Doesn't that give them ... stones?

Regarding edits that improve the quality of a question, but the question itself clearly should be closed: Should these edits be approved or rejected?

@Terah I actually support that idea. However, now that ELL has developed its own identity, it will need to be a union of equals - it would be unfair and infeasible to unilaterally fold ELL back into ELU.

Coupling this with the policy of some at ELU to down-vote even good answers to discourage answering 'off-topic' questions, I wonder whether we've ever had the following happen: an answer gets down-voted in ELU, migrated with its question to ELL, then gets up-voted by the same people.

@Kyle Depends on community consensus really.

Smaller sites do approve such edits because the edit itself isn't bad.

Larger communities reject them because crap is crap even when polished.

I think you should open up a meta post if there isn't already one on this, 'cause it's ELU meta that can decide this ultimately.

Hi everybody

Hullo

I was in a meeting and for the 1st time I had a chat with my client

when my manager introduced me to client she said Hello xxx,I have heard a lot about you

I know client is happy with my work and so she said this way

I did not know how to respond so I simply gave a smile

did I do correct?

or is there any better way to respond?

Hmm

How was the smile?

In those cases I usually keep listening and they say a variation of "you're awesome" and you say "thank you".

@IͶΔ sorry did not get you

will it be ok if I say my pleasure if some one says again next time?

@Kyle approved

@SpringLearner Nope

@SpringLearner In the workplace, I think smiling is the best you got.

If you want an opportunity to show off skills, this is the time.

It's a conversation that must end soon, or you'll look, I dunno, like, kinda selfish.

@IͶΔ thanks for the suggestions

Eggcorn of the day: sly of hand.

Is this correct?

how to combine two regex pattern to one?

@TRiG not really an eggcorn but 'per say' in the same answer

@Kyle approve them (if the edit is OK). the little progress added by the edit can still go towards resurrecting the question

@Shafizadeh that's a sentence fragment (don't use it as a complete sentence).

"I don't know how to combine two regex patterns into one?"

"... how to combine two regexes into one?"

@Mitch tnx

@Shafizadeh You keep asking the exact same kind of question. Questions start with "How do I..." or "How can I..." When you start with "How to ..." it is a headline for an article that describes how to do something. It is not a question.

@KitZ.Fox Good memory .. Yes you told me this point already .. ok tnx

Good morning

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Ohai!

I forgot about Writer's chat again.

yeah me too, sorta. didn't really have time

but DE posted a topic so I starred it. However nobody, not even DE, wrote :p

I haven't been writing lately.

Too much other stuff.

I haven't been moderating that much either so I haven't been in chat.

yeah me neither. not in chat, I mean. I'm never moderate.

Haha

What's new in Canada?

our PM is visiting your P.

my mom's dog died.

My daughter's lost some more teeth.

um.

it's double-VIP points at Lego which means I'm going to go shopping this weekend.

I'm dangerously close to developing an addiction to ordering things online.

I think that sums it up.

Oh, I've been spending some time on Bumble, a dating app, doing research into how the app works. My profile says "I'm not here for dating" and my profile pic is Tesla.

You'd be amazed what a good response Tesla gets. The ladies loooove Tesla.

I looooove Tesla.

My littlest just had a tooth extracted.

Also, it seems that my eldest has 'retarded dental development'.

He has had one tooth extracted, but otherwise he hasn't lost any of his milk teeth, and he's only just last week or so had one 6-year molar erupt.

Finally posted my story from yesterday

Is Tuesday just dead?

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Tesla as in Nikolai Tesla? My first reading nowadays is entirely Tesla Motors, so I was wondering why the ladies are so into electric cars.

@Mitch Environmental safety implies intelligence, and women love smart guys

Or so I'm told

@DeltaEscher Tuesday's are the worst.

There've been studies

@Mitch Did you write a story for Tuesday?

@DeltaEscher Social engineering by smart guys triumphs again!!!

The Jedi mind trick

This is not the car you're looking for

@DeltaEscher I did not. Stories are lies.

@Mitch So is most of everything

Not that lies are bad.

Ever see the Matrix?

the Matrix, or the movie about it?

The Movie

I saw a lattice of tiny magnets stitched together

Please don't say you enjoyed the second one

Oh

I've also seen a red pill but never a blue pill.

I have

@DeltaEscher It is a truth universally acknowledged that the Matrix II and III both sucked toad warts.

@Mitch One of the variations of my autism medication was blue

@DeltaEscher how about red then? What if you take both of them at the same time?

