English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

Cerberus

00:39

Hello.

Mahnax

00:55

Hiya.

Cerberus

I was forced to watch football, kind of.

How is your evening?

Mahnax

My evening is going quite well. I think it'll storm soon, I'm about to crack a book for the first time in quite a while, and I have an iced americano. Hbu?

Cerberus

01:10

An iced americano? Qu'est-ce que c'est, ça?

Sorry, I had to make smoked chicken with tomato and my aunt's horse-reddish sauce.

What book?

Mahnax

@Cerberus Espresso+water+ice.

@Cerberus Love in the Time of Cholera.

Cerberus

Ahh.

That is probably not fiction?

Mahnax

It's fiction. By Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

Cerberus

Ah, I know that name.

Translation?

Mahnax

Yes.

Cerberus

01:15

Sometimes, we are forced to read great works in translation, doesn't mean we can't still enjoy and appreciate them.

Robusto

@Cerberus They only bring you out for the important games, eh?

@Mahnax "It was about girls, right?"

Cerberus

Was it important, hmm?

Just another lottery, just like the last match I saw.

Robusto

@Cerberus Your home team is going, well, home.

Cerberus

01:33

Yeah, and I care...NAWT!

We were mostly chatting during the match.

Where is @terdon's line about how doing sports is fun but watching is not?

Robusto

Watching it can be fun, if you're watching a sport that's watchable. Soccer mostly doesn't qualify. It is the artichoke-eating of sports, except without the butter.

Baseball is boring to watch.

Basketball can be exciting, as can American football.

But teams actually score in those games. It isn't like soccer, in which a 7-1 result is flabbergasting.

What makes basketball so good is that one man can actually, by his own skill, will and strength, score against all opposition. And a team of good players playing as a team can simply dominate. It's not like soccer, where most of the time a score looks like it happened by accident.

I watched the Ned-Arg game with my tablet, and sometimes turned the sound off because the breathless announcers were interfering with my reading. Their huffa-puffa commentary was out of all proportion to the action going on.

Cerberus

01:48

Of course.

Sports "journalists".

I don't find basketball or any of those other sports any more exciting.

Even sports I have played, like hockey, are only marginally less boring.

Tennis I have played, super boring to watch.

I mean, I see your point about the low number of points in football.

But it's too minor.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

A friend and I were discussing how to make soccer fun.

We concluded that the field should be 1/4 the size and have no out-of-bounds, but instead be walled in, with the goals set in the end walls and the corners cut off to 45° angles.

Essentially, like foosball, minus the poles

Then players could do stuff like bank the ball off the wall, etc.

Cerberus

02:03

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Or indoor hockey, minus the sticks.

But it is already by far the most popular sport in the world, especially spectating.

So apparently it is as "fun" as it gets.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus Yeah, that's pretty sad.

Cerberus

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Just like any other sport...

Or most things people watch on television.

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

@Mahnax Yum!

I got Foamy on those.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

02:24

Is an iced americano supposed to be better than an iced coffee?

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

shrug

They're stronger, in theory.

Because espresso.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

yeah but watered down

Cerberus

By the way, we won.

Mitch

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 That's exactly indoor soccer.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

we did? yay! go team

Cerberus

02:26

We have an Argentine Queen.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Mitch well there you go. It should be the norm.

@Cerberus I googled "Argentine Queen" and this was the first result

Cerberus

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 There you go.

Mitch

You know what's extremely boring to watch? Fencing.

Cerberus

Always fabulously dressed.

@Mitch You know what's extremely boring to watch? Paint drying. And all sports.

Mitch

two minutes of standing there looking nervous and then half a second of an explosion like two mountain boats butting heads, and you have no idea who got the point.

@Cerberus I've done that. It's not so bad.

Grass growing isn't so great. Over the course of a couple days maybe.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

02:31

@Mitch did you ever play the Sierra On-Line games of the old days? like King's Quest, etc?

Mitch

@Cerberus Golf. Fishing. Boring to watch boring to do, and you really hope that someone or something dies at the end.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

There was one called "Gold Rush", which featured multiple quest paths, and on one path you literally had to watch for the grass to grow so your oxen wouldn't starve on the journey to California

Mitch

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 real life is boring.

boring boring boring.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

luckily it only takes a minute or two in the game

Cerberus

Mitch

02:33

and repetitive.

