@Mitch To run with the cart.

@JasperLoy Stop encouraging people to delete their accounts! Jesus.

@Mitch Nice. I do wonder how much more agreement there is about the Proto-Indo-European heimat.

falafel is on my list of things I need to try

@Cerberus The poor cart will feel all alone

Why?

@JohnB Why not try and make it?

@Cerberus It's all kind of ... made up.

@Cerberus that'd be fun, but with nothing to compare it to I'd have no idea if I made it properly or not :)

those maps are just the wildest of guesses that can't be wrong. Afroasiatic most likely didn't start anywhere else like china or scandinavia

@JohnB I'm sure there's a place nearby. just google maps for it.

there's a market near the train station I walk by a lot that would probably have a vendor selling falafels, I'll make it my mission the next time around there

@JohnB Heh, well, it's actually not very complicated. It is basically crushed/minces chickpeas with cumin, fried or deep-fried.

The only thing that can go wrong is if you make them too "loose" and they fall apart.

well I love chickpeas and cumin so it sounds like I'd like it. Chana masala is one of my favorite Indian dishes

@JohnB Just so you know the falalfe outside of Israel/palestine/Egypt isn't as good.

@Mitch Yes, but there are different degrees of made-upness.

@JohnB it's not like that at all

@JohnB There you go!

Make sure you eat your falafel with some nice sauces.

@Cerberus yeah, but saying the heimat is maybe Egyot/levant is kinda boring.

It's often sold with garlic sauce here; not sure how authentic that is.

@Mitch Yes.

It's only slightly interesting that the PIE heimat is considered north of the caucasus.

But it seems they have a bit more to go on for Proto-Indo-European, don't they?

I hate to leave this discussion of food. But I will. be back soon

As you say, it is a bit more surprising, and hence probably based on more evidence.

Adeus.

What if all question titles beginning "can we say" were automatically moved to ELU?

Can we say that the Semitic-Hamitic Urheimat lies somewhere in North-east Africa or the Levant?

Can we move all those questions?

@Cerberus Have you read "Snakewoman of Little Egypt" by Robert Hellenga?

Hmm no?

Sounds Dutch?

@Cerberus I don't know his family history, does the name sound Dutch?

I believe he personally grew up in the midwestern USA.

-nga sounds Frisian.

It is a fun read, and one of the subplots concerns the origin place of civilization.

But places it more or less in The Congo, not in northeast Africa.

Well, civilization is a bit fuzzy, but it is not the same thing as the birthplace of the Afroasiatic linguistic family.

What genre does he write in?

I would have expected the spelling Hellinga, which is common enough in Friesland.

For example, the names Wieringa and Wierenga both exist.

They both seem to be from around Groningen, which is next to Friesland.

Perhaps it is a Groninger suffix, -inga or -enga.

Friesland sounds delicious and fattening.

@Cerberus Fiction. That's a broad category, I know.

Quite.

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 Hah, no fries!

More like...smoked fish.

@Cerberus that sounds good, too.

Dried fish, then?

Enh.

I'll try it.

Doesn't look very appetizing to me...

Oh. Oh dear.

@RegDwigнt My Soviet music isn't working any more.

Njet.

@Cerberus The Language of the Troubadours of course, whether you call it Galician-Portuguese or Old Portuguese or Medieval Galician or galego-portugués or galaico-portugués or galego-português or galaico-português: Sedia-m’eu na ermida de San Simón

@tchrist I see no "of course" there, but OK.

There are and have been so many Latina dialects; how I am supposed to distinguish between them all?

I'm not even sure they had a name for it a millennium past.

@Cerberus What is 'known' is one location of questionable archeological evidence, and then they extrapolate without reflection an area around it. Also, they will follow or not follow government boundaries of stated control at their whim.

Oh my aching feet.

like people actually patrol the tops of mountains or in the middle of deserts and wastelands.

How is it possible to have hurting feet when I haven't even stood in these?

@KitZ.Fox from dancing? kick boxing? standing in line?

oh. shoes.

painful shoes.

But they aren't usually. I go dancing in these.

I find it bizarre when standing in new shoes they hurt. doesn't seem right.

or fair

@MετάEd do you mean ELL?

@KitZ.Fox so did the executives retreat well?

It's going great.

I just had a twenty minute conversation with the CIO. She actually cornered me and asked me a bunch of questions about what I thought about some process changes.

Me! Eep!

@Cerberus it's hard. race is not language ... but it's so easy to expect them to go together.

I'm the second most junior person here.

@KitZ.Fox "Change everything!"

Also, the only one bold enough to wear red on the first day.

@Mitch Right, so better than nothing!

Yeah. Red is more of a third day thing.

I'm changing into bracers for the evening reception.

@Cerberus Yeah but I'm always pedantically annoyed that they color in things that are just not known.

@Mitch But you're assuming Proto-Afroasiatic is the oldest language?

@KitZ.Fox Sounds great! except I don't know what a bracer is.

I suppose they should make it more like a very fuzzy blob than an actual region.

@Mitch Suspenders, in this case.

@Cerberus no not at all. you're arguing with a strawman of confused issues.

But you were talking about civilization.

In the context of the Afroasiatic family.

biological evolution of people have been giong on for a couple million years, and most likely started in southern ethiopia (but I question that for other reasons). in the past 100K years, people have been coming in and out of Africa every 20K years (I have absolutely no evidence of that) and the forbears of afroasiatic and PIE and ural-altaic have mushed around multiple times in 10K years. totally diffferent stories (but I think that's what you were saying).

@Cerberus I never was.

@KitZ.Fox oh. is that what they're called?I remember them being called the new(ly revitalized) word 'braces' in the 80's

@Mitch Oh, it was Ed. But you replied to my reply to his civilization thingy.

@Cerberus the friend of my friend .. well they should be a friend but sometimes not.

@Mitch Um. OK. I'm from Maine. We stick Rs on the ends of things.

Something like that.

also all this talk of dried fish makes me want to get dinner.

Why do you question the origin of mankind? I thought there was pretty much consensus?

@KitZ.Fox wait...are your pants slipping?

Arthur C. Clarke says so, doesn't he?

@Mitch No.

Not now.

@Cerberus oh that's longer. more about inferences from the fossil record.

@KitZ.Fox you're wearing a belt and suspenders? with your skirt? That's ... bold.

a statement

What?

No.

I'm wearing suspender with my pants.

Except I'm kind of losing my nerve.

How do you mean longer?

you said that you're changing into bracers. and if that's the only thing you're adding, I'm just trying to figure out the practical and fashion concern.

@KitZ.Fox Oh come on. They'll have hors d'oeuvres, right?

Yes, and drinks.

@Cerberus a longer discussion that may have to wait until after dinner.

But I don't have to wear suspenders.

Ah OK.

@KitZ.Fox yeah, just go.

Oh. I've changed out of my skirt.

oh. nerve for the suspenders, not for going. I misread.

Do you deny that there is consensus among palaeontologists?

Or whoever study that. handwave

Or should that be a hand flutter.

Paleontologists have some to a consensus on the poverty of innovation in Swedish cuisine, I will grant you that, sir.

Umm.

dried fish. well, not bad on toast I guess.

I'm having syntacto-semantic doubts.

as well you should.

I'm having pragma-morphemic doubts.

only here for a short time, now must leave again.

BBL

Dubitatio omnia vincit.

Bye.

You're so pragmato-morphemic.

@Mitch I bet I did. Can we say ELU when we mean ELL?

@JasperLoy I like to mix it up.