@Mitch The Schrodinger's Box of medicine

@DeltaEscher probably causes nausea and headaches. like everything else, especially if you're a sentient being forced to stare into the bottomless dark beyond dark abyss of ambition personified by the guy next to you taking over the arm rest.

@KitZ.Fox huh. Is that cause for concern? I'd imagine not really....

@Mitch if it were a car, I'd have said "my pic is a Tesla"

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Weird teeth is normal

Two of my front teeth are pushing another one back

@Mitch I liked the second Matrix. The problem is that it is half a story, and the other half of the story is so dumb it retroactively ruins the first half.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 She isn't sure. She was going to consult with an orthodontist. The problem is that we're not doing anything about some of the cavities because we keep expecting these to fall out. The longer they stay in there, the worse it gets.

@DeltaEscher the mean has the highest probability, but that highest probability isn't all that high and there are many more instances that are not the mean.

Know what I mean?

My Tuesday thing is just me writing a story chapter every week

@Mitch Yah

It's like how dominant traits are actually very rare to appear most of the time

@KitZ.Fox ah, hm.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I see that now. I also thought you meant Musk. But then you'd probably say, "if I meant the owner of Tesla, I would have said 'My pic is the owner of Tesla'". You sure say a lot for someone who didn't say all these things.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I can't actually remember movie plots much anymore. I just remember my vague impressions. So it allows me to watch again without any spoilers other than vague apprehension.

@Mitch That goes without saying.

@Mitch yeah I haven't seen the matrix 2 in years. But I remember enjoying it a lot and not thinking it was dumb whatsoever. No dumber than the first, anyway, which has its dumb moments despite being awesome.

But the third, gah, the third movie.

not a good movie.

not a good way to resolve the second movie.

not a good way to close out the storyline.

So the trick is to just show up at meetings, say 'It goes without saying', stare at each other for an hour, and go 'Aha!' at the end.

it ruins the second movie by not answering the questions it raised, or worse, answering them badly.

@Mitch aha!

You thought the Matrix was awesome?

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 when reseeing the first movie, I'm surprised how good it is despite your mentioned stupidities, all because association with of the entire stupidities that came later. I can't judge your assessment of II because I haven't wanted to rewatch it. I get aesthetically nauseous even flipping through it on TV.

Which one was the rave in, when they won something?

@Mitch That was the 2nd.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Wait, which one has the fight scene on top of the trucks going down the highway?

@Cerberus Yes, it was a fun movie with a decent plot.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Hold on, what about... oh, I see your point, say no more.

@Mitch The 2nd.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 bleurgh that was the worst.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 hm...that wasn't entirely idiotic.

@Mitch yeah the rave thing was bad. But I didn't say the 2nd was perfect. I just think it's not a horrible movie until you factor in the third.

that one fight scene that is.

The CGI in the 2nd was spotty, from super-crappy to pretty decent. I didn't like that.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I need not say this but I will take your (unspoken) word for it.

The problem with the third movie is that Neo is connected to the machines even when he's not in the matrix. spoiler alert.

I didn't like The Matrix at all though.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 THat's because he's chosen, duh.

That made no sense.

@KitZ.Fox It's a classic.

(but seriously, it compiles a lot of classic sci-fi tropes into one whole in a coherent way. Also, Jesus.

Because The Matrix is an illusion. He's still inside The Matrix that is the symbolic bullshit that anyone who has smoked dope has thought about before.

There is no spoon.

@KitZ.Fox whoa

I never smoked dope....

maybe if I did I'd enjoy the 2nd and 3rd more

Did I just say 'whoa' out loud or was I only thinking it?

Except he's not, because then Confucianism but stick Jesus on it.

starts campaign for legalization

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 only while smoking dope.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 You wouldn't. It makes it worse.

@KitZ.Fox well, but that's more the 2nd and 3rd that start piling the philosophy on too thick

The first one wasn't that bad, I thought.

@KitZ.Fox Jesus on a Confucian stick? Aisle 17, frozen novelties.

but anyway, I think we can all agree that the third was utter crap.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 did you see 'Sense8'?

And that the 2nd and 3rd, taken together as they are meant to be, form a pile of crap, no matter how many good parts there are.

@Mitch no

Made by the Wachowskis (who made the matrix (it goes without saying))

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 there's something to be said for artistic coherence and II and III didn't have it.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 It was OK, but I've read countless scifi books that were more interesting.

@Mitch I don't think I knew that. I liked Sense8.

Not mind-blowing, but interesting to watch.