Cerberus

> We blow those Argentines away! ^

> We know what it's like to screw Argentinians.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

lol

Cerberus

Naaien is literally to sew.

Mitch

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I hesitate to answer... because I didn't.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Mitch You missed out

So many good games

well, if you like that genre

Cerberus

02:35

Hmm King's Quest...

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

There are modern remakes of King's Quest and King's Quest 2 and King's Quest 3, by fans

I've played the first two, they were pretty good.

Cerberus

I did play Sierra Online games! I remember the name so well because of the hundreds of hours I spent looking at the logo when a game wouldn't start.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

I still have the hint books for several of the games

Cerberus

Good.

I don't think I ever played K's Q.

Ah, Quest for Glory V, I did play that.

685-252

There was a movie called "Quest" iirc

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

02:40

Argentine Queen / now we're sharing the same dream

685-252

don't cry for me?

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

►

685-252

►

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 I have been humming that for 21 minutes now

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I'm terribly sorry. :x

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

02:48

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 it's Cerb's fault, not yours

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

Oh, okay! Bad doggy!

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

I was merely pointing out that we're thinking alike, you and I

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

:D

Cerberus

I'm sorry.

685-252

Nah, it's my fault. Bad skull bad skull :-)

Cerberus

02:49

But Outpost 2 was also by Sierra! I loved the included novel. And Caesar II! The Rise & Rule of Ancient Empires! Spacebucks! Betrayal at Antara! Return to Krondor!

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

Spacebucks!

Mitch

►

Cerberus

Can you believe I actually put the novella from Outpost 2 on my reading list in high school?

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 You liked it? It was my brother's game, so I was barely allowed to play it...

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus I was more into their quest games

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

@Cerberus Never heard of it. I like the name, though.

Cerberus

02:52

I have played Quest for Glory. But honestly I found many of their other games better.

685-252

Quest for Fire (film)

Quest for Fire () is a 1981 film adaptation of the 1911 Belgian novel by J.-H. Rosny. Directed by Jean-Jacques Annaud and adapted by Gérard Brach, the film stars Everett McGill, Ron Perlman, Nameer El-Kadi, and Rae Dawn Chong. It won the Academy Award for Makeup. Michael D. Moore was the associate producer in charge of action and animal scenes. It is set in Paleolithic Europe, 80,000 years ago, its plot surrounding the struggle for control of fire by early humans. The movie was filmed on location in Iceland, Cairngorms National Park in Scotland and Tsavo National Park and Lake Magadi in A...

Cerberus

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 Ah OK!

Homeworld!

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

I'm diggin' for fire / I'm diggin' for fire

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

I've played the first 6 king's quests, the first 4 police quests including the remake of pq1, gold rush, the first 6 space quests...

Cerberus

No Quest for Glory?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

02:56

But also Red Baron, Rise of the Dragon, Thexder, Jones in the Fast Lane, Phantasmagoria, a-10 tank killer

No, I never played QfG

Oh, I guess technically the first gen half-life games were published by them

Cerberus

How come we have played exactly the opposite games??

685-252

opposite in what way?

what's the opposite of chess?

anti-chess?

Cerberus

The opposite of a game is not the game.

Whichever game he played, I did not, and vice versa.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus we are alike, yet unalike.

In many ways we are opposite.

Let's see who the bot likes better, you or me

!!king's quest or quest for glory?

Jarvis the Bot

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 quest for glory

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

03:06

!!the hoi polloi or hoi polloi?

Jarvis the Bot

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 the hoi polloi

2

Cerberus

What the hell does that mean?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

!!boys or girls?

Jarvis the Bot

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 boys

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

!!xp or 7?

Jarvis the Bot

03:06

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 7

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

hm, it's a toss-up

Cerberus

Your style and pastime activities and sexual preferences are dictated by a robot?

That explains a lot.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

No, I was wondering if the bot would favour your positions over mine.

The bot has it out for me.

!!do you have it out for me?

Jarvis the Bot

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Of course not

Cerberus

What function are you using?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

03:07

!!are you just saying that?

Jarvis the Bot

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 All signs point to yes

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

see?

Cerberus

Clearly.

The whole world has it out for you, right?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

!!Cerb or Shiny?

Jarvis the Bot

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Shiny

Cerberus

03:08

Tsk.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

no, just the bot

Cerberus

Just the bot.

