDB.

Damkerng T.

A-ha!

CopperKettle

But negative posts in the forum put me off.

Damkerng T.

It's a curious film, unlike any other.

CopperKettle

Oh. I'll get it then. In mysterious ways. (0:

The title reminded me of Magnolia

Also unrelated.

Magnolia (film)

Magnolia is a 1999 American drama film written, produced, and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson and starring Jeremy Blackman, Tom Cruise, Melinda Dillon, Philip Baker Hall, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Ricky Jay, William H. Macy, Alfred Molina, Julianne Moore, John C. Reilly, Jason Robards, and Melora Walters. The film is a mosaic of interrelated characters in search of happiness, forgiveness, and meaning in the San Fernando Valley. The film itself was partly filmed in Reseda. Magnolia was a critical success. Of the ensemble cast, Tom Cruise was nominated for Best Supporting Actor at the 72nd Academy...

Also a curious film.

Damkerng T.

The visual is good, the plot is familiar, but the story is not, and chances are, you may not understand what's going on in their minds. (Not that I understand them!)

@CopperKettle Oh, I tried to catch it several times, and yet I missed it every single time!

CopperKettle

17:30

@DamkerngT. You've intrigued me. Maybe it's like Donny Darko.

@DamkerngT. I liked it.

Damkerng T.

I have a strong feeling that I'll like it too!

CopperKettle

It's worth watching, IMHO.

Damkerng T.

nods -- I'll try harder next time. :D

CopperKettle

> Roger Ebert praised the film, saying: "Magnolia is the kind of film I instinctively respond to. Leave logic at the door. Do not expect subdued taste and restraint, but instead a kind of operatic ecstasy"

A Russian guy liked my explanation of the Penthouse Principle. (0:

Damkerng T.

Yay!

CopperKettle

17:35

I used the words like SVO >> OVS inversion etc. He must be a programmer, so he liked it. (0:

CopperKettle

18:13

I've learned a new word: seconds

Factory second

Factory seconds, also known as factory rejects or simply seconds, are retail items which, through minor fault of manufacture, are sold to the public for a reduced rate, rather than being discarded. Such goods are often resold at this lower rate after failing the factory's quality inspection, being returned to the manufacturer's factory by the original retailer, or (less frequently) being returned to the retailer or wholesaler by the customer. The amount of damage or fault in the manufacture which may constitute an item being resold as a second varies widely; in clothing, for example, it may simply...

I've been watching "The Lilies of the Field", and a businessman says to the hero about a load of bricks: "these are seconds".

I thought "What? Second-hand bricks? They look unused!" O_o

Damkerng T.

Nice word!

(or sense of a word)

CopperKettle

18:58

> +Copper Kettleさん、こんにちは！

Google glosses this as
> Kappā ketoru-san, kon'nichiwa!

I wonder what kappa is.

Damkerng T.

@CopperKettle If you've read or watched a version of Journey to the West, you'll have a very good idea. :P

Sha Wujing

Shā Wùjìng is one of the three disciples of the Buddhist pilgrim Xuanzang. He appears as a character in the novel Journey to the West written by Wu Cheng'en in the Ming dynasty, although versions of his character predate the Ming novel. In the novels, his background is the least developed of the pilgrims and he contributes the least to their efforts. He is called Sand or Sandy and is known as a "water buffalo" for his seemingly less developed intelligence in many English versions of the story. His Buddhist name "Sha Wujing", given by Bodhisattva Guanyin, means "sand aware of purity". His name is...

Damkerng T.

19:26

You may want to check out Genesis 50:20. There are several translation alternatives. — Damkerng T. 8 secs ago

Anonymous

@CopperKettle Oh, I love it! :-)

Anonymous

@DamkerngT. There are websites that compare different translations of bible verses.

Damkerng T.

@snailboat Oh, I missed it! (Because it's just a link.)

Anonymous

I don't know much about Christianity myself, but I've happened across them once or twice.

Damkerng T.

@snailboat There are so many translations that I didn't dare to quote one in the comment.

Anonymous

19:35

This looks like one of those sites: biblehub.com/genesis/50-20.htm

Anonymous

Wow, a lot of these versions have standard in the name!

Damkerng T.

Hehe!

Anonymous

I guess the old line about standards from engineering applies here, too.

Anonymous

The wonderful thing about standards

Anonymous

@CopperKettle It's copper through the lens of Japanese loanword phonology.

Anonymous

19:39

Kappa means 'kappa', but kappā means 'copper'.

Anonymous

The macron over the vowel indicates that it is long, and the lack of a macron indicates that it is short.

Anonymous

There's a contrast in Japanese between long and short vowels.

Anonymous

But in English, we don't make that distinction, and we don't normally write diacritics like that, so we tend to ignore the difference like you just did :-)

Damkerng T.

@snailboat Ah, it was a long vowel. A kappa has his own charm as well, though. :-)

Anonymous

@CopperKettle I guess a lot of people do! :-)

Anonymous

19:42

Anonymous

Literally kappa means 'river child'.

Anonymous

But I think 'kappa' is a better gloss in English :-)

Anonymous

Kappa are kappa.

Damkerng T.

@snailboat Cute, right?!

:D

Anonymous

They are! :-) I like kappa.

Anonymous

19:45

I was looking through a Google image search for the cutest kappa.

Anonymous

google.co.jp/…

Anonymous

Some of them are non-cute!

Damkerng T.

In the story (Journey to the West) he was a bit like a moderator. :-)

Anonymous

Some of them are quite funny, though.

Damkerng T.

(When two of the three brothers argued over something, the kappa, the third brother, was usually the one who cleared things up between the two. :-)

Anonymous

19:47

Oh, I see!

Damkerng T.

So, even though he was less powerful than the other two, he was quite necessary in the band. :-)

Hanaa

Hi everyone !

Damkerng T.

Hi!

CopperKettle

@snailboat Yes, I love this poem. I don't know how this verse meter is called, but it's great. I love another poem written in this meter.

lekon chekon

hey.

CopperKettle

19:58

@Hanaa - Hi, Hanaa!

Hey, @lekonchekon!

Keiko Matsui - Kappa

►

lekon chekon

here's something. :P

"A child was standing on a street-corner."
"A child was standing at a street-corner."

Which one would you use?

Anonymous

@CopperKettle I'm certain I studied that in school, and I'm equally certain I don't remember.

Damkerng T.

"Kappa, the water elf." -- Oh, that's a nice way to call kappa in English!

CopperKettle

And it's a breathtaking composition.

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