OK here's an exercice de style, choose a literary trope at random and write a paragraph where every sentence exhibits that trope. anacoluthon. parataxis. what is the trope about saying you're not gonna talk about something but by doing so you just did?

@Cerberus Sure, but I don't think that takes away from the Matrix as a movie.

Just like how movies based on novels can be good despite not being "as good" as the novel.

e.g. I loved the LotR movies. They are flawed, sure, but they are great movies.

@KitZ.Fox I wanted to like it by the premise, and it kept me going and wanting to see how it turned out. but at the end was disappointed. I should have stopped at episode n-1. Also the orgy scenes were stupid. I like my orgy scenes to be well reasoned and insightful.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 one could arguably argue that the HP tXotY series of movies were better than the books because they cut out 100's and hundred's of pages of young adult novel whining about feelings.

Hmm, yes. I don't know if I remember the last episode very well.

@Mitch The person making that argument would be wrong.

The biggest problem with the HP movies is that they stuck too close to the source material but didn't devote enough time to them.

Not that feelings are intrinsically bad. Just ... Rowling's success made her uneditable (no one had the courage to say 'pages 150 through 650 add nothing, cut them'

By the third book the books were too long to film.

@Mitch I disagree.... there's a lot wrong with HP but the length of the books isn't it, I'd say.

@KitZ.Fox I don't think it was the last episode that did it. just know that that was all sort of put out the fire. and really the orgy scene was totally unmotivated

The world-building is a bit shaky. well, a lot.

The story outgrew its world.

There was a lot of spontaneous non-vanilla sex. It made me a bit uncomfortable.

What was comical and absurd in book 1 was a plot hole in book 4, etc.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I'm not arguing, but that is the case for all adaptations. novels are too long to fit into a screenplay, and 'inspired-by's are almost separate works of art.

@Mitch yes. well, that's just it though. I think they should have changed the story more to fit the medium, or else changed the medium to fit the story (as they did with book 7: it's two movies)

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Really? in what way?

@Mitch lol. You're asking me to explain how rowling's world-building lacks sense?

@KitZ.Fox a lot of rainbow sherbert sex? ha ha ha ha ha h.

ha ha ha h

ha.

clears throat

ewww...

There are other flavours besides rainbow sherbet.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 oh

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 ooh...sassy!

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 well, an example to hold my metaphorical hat on.

my only problem,which was a problem I have with 'imaginative' fiction that I have a problem with, is the rule fitting in that built world.

that's worded strangely...

Just a short list of things I dislike of HP's world: 1. Wizard money is based on prime numbers, which is stupid, which implies wizards can't do math. 2. Wizards are somehow totally incompetent with regards to muggles, despite most of them knowing muggles. Things like telephones render wizards completely incompetent, yet a magical device that had the same UI would not. 3. The wizard world is very very dangerous and nobody realizes it. love potions are roofies. polyjuice potion. memory charms. etc

I mean the make up out of the blue some magical power, and...

...and they go ahead and prescribe it's affect, like time travel or potions,...

but it always seems like if they could do that, if they had the technology to do that, or the magical power to do that, that despite its limitations...

why couldn't you use some other comparable tech or magic power to entirely avoid that situation, or solve the problem facing the protagonist immediately.

You're in a fight with a super powerful wizard and expelliarmus works on them. Why doesn't the wizard apparate to right behind you and punch you in the neck?

Same reason you can't Force choke every Jedi you see.

Did I say that out loud?

@Mitch well, apparition is tiring and also restricted (can't apparate inside hogwarts)

But nobody uses a gun.

despite the fact that most wizards wouldn't expect it at all

Or a knife.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 My rejoinders: 1. It's pretty obvious wizards are math idiots because frankly they don't need it and if they did they could use magic to make the equations come out right.

2. UI? magicians just think it what they want. Telephones... pfft.

3. good point. they should all be besotted, cat-faced, and dead.

And most spells, be they the killing curse (abra cadabra) or the disarming curse seem to shoot from wands like slow bullets from a gun or arrows from a bow. So it's easy to miss... you'd think marksmanship would be a major course in school.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 YOu can't do that because there's a spell, for which the magic-tech allows that there could be some magic spell to undo it in many variations.

@Mitch The trifecta of memory charms (easy enough an advanced school kid can do them), roofie potions, and polyjuice would allow anyone to commit any sex crime whenever.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 haha. Indiana Jones would wipe up at Hogwarts.