Do you use Firefox?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

yes

Firefox likes me

Cerberus

Sure?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

for my friends, Firefox is the worst shit ever, always crashing and slow

for me, it works flawlessly

Cerberus

03:12

She lets me keep 70 tabs open at the moment, she must hate me.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

Oh, I'm a compulsive tab-closer

Cerberus

It works well for me too, when I'm not crushing it with too many extensions and stuff.

A new profile is blazingly fast.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

You can't blame FF if you install a shitty extension.

Cerberus

Indeed not.

The only reason Chrome is faster and more stable for me is that I just can't install the right things on it, partly, and that I won't.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

yeah, my friend who makes new profiles all the time can't seem to keep FF running. With almost no extensions it is still constantly locking up for him while Chrome works fine.

Cerberus

03:13

Very strange.

Since when is this happening?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

I dunno. I can't keep track of his myriad tech problems

Cerberus

I have to say it began crashing on me under heavy load maybe a year ago.

It's usually a heavy Google site, Youtube or Google Maps.

But rarely some other site.

Mitch

!!yes or no

Jarvis the Bot

@Mitch no

Mitch

dammit

0

Q: Posts Linking ELU and Meta

TL;DR If ELU posts linked on Meta (and vice versa) don't show up on the Linked panes, are there rules about when/how to use them? My interest is in Meta posts linked as comments on ELU. What rules govern this use and can they be improved? Intro I want to know when promotional (particularly sel...

I just don't get it.

At all.

I feel like links to posts are involved maybe the link is on ELU for a post on meta.elu. But I can't tell. Also, what is the problem?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

03:23

@Mitch yeah my thoughts exactly.

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

@Mitch TL; DR.

Cerberus

@Mitch I can't parse your sentence...

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus read that meta post, it will become clear.

skullpatrol

04:41

2 hours later…

3 hours later…

4 hours later…

.

..

...

Johan Larsson

06:14

@Robusto The 7-1 game was pretty boring. Started good but was over quick.

skullpatrol

the quickest ever!

Matt Эллен

07:15

mergblerg

@Mitch nor do I.

livresque

07:55

Greetings.

Alraxite

Hi.

livresque

It has been a while, and I want to say how impressive the retention rate is on ELU. I never thought I would see the same active user names from a year ago!

This community fell off my radar for a while, and I had completely forgotten how much fun and learning I get from geeking out here.

skullpatrol

welcome back :-)

livresque

Merci!

So how about all the young adult lit being written in the present tense?

skullpatrol

the young live for the present

livresque

08:08

I teach middle schoolers and high schoolers who all read Gladiator Games and Subvergent series, so I read them too, but I can't get over the present tense.

skullpatrol

when in Rome...

livresque

That is rather profound, but these books read like Bert and Ernie.

All roads lead to Rome, but no one seems to survive.

skullpatrol

sophistication comes from experience

livresque

Product of our raising.

skullpatrol

Indeed.

livresque

08:12

I feel like these narratives in the present tense are a reflection of situational comedies.

TV shows about nothing are never in the past tense, with How I Met Your Mother being a rare exception every once in a while.

Okay, change of subject since I just saw your mathiness. Do you know the Life of Fred textbooks?

skullpatrol

Nope

should I?

livresque

Lifeoffred.com

It is a method of math story written by a master teacher who retired to create this way to stop kids from hating math.

No drill and kill kind of thing, but great mental math exercises and general interest woven in.

skullpatrol

@livresque have you read The Mathematician's Lament"?

livresque

It starts with single digit addition facts, then the commutative properties, and then everything from the Greek alphabet to the Lorentz equation to calculus and economics.

No, do tell.

skullpatrol

A Mathematician's Lament

A Mathematician's Lament is a short book on the pedagogics and philosophy of mathematics by Paul Lockhart, originally a research mathematician but for many years a math teacher at a private school. Characterised as a strongly worded opinion piece arguing for an intuitive and heuristic approach to teaching and the importance of mathematics teaching reforms, the book frames learning mathematics as an artistic and imaginative pursuit which is not reflected at all in the way the subject is taught in the American educational system. Background The book was developed from a 25-page essay that...

livresque

08:30

Sounds like a cohort of Stan Schmidt, author of Fred. Excellent. Downloading it now.

skullpatrol

:-)

livresque

You should look into Professor Schmidt's Life of Fred, seriously. Each bok has a beautiful preface about how this is not what the government schools are teaching.

