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Jez
11:00 PM
bloody "happy christmas" is everywhere nowadays; on cards, on TV, on the radio, etc. Christmas is NOT happy, it is merry.
 
Happy Christmas sounds archaic to me. Isn't it in A Christmas Carol like that, or something?
Apparently I've got it exactly backwards and the story popularized "Merry Christmas" instead.
Holiday greetings are a selection of greetings that are often spoken with good intentions to strangers, family, or friends, in nations around the world, during the months of December and January. Holidays with greetings include Christmas, Eid ul-Fitr, New Year's Day, Chinese New Year, Thanksgiving (United States), and Hanukkah. Some greetings are more prevalent than others, depending on the cultural and religious status of any given area. Typically, a greeting consists of the word "Happy" followed by the holiday, such as "Happy Chanukkah" or "Happy New Year", although the phrase "Merry...
But hey at least I sort of knew something.
 
Jez
well exactly. if you get drunk and are dancing around, are you happy? of course not, you're merry.
 
:"The Night Before Christmas" and "Twas the Night Before Christmas" redirect here. For other uses, see The Night Before Christmas (disambiguation) and Twas the Night Before Christmas (disambiguation) "A Visit from St. Nicholas", also known as "The Night Before Christmas" and "'Twas the Night Before Christmas" from its first line, is a poem first published anonymously in 1823 and generally attributed to Clement Clarke Moore, although the claim has also been made that it was written by Henry Livingston, Jr. The poem, which has been called "arguably the best-known verses ever written by a...
This poem must be what I know.
> Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good night.
 
Is the main site down for anyone else?
 
Jez
funny. i thought that poem said "merry christmas"
 
11:05 PM
I was in the middle of fixing stuff and closing dupes.
 
Wasn't a moment ago, but now it is.
 
Jez
yes reg
 
Bah. Thanks.
 
@Jez Wiki sez it is sometimes changed nowadays due to the shift in use.
Which seems weird, like, why change someone's poem?
 
Jez
as i said, because "happy" is just wrong.
i mean, i barely use "merry" anywhere else. we have to keep it at christmas, for the sake of the word.
ah, i just thought of a question i was going to ask. why do we say that one's "beside oneself" with anger?
 
11:10 PM
You just think happy is wrong in that context because it is wronger for more ppl than it's ever been, but even just fourscore years ago you might have been the queer one for trying to advocate for merry.
 
Jez
well, it aint fourscore years ago.
otherwise we might still have an empire.
 
@Jez Um. The little devil on the shoulder is visible next to us?
No, I've really no idea.
 
Jez
heh
Q: Quel avenir pour l'expression belge "Mon franc est tombé" ?
presumably similar to "the penny's dropped"
 
The penny's dropped?
Like dropping the ball?
 
Jez
you don't have that expression?
here it means you've just come to understand something.
 
11:15 PM
I don't think I've ever heard it.
 
Jez
maybe it's British then
"allusion to the mechanism of penny-in-the-slot machines"
 
@Jez Ah. I'm sure there are plenty of idioms for sudden realization here but I didn't know that one.
 
Jez
apparently in Belgium they're now changing it to "my Euro dropped"
haha!
that so wouldn't work in English
 
Hi all!
 
Jez
hi
 
11:24 PM
Well, this is exciting.
Reg, say something sarcastic and demeaning, if you'd please.
 
@Jez It exists in Dutch too: het kwartje is gevallen.
 
Oh hey @Cerb.
 
Hi.
And I think it comes from machines that are operated by inserting a coin.
 
@Cerberus I failed my raid because my father turned the internet off -_-
 
Aww, why?
 
11:26 PM
Why did he turn off the Internet, you mean?
 
You tell me!
No, I was wondering why you had failed your raid, since it couldn't be due to your father's turning off the Internetz.
 
Hmm, I don't know. Maybe a feeble attempt to enforce a bedtime.
 
That's silly.
And early.
Where are you again?
 
GMT -7. He turned the Internet off at 11, turned it on again after I left for school in the morning; I couldn't finish my raid.
 
Huh, wait, he turned it off yesterday?
 
11:29 PM
@Cerberus Yeah, last night.
 
-7 is America, right?
OK.
 
@Cerberus Well, I'm in Alberta, Canada.
So yes, North America.
 
Well, the New World anyway.
 
Indeed.
 
I hate Canada, at least in Geosense.
Too many obscure inland cities.
Otherwise it could be nice.
 
11:31 PM
It is a nice place.
 
But how is one ever to remember cities like Regina, White Horse, Edmonton (I had heard of that vaguely), etc.?
 
Hmm, our "geography" for the past 9 years has consisted of memorizing that garbage.
 
