English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

user174558

00:02

@Cerberus Woof.

Robusto

@MετάEd I thought was a solved problem.

MετάEd

00:25

@Robusto To begin with it seems to be a money sucking black hole.

Old system: say we have 10 extension phones and 4 trunk lines at $70. With VoIP, we eliminate trunk lines and instead pay per user at $40. Presto, our bill just went from $280 to $400.

Much negotiating and looking at other options will now ensue.

Cerberus

Hi!

I quote Alexis de Tocqueville from his On the Democracy of America:

> In the confusion of all ranks, everyone hopes to appear what he is not.

That is rather nice. Now I must find the original French.

MετάEd

@Cerberus I think the original French must all be dead by now. Maybe not -- we should have tried harder in 1066.

Cerberus

00:43

@MετάEd Have you looked down here?

Robusto

@MετάEd You don't need to be so Frank with him.

MετάEd

@Robusto I hear he's a Francophile.

Mitch

@Cerberus I wonder if there is an itinerary of his travels (where and when he visited each city) and who he talked to at each place.

Cerberus

> Not that in democracies the arts are incapable, in case of need, of producing wonders. This may occasionally be so if customers appear who are ready to pay for time and trouble. In this rivalry of every kind of industry, in the midst of this immense competition and these countless experiments, some excellent workmen are formed who reach the utmost limits of their craft. But they rarely have an opportunity of showing what they can do; they are scrupulously sparing of their powers; they remain in a state of accomplished mediocrity, which judges itself, and, though well able to shoot beyond …

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

Bon jovi, everyone.

Robusto

00:45

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 Let's not say things we can't take back.

Cerberus

@Mitch Hmm I'm sure we can find out whether such a list has been compiled. Otherwise, one would have to go through his works.

Mitch

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 we're gonna live forever!

MετάEd

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 Bene gesserit.

Mitch

L'chayem

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

What do you suppose the Romans meant by silex back when the Appian Way was built?

MετάEd

00:46

@Mitch L'chbusy.

Mitch

@MετάEd please expectorate directly into the commode

user174558

I just defecated twice, lol.

MετάEd

@Mitch I can accommodate you.

@Jasper But you were defeated a third time.

Mitch

@Cerberus tocqueville.c-span.nsatc.net/chap4b.htm

MετάEd

My work here is done.

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 Ah, so that's apparently where we get "silica"?

Mitch

00:49

@MετάEd we can tell you weren't in the navy...

Cerberus

> Dans la confusion de toutes les classes, chacun espère pouvoir paraître ce qu'il n'est pas et se livre à de grands efforts pour y parvenir.

MετάEd

I always liked the word "scrupulus".

Cerberus

This is the French.

Mitch

because you lost your c.

!!rimshot

Robusto

wake up in da mornin slavin for bread sah / so that every mouth can be fed

MετάEd

00:49

@Mitch I c what you d there.

Cerberus

@Mitch Good.

MετάEd

ba'

Mitch

@Cerberus in the original it just doesn't sound like anything.

Cerberus

Pourquoi pas?

Mitch

@MετάEd I always like the word scrutable.

@Cerberus because all the words are so ... foreign.

really. because they're French they just don't make a strong impression.

Cerberus

00:52

On the contrary. They feel quite at home here.

Mitch

well I'm sure native french speakers get a lot more out of them.

To me it's like they could mean anything, and just out of nothing better to do, the meanings were settled on by grudging convention, like they could change to another meaning very easily because no one really cares.

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

@MετάEd Yes sir.

user174558

It is very interesting that the c word also starts with c in Hokkien, or more precisely, ch.

Mitch

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 do you mean what they paved the road with?

@Jasper which c word? conchita?

user174558

@Mitch Now you are just trying to bait me, lol.

Mitch

00:58

@Jasper Am I ever not trying to bait anybody?

Don't answer that.

user174558

Now thinking about it, Gravity is a much better film than The Martian.

Robusto

Gravity is a weak force. I spit on it.

tchrist

@Cerberus What happened to the end of it?

Mitch

@Jasper Exactly!

Both lots of fun but Gravity wins in the end.

user174558

@Mitch So, I have been speculating that even Buddhism is non-truth. I have already convinced myself that the Abrahamic religions are non-truth.

Mitch

01:08

@Jasper Whatever works.

Have you seen 'Life of Pi' (the movie) or read the book?

I've asked you this before.

user174558

Nope, but I heard about it.