My school's maths philosophy for early elementary is pretty much math games, manipulatives, story. It is fun.

Wow, thank you so much for the reference. This is beautiful.

skullpatrol

I thought you might enjoy it...

livresque

I am drooling.

skullpatrol

...savior every word.

Matt Эллен

08:42

savour*

(US savor)

skullpatrol

thanks :(

livresque

Savour works when you can devour this kind of pedagogy.

What do you do?

I have heard that is quite a lucrative field.

Alraxite

09:14

Do you have to be logged in in your OpenID website to be able to log in into a website with your OpenID info?

Matt Эллен

09:25

logging in with an openID usually requires logging to the site where you got your openID from. Usually this is done via redirection. Whether there is another way to implement verification, I don't know.

Alraxite

openid.stackexchange.com

Are you logged in here?

When you go to the page.

Matt Эллен

I don't use the stack exchange open id

Alraxite

Oh.

Google?

Matt Эллен

yeah

Alraxite

Are you logged in there?

Matt Эллен

09:28

yes

Alraxite

Hmm.

Did you get logged in into there by going there by yourself?

Or did you get logged in while logging in to SE?

If you remember...

Matt Эллен

I came to EL&U, clicked login, chose the google option, then was redirected to google to log in

then I entered my username and password and was redirected back to EL&U

Alraxite

But before doing that, you weren't logged into google?

Matt Эллен

I wasn't

Alraxite

OK.

I use SE OpenID but I'm not logged in.

Matt Эллен

09:32

if you allow SE to store cookies, it will probably remember that you've logged in and keep you logged in

like google does

and most other websites that use logins

I don't store cookies, so I have to log in

Alraxite

I think I do have cookies enabled.

But my account's all acting weird.

So might have something to do with that.

Matt Эллен

maybe

Mitch

10:23

@Cerberus exactly

Matt Эллен

16

Stack Overflow Academy

Proposed Q&A site for programmers who want to learn how to ask good questions on Stack Overflow

Currently in definition.

Alraxite

Haha.

I can't believe this is for real.

They might need a complementing Stack Overflow Academy Academy too.

Robusto

10:54

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Then put it on ice, with sticks and a puck, and poof! — hockey.

KitFox

12:01

A little bird keeps flying up to cling to my window screen.

Matt Эллен

12:11

probably doing reps.

skullpatrol

or laps.

Mitch

I saw a bear doing pull-ups.

KitFox

Hey, skully is back.

Mitch

You were gone?

skullpatrol

yep

Mitch

12:18

Anything exciting happen? (that you can tell us about; if not make something up)

Robusto

Don'tcha just love it when, in a requirements meeting, the product owner asks for a specific set of functionality, and you say, "OK, you can have A, but that means you can't have B [something that their request makes impossible]." And they agree, and you go on and create A, and after you're all done and everything works fine, they say, "Cool, but where is B?"

facepalm

skullpatrol

then you move on to F followed by U

KitFox

"What is the obstacle here?"
"Geometry."
"Well, just ignore that."

Robusto

People are stupid. QED

skullpatrol

"I'm an expert, I can do anything."

Robusto

12:22

I can actually give them B, but it is an ass-ton of pain and it slows everything else down.

skullpatrol

is your time worth it?

Matt Эллен

offer to run them down in your car, and while they recover from their asston of pain, your can implement B as penance

Robusto

So my crisp, elegant, performant A is going to be not as shiny.

Which is the real issue. A is clean, elegant, and faster than fuck.

They want to pee on A.

KitFox

Fucks can be pretty slow.

Matt Эллен

Hey! Don't P on my A!

skullpatrol

12:24

they always say "faster, faster,..."

Robusto

There used to be a supermarket in the US called the A&P.

Matt Эллен

Now it's called T & A?

Robusto

No. It's gone, gone, gone.

skullpatrol

!!wiki T & A

Jarvis the Bot

T.A.T.u.

t.A.T.u. (, ) was a Russian music duo that consisted of Lena Katina and Yulia Volkova. The duo was managed by Russian television producer Ivan Shapovalov while in the group Neposedi. The duo were signed to their own production company T.A. Music, following the split with Universal Music Russia, and their sub-labels Interscope Records and Neformat. The duo established their success with their debut single "All the Things She Said", which gained acclaim from music journalists and critics, who deemed it one of the best singles in early 2000s. The video of the single, however generated co...

