narcimund
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Everything posted by narcimund
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Using "(sic)" in this case would have helped get the point across to the humor-impaired among us, but is not proper usage in this case. "(sic)" is used to indicate a faithful quote of a poorly written original. In that usage it's generally included to make the original source look illiterate. It's like faithfully reproducing every "um" and aborted sentence when dictating a verbal interview. It makes your subject look bad and tends to piss them off. First Class Citizen Twice Over
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I attribute the entire growing apostrophe abuse problem to the one or two exceptions that confuse distracted minds. One exception is the counterintuitive collective situation of "its", "hers", and "his". Another is the ambiguous case of possessive and plural usage of abbreviations and letters. Unlike the obvious cases above (which is all I'm really trying to deal with), there is a split opinion about possessifying and pluralizing acronyms, abbreviations, and letters. You can say: o's Os or os and any of them could plausibly be used for plural. I would instead recognize that English doesn't handle this well and rewrite the sentence: "...a double 'o'". First Class Citizen Twice Over
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I notice you've made twice as many post as I have. First Class Citizen Twice Over
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Jeez... I'm flying to Dominican Republic in a month. That's going to involve three airlines and five trips through security! And of course the D.R. boogie is absolutely specific that everyone MUST have an aad. FedEx is looking more appealing. First Class Citizen Twice Over
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I've always liked parties with a wide variety of ages, backgrounds, personality types, and opinions. It's the people that make it, not heavy drinking or sexualized games or hijinks. Our christmas party spanned ages from 16 to 64, included photographers specializing in third world faces and architecture, the chair of the political science department at an ivy league college, a grade school teacher, a self-employed genius integrated chip designer and his M.D. wife, an unemployed unix guru wanna-be, a dozen other strange types, and of course two homo web designer entrepeneurs. First Class Citizen Twice Over
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But back to the main point: Apostrophes DO NOT PLURALIZE! Wrong: "Buy carrot's here." (The apostrophe does not make "carrot" into a plural.) Wrong: "Buy banana's here." (The apostrophe does not make "banana" into a plural even though the word ends in a vowel!) Double wrong: "Whats so differen't?" (Apostrophes are not necessary EVERY time a word ends in "-nt". By the way, this lovely example is a quote from a prolific DZ.comer. Sorry; I'm really not trying to pick on anyone in particular.) Four ridiculous attachments enclosed: First Class Citizen Twice Over
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I hate Barnes & Nobel. The same books used at Powell's (the largest bookstore in the world by some accounts) would be 1/2 that price because Powell's has more used books than new. They stock the used and new together. Powell's is also more concerned with high quality selection representative of the whole history of writing, rather than B&N's costco-like focus on quick sellers from budget publishers in snazzy jackets. By the way, Powell's is in Portland and covers an entire city block, three stories high in some sections, plus 7 or 8 satellite stores with specialties (high tech, cooking, and travel). The free full-color map located at stations throughout the store unfolds the same way a city map does and is just as necessary. Literate tourists come to Portland just to spend several days in Powell's and take home steamer trunks worth of reading. powells.com is a worthwhile substitute if you can't make it to Portland. First Class Citizen Twice Over
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SpeedRacer is correct. 1) "both of the stripper's boobies" indicates one stripper and her two boobies. 2) "both of the strippers' boobies" indicates two strippers and an unspecified (but plural) number of boobies. #3 is a bit of a mind bender: 3) "each of the stripper's boobies" indicates one stripper and an unspecified number of boobies. In usage, "each" implies but does not denote a number greater than two. So #3 suggests the image to the mind, though does not strictly claim that the one stripper was endowed with more boobies than we would expect. First Class Citizen Twice Over
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Prepositions are not words to end sentences with, asshole! First Class Citizen Twice Over
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When you demand free airline tickets and the value of your vacation in cash plus a big apology, be sure to point out: Delta's online carry-on policy about parachutes First Class Citizen Twice Over
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Read through the forums. You'll see a random mix of success and failure stories. This isn't a "Delta" problem. It's a lousy system problem. First Class Citizen Twice Over