Mitch

Mar 19 '14 at 13:08, by Mitch

@JasperLoy You're gonna read all about religion X and then add it to your list. XYZ and now B. Did you ever read Life of Pi or see the movie?

user174558

So, what about Pi?

Mitch

anyway, not to give away the ending or anything (they all die at the end)...

Pi converts to Christianity, Islam, and Hinduism, all at the same time

user174558

OMG, LOL

Mitch

01:11

and then there's a scene where his priest, his imam, and his guru all meet. stuff happens.

user174558

I think I should watch it.

Mitch

I remember the scene in the book as being better than the movie. actually in the movie the three people don't meet, you just see his dad at the dinner table telling him that his three (or is it 2 (or is it 30M +2)) gods aren't going to help him on his science test at school the next day.

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

@Mitch yes. It meant flint before it meant silica.

I'm going with flint.

Mitch

01:30

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 I'd never heard silex before but googling said something like basalt from local quarries, so flint does sound better (if you're going for a translation).

but I don't think I'd want to be walking on that road in barefeet.

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

It reminded me of Proctor-Silex.

MετάEd

Which reminds me of Proctor and Gamble. Boo hiss.

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

:(

MετάEd

01:48

Boo hiss not because I hate Procter and Gamble purse a, but because they're the competition.

Who. Text to speech strikes again.

Although actually I'm pretty impressed to see that ' in the right place.

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

02:01

I wonder what's in purse b.

Robusto

@MετάEd Oh, you have nooooo idea.

Procter (correct spelling) & Gamble are the worst client you could possibly have.

They literally have zero imagination.

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

Do you think that's because their product line is so diverse?

Robusto

I think it's because they are the ultimate bean counters.

Cerberus

@tchrist Happened?

Mitch

@Robusto they do well don't they, and they've stuck around since the 60's

tchrist

02:10

... et se livre à de grands efforts pour y parvenir.

Robusto

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 Back when I was a creative director in advertising at D'Arcy St. Louis I had to work on Ivory shampoo. It was . . . a nightmare.

@Mitch The 1860s, probably.

> Founded Cincinnati, Ohio, United States (October 31, 1837; 178 years ago)

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

@Robusto are you the 99 44/100ths pure guy?

Robusto

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 No, I'm not even old enough to be the grandson of the guy who came up with that one.

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

That must have been a revival of it in the 80s, then.

Mitch

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 leaves a little room for fudging

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

02:12

I thought 'so pure it floats' was pretty old, but not the exact figure one.

Robusto

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 You're confusing the soap and the shampoo. The soap was 99 44/100% pure.

tchrist

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 Exact figures don’t mix well with floats.

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

@Mitch I wondered as a kid what comprised those dirty, devilish 66/100ths.

@Robusto Solid shampoo?

@Robusto I know this.

It also floats.

Robusto

For the shampoo they wanted to say "naturally beautiful hair" . . . and the idea we worked up was to have the Carole King song "You make me feel like a natural woman" with that line as the tag.

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

@tchrist drink your big black cow / and get outta here

tchrist

02:14

0x1.aaaaaaaaaaaabp+1

Robusto

And it went down in flames. The final campaign used the line: "naturally beautiful hair"

That was after six months of agonizing over new ways to say that.

We finally just ran the client input.

God, I hated advertising.

And still do, to this day.

Mitch

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 that was supposedly initianlly an engineering error, too much air mixed in made the soap look white and also made it float. so they sold the mistake.

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

@Mitch soap-endipitous.

Mitch

like .. uh.. what's that sticky stuff?

post its

Robusto

How very saponaceous of you.

Mitch

02:18

a vat of some glue experiment falls over, killing hundreds, only slightly sticking to things, not too much not too little, a failed dupont experiment... but rebranded becomes the best thing in office supplies since the paper clip.

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

I thought thousands perished.

Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing.

Robusto

The Dandy Warhols - Minnesoter

►

skill patrol

did you go see the world series trophy yet?

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

@skillpatrol I didn't know I could do that 0,0

skill patrol

it should be on display

Robusto

02:28

World series is old news. Wasn't that like, last month?

The Dandy Warhols - Hard On For Jesus

►

hahahaha

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

@Robusto week. Last week.

fox4kc.com/2015/11/04/…

I found a big one ^

Robusto

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 The World Series is dead to me.

This was supposed to be the Year of the Cubs. It was even foretold in Back to the Future III or something like that.

The only good thing was that the Mets got their asses handed to them by your Royals.

skull petrol

The first game of the series was incredible!

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

@skullpetrol that's the truth.

@Robusto pop culture has its claws in you.

Robusto

Must be the season of the witch.

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者