KitFox

12:27

hahaha

!!urban T&A

Jarvis the Bot

@KitFox T&A Tits and Ass, see [T and A]

KitFox

Thank you.

Robusto

12:39

We should elect a moderator named Naughtius Maximus.

Matt Эллен

mmmm. passive reps. goes down smooth

A road named after a computer game character?

I suppose it is

Core Design were from Derby

Robusto

@MattЭллен Whoa.

Matt Эллен

yeah

Robusto

@MattЭллен Speaking of which, I need another 9 votes to break 90k. Them passive reps should get more active.

KitFox

12:54

One of our existing mods could change their name.

I wonder if sim would notice if I changed her name for her.

Matt Эллен

Why would we want to change our names?

skullpatrol

Naughtius Foximus?

Matt Эллен

Oh! for the NM joke

Robusto

@MattЭллен Can you think of a better reason?

Matt Эллен

no :D I'd just forgotten what was going on

skullpatrol

12:58

Come'on you're a blue blood now.

Matt Эллен

I've always been a blue blood, if by blue you mean prone to swearing

skullpatrol

true fans^

just like us raider fans

we bleed the silver and black

Cerberus

Hello.

Mitch

Hey

KitFox

Hi

skullpatrol

13:04

yo

Alraxite

Hullo.

Andrew Leach

Hallo.

Matt Эллен

G'day

Cerberus

Such variance.

skullpatrol

yep

Cerberus

13:10

Yay no one-box!!

skullpatrol

depends on the context

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

Morning

KitFox

What's up?

skullpatrol

The opposite of down.

Matt Эллен

What's down?

KitFox

13:13

My frown.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

The fluffy stuff on young birds

Matt Эллен

@KitFox I'm afraid @Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 got the answer written on the card. So the points go to him

Cerberus

Young birds are nice.

KitFox

sighs ruefully

skullpatrol

@MattЭллен what about the opposite of up?

Matt Эллен

13:15

@skullpatrol ... circular reasoning works because ...

skullpatrol

it works

Matt Эллен

0

Q: I was used to do vs I was used doing

Good day everyone, Looked around and found not the desired answer to my question. Would you please be so kind to give me a hand with the following: "I was used to do..." or "I was used to swim here" vs "I was used doing..." or "I was used swimming in here" Are they all co...

grammar

what is this about?

Cerberus

Guess: what do you think the top 22 of television broadcasts is in the Netherlands, by number of viewers?

Matt Эллен

is there some part of English people have kept hidden from me?

@Cerberus world cup. 21 reality tv shows

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

Cerberus

13:19

@MattЭллен Ding! The answer is: 22 football matches.

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus do you mean today or all time?

@Cerberus ha!

Cerberus

Last night's match is the number one with 9.6 million viewers. And that excludes people who watch the game in a pub, I think, as we did.

Matt Эллен

a close game

skullpatrol

too close

Cerberus

A silly lottery, as often.

Matt Эллен

13:21

penalties are a sad way to leave the tournament

skullpatrol

the refs need to pay their bills too

Cerberus

It's a sad tournament. Like all tournaments.

Matt Эллен

13:39

except for the victors. I bet they won't feel sad

Cerberus

Especially not their pubs!

Great for turnover.

Matt Эллен

aye :D

KitFox

That little bird is still at it.

Matt Эллен

perhaps it's a mechanical bird sent to spy on you

KitFox

Hmm.

I am also having some serious bandwidth issues.

Cerberus

13:50

Alraxite

No image.

Cerberus

A bird attack.

Don't Google "home made bird attack costume".

Alraxite

With quotes or without?

Andrew Leach

imdb.com/title/tt0056869

Alraxite

Oh...

Andrew Leach

13:52

Ah. IMDb should one-box, really.

Cerberus

@Alraxite I think it works either way.

Alraxite

Too late now.

Cerberus

nods

But I must away.

Later!

Alraxite

bai.

Matt Эллен

CU

Cerberus

13:54

evaporates

Robusto

@AndrewLeach Agreed.

@Cerberus You are so evanescent.

Transcript for

English Language & Usage: Multi-Layer…