I mean, I know that Calgary exists, but it's freaking hard to pinpoint on a blind map.
Learning geography is good.
 
@Cerberus Memorizing 13 capital cities for 9 years is good? You'd think that we could get more done than that.
 
Huh, only 13 cities?
That should take you about an hour max.
What else have you been doing?
 
11:34 PM
@Cerberus Well, 13 provinces/territories, each with a city.
@Cerberus Geography-wise?
 
Ontario, Alberta, Québec, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland...
North-West Territory.
Hmm that's all I can come up with.
@Mahnax Yes!
 
Saskatchewan, Manitoba, BC, Yukon, Nunavut, PEI, New Brunswick.
Northwest Territories.
@Cerberus This year, we started doing Asia and the USA.
 
British Columbia?
And what's PEI?
 
Yes. And Prince Edward Island. The smallest province.
It really should not be a province.
 
@Mahnax And the other 8.9 years?
I remember PEI.
 
11:38 PM
@Cerberus Essentially, taking tests on that.
 
I had Kit guess it.
 
We don't do much geography; mostly "Social Studies" which is kind of like History.
 
Taking the same test about the same 13 cities over and over and over, for 8 years?
 
@Cerberus Yeah.
 
Hmm.
 
11:39 PM
Every time we take it, part of my soul dies.
 
We learned all the capitals in the world (except Africa, I think), and the major cities of a lot of important countries, all in elementary school.
 
@Cerberus Wow. I wish we could have learned that.
 
After that, no more geography as in topography.
@Mahnax It's not hard. Takes only a couple of hours.
We also had to learn a lot of silly, inconsequential towns in Holland.
Certainly many more than 13.
 
@Cerberus I would assume so.
The sad thing is, half the kids forget half of them.
Idiots.
What sort of mark is considered bare-minimum decent in the Netherlands?
 
@Mahnax Your parents turned off your internet!? What kind of disciplinarians are they?! Don't they know it's Christmastime at all?
 
11:42 PM
@aediaλ They are.... not nice to me when it is late.
Hold on, I have to go murder a small rat-like canine creature. Cerb, you hungry?
 
@Mahnax What do you mean by decent?
6 is pass.
10 is max.
@Mahnax I forgot half of them too.
Like the major cities of Spain.
I remember all the names but not their exact locations.
@Mahnax Always!
I have no problems with cannibalism.
 
user19161
@Mahnax Boo!
 
user19161
@Cerberus Woof!
 
Hi.
 
user19161
@aediaλ Arf!
 
user19161
11:47 PM
Just now Joel came in for a while, I wonder why.
 
Heh my snowmen are piling up!
I have to finish up a few things and get outta here for the weekend.
 
@Cerberus Good.
@JasperLoy Hi!
 
@aediaλ Have fun!
 
@JasperLoy The Joel?
 
user19161
@Mahnax Spolsky. Yup. I've seen him twice in here.
 
11:49 PM
@Cerberus I shall stuff it in a box and mail it to you expressly.
 
user19161
Of course TPTB can enter the chat room without others knowing too.
 
Yay!
 
@JasperLoy Wow. I am honoured to have been in the same chat as him, even if I was AFK.
@JasperLoy TPTB?
 
user19161
@Mahnax The powers that be or something like that, refers to the SE staff.
 
@JasperLoy OIC.
@Cerberus Would you like it pre-seasoned?
 
user19161
11:51 PM
@Mahnax What do you think of my avatar?
 
@Cerberus I will! Probably won't be online much over the weekend as we're celebrating with family, but I'll be back next week.
 
@Mahnax Yes, please!
 
@JasperLoy I am not personally a fan of things frilly and pink and heart-y, but whatever floats your boat.
 
@aediaλ Yeah same here.
 
@Cerberus Very well.
I work on Christmas Eve.
Yay!
 
11:54 PM
@Mahnax I hope you get a chance to be silly and merry at work at least?
 
@aediaλ If it's not busy, we goof off a lot.
 
user19161
@Mahnax My 16th post is up.
 
Unfortunately, here it is custom to eat a lot of junk food on Christmas Eve. We will be busy.
@JasperLoy Ah, I shall read it.
 
user19161
@aediaλ He can say HO HO HO to every customer!
 
@JasperLoy Hm, maybe I'll get some of those books.
@JasperLoy I'm not Santa! >:(
 
user19161
11:57 PM
@Mahnax You should decide on your undergrad course of study first! If you want to be a physicist get the Feynman lectures instead. They cover more or less all the topics in an undergrad course.
 
@JasperLoy I still can't decide. thankfully, I still have a few years until then.
 

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