@Mitch They have curses that muffle noise. presto! instant firearm silencers.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 wizards should be put on sexoffender warning lists automagically.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 They have owls that go where you want them. That's crazy. and a health hazard I bet.

@Mitch yeah. want to know where someone is? just send them an owl with a letter that has a tracking device.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Well, and also some really awesome sexy kinks.

presumably not all owls get delivered? but that doesn't explain how the school owls can reach sirius black who's in hiding.

@KitZ.Fox sure, polyjuice would be awesome for sex adventures... though there would be the issue of polyjuice prostitutes.

But also, why would anyone not alter their appearance to make themselves always beautiful. This is a faerie thing, glamour, and that's what they do with it.

I mean, we're talking about a society that enslaves house elves. They'd have no problem with prostitutes.

@KitZ.Fox In fact, Hermione does this exact thing. Her teeth were too large, and a spell made them comically over-sized, so the hospital person restored them to their "right" size, but H- lied about the size so they were smaller (and thus more beautiful) than before.

In later books there is a ret-con that explains that magic can't create food.

There is no justification for this at all, it's just one of the laws of magic.

of course, there's no reason why that should be the case.

in HP:MoR (fan fic) the author tries to impose some rules on the world-building with varying degrees of success. Many of the HP world-buliding rules make no sense and the protagonist just shakes his head at it.

Like, why are all spells weird latin-ish phrases?

What do wizards in China say when disarming someone?

What about non-rhotic British people? "Expelliahmus! Bloddy 'ell, it din' wo'k agin!"

Disarmeh!

Sometimes spells only work if you do a gesture and a phrase together. Other spells just require the phrase. some spells obviously require a bit of mental work because the same keyword performs varying results depending on what you want, while other spells work even without knowing what they do... just the incantation is enough.

e.g. SectumSempra causes cuts to appear. It's very dangerous. Harry uses it without knowing what it's for.

But the memory charm, Obliviate, is one single word that allows Hermione to change her parents' memories so that they forget they have a daughter and think they're australian.

Avada Kevadra, the killing curse, only works if you're powerful enough and really mean it.

Also, it'd seem that there'd be a zillion ways to kill with magic.

but there's only one "killing curse"

Where's the "apparate an object into a person's brain" curse? The "stop their heart" curse? The "replace all the blood in their body with alcohol" curse?

Or the "turn them into stone" curse?

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 You bring up so many good points, it's almost like you don't believe those history books.

TL;DR: the world-building isn't great. It really doesn't hold up to scrutiny.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 There's witch grad school for that.

The HP books are good because of the characters and their whiny journey

The movies cut out all the character development.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 And because America throws fame at anything remotely British

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 They had that opportunity with the French and Russian students in HPGoF

@Mitch yeah, those students spoke English fluently, though accented, and used the same spells.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Mind Spells. It's like you haven't even read HBP.

Fine, they're all IE-languages, maybe the magic is PIE.

@DeltaEscher The travel advertisements for the Falkland Islands say "Remotely British"

@DeltaEscher lol. sure it is. But anyway that just raises another inconsistency.

It's a novel

It's not supposed to make sense

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Well, you can still compare them, which one stimulates the mind more.

@DeltaEscher HBP? Is that that addictive steak sauce?

Oh no. This chat is active when I'm coming in. This world is coming to an end.

@Mitch Half Blood Prince

@Jasper Hey Jaz!

6'th book

@DeltaEscher Right. Same thing.

@Cerberus Sure, I can compare them, but it doesn't mean I can't find one "awesome" for qualities that the other lacks even if it doesn't do as good a job where they overlap.

@DeltaEscher I don't get what you're saying. They are history books, just told from individual points of view.

Hi

@Mitch Exactly. History never made sense

@Jasper welcome back!

@Jasper Hello!

Why didn't the Columbus realize he wasn't in India?

I want them to have spoken in a super grammatical way in complete English that he understood, but pretended not to.

"This is America, not India!"

@DeltaEscher Right, Goes good with london broil. a tad spicy though

"I finally found India!"

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 That is possible.

But I didn't find it super remarkable.

@DeltaEscher My condolences

@Mitch It tastes like they were trying too hard to impress a different sauce demographic

@DeltaEscher He's a CEO. Truth, pfft. It's results that matter.

best thing ever that happened to Spain

@Jasper Welcome back!

@DeltaEscher Wait, is that a serious question?

@Cerberus You'll like it more in 100 years, when it's old.

'cause if so, it's pretty interesting to analyze.

@DeltaEscher YOu don't want to look at the ingredients. Just enjoy. Besides, it's no one you know.