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Enjoy it. Plato writes charming dialogues with an astounding wealth of intellect. It's a familiar chant of the Christian religious zealots that there are only two moral systems on earth: theirs which is systematic, justified and true vs. atheistic random desires for immediate and personal selfish pleasure. In diminishing an entire arm of the brightest and most established human thought to mere animal impulse, they're simply belittling their opposition with ignorant lies. Imagine that. First Class Citizen Twice Over
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One base jumper defends that his rainbow canopy reduces bust factor. "The pretty colors make everyone happy!" And happy cops don't take you away for trespassing. First Class Citizen Twice Over
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It'll be fun to hear from TomAiello and d-dog who are both there jumping. First Class Citizen Twice Over
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An Arrow's Flight by Mark Merlis, 1998. An astoundingly literate revisiting of the world of Homer's Iliad, set in modern gay culture, telling the story of Pyrrhus, son of Achilleus. Pyrrhus is a flighty but astoundingly beautiful child born of a goddess who grows up to be gay and a stripper in the big city while his estranged father fights Troy. After Achilleus' death, Pyrrhus is drafted to fulfill prophesy, but prophesy is often cryptic. Firmly set in the homosexual subculture, but universal in its human portrayals, metaphors for modern war, disease, and sexuality, and a huge fun read for people aware of ancient greek culture. First Class Citizen Twice Over
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No no no! That's adding apples to oranges. Your airplane exit speed is purely horizontal. The 80mph you start with is wholly irrelevant to your vertical final velocity. The two vectors are orthogonal (90 degrees from each other) therefore entirely independent. The "falling" sensation is an effect of acceleration, not speed. And you accelerate at 32 ft^2 downward* whether you have horizontal speed of 0 or 80 or 800. * Initially, of course. First Class Citizen Twice Over
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Most certainly. I refer you to 2000 years of ethical philosophy for many attempts at systematic, universal, and necessary ways to explain morally rightness and wrongness. I would start with Socrates/Plato. Then work your way up to Kant, Mill, Hume, Descartes. Then go back and read Plato again. Actually, just read Plato and skip the rest. That's enough to answer your question. First Class Citizen Twice Over
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Ivan, we who intend to live forever admire you and those like you for making more room for us to live our dreams. First Class Citizen Twice Over
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I agree they're related, though people will vary in their ability to distinguish between them. Of course you're right. It's used occasionally that way, but not often. That's a cynical view Also, your inclusion of "not suitable" is a valuable contribution. I'd like to add that as #5. First Class Citizen Twice Over
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There have been a lot of threads lately where people carelessly throw around the word "wrong". I figured if people are going to use explosive words they should think carefully about what they're doing with them. First Class Citizen Twice Over
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How strange. Wasn't someone complaining in another thread that the human population is about to collapse because so many straight people are turning gay? First Class Citizen Twice Over
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I can think of four meanings of the word "wrong". Does everyone know the difference? 1) factually incorrect "He was wrong when he said two plus two equals five." 2) morally reprehensible "You should not lie. That's wrong." 3) legally impermissable "You must not murder. That's wrong." 4) emotionally disquieting "What gay people (or straight people or polygamists or sadomasochists) do in the bedroom is wrong. It makes me sick." First Class Citizen Twice Over
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Fine. Then fight to prevent using people for research or spare parts. Outlawing cloning because it could be misused is like outlawing bread because criminals eat bread. First Class Citizen Twice Over
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It doesn't sound science fiction to me at all. What it sounds like is completely overblown, emotional knee-jerk reactionism. I am STILL completely unconcerned about it and consider the entire thing to be a media-driven distraction from the real problems we're not supposed to be watching for. First Class Citizen Twice Over
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So let me get this straight... In a world with cloning, people with impaired memories might become confused. While that's somewhat unfortunate, in a stubbed-toe kind of way, it's hardly an ethical nightmare. I repeat, I am completely, 100% incapable of understanding why anyone cares about cloning. Or why 30 years ago test-tube babies elicited the same response and 12 months later absolutely nobody gave a shit. People are fickle to their lifelong, universal, world shattering convictions. First Class Citizen Twice Over