Monox D. I-Fly

On 11/23/2013 at 6:46 AM, thekernel said:

I see someone doesn't like "stats" used in place of "statistics". As someone who is heavily into fantasy sports it seems very strange. Nobody has time to type out the full word!

Weird. As someone who plays CCGs, whenever I heard someone says "stats" my mind immediately jumps to "status" instead of "statistics".

On 11/29/2013 at 11:38 PM, rodserd said:

typing quickly and relying on Word to make things red.

This is also my weakness. Sometimes my fellow language-learners would ask me "Do you use American spelling or British spelling?" and I answered, "I don't know. I just rely on Microsoft Word about my spelling choice. If it shows a red underline, I change to the other option". Pronunciation is also my other weakness.

As for my strength, even though I have bad memory but somehow I can memorize vocabularies rather easily. Also, since my main "weapon" is math, I can see grammar patterns as algebraic expressions, really saving my time of understanding things.

If you think English is hard, try Japanese. There are so much more homonyms than English (at least when they're written in Romaji). English felt easier since then.

On 12/10/2013 at 1:47 AM, Rosa said:

Well, I can't say for sure, but seeing the stare and general expression you just have to assume that the comment was rude. I would imagine if it was something good there would at least be a little smile.

Not always the case. Sometimes people make rude comments while constantly smiling, essentially thinking "you are a joke".

On 12/3/2013 at 11:16 AM, SpiralArchitect said:

 

I always thought that's how it usually was in most languages. I mean most Indian languages work that way as well including Hindi.

Indonesians too! And also Javanese! And also Arabic! Japanese is not, though... They still use "red... car".

On 10/5/2013 at 4:29 PM, Alfonso said:

Its got to be Uranus. People used to pronounce it as \  yu̇-ˈrā-nəs\ but I guess because of so many people were making fun of the name they changed it to \ˈyu̇r-ə-nəs\.

I thought Uranus isn't pronounced with "y". At first I thought that's how my native language read it until I knew that native English speaker pronounced it as "Yuranus". However, when I read Sailor Moon manga in Japanese, the name "Sailor Uranus" is written in Katakana as "Seeraa Uranusu" instead of "Seeraa Yuranusu". Then again, Japanese aren't that good in English either.

So when those 9Gags folks said that SWAG means "Secretly We Are Gay" they were just joking. My brother believed that.

On 12/10/2013 at 7:58 AM, PSLoveCharli said:

I was the kid in my family and group of friends that would rather stay inside to read a book than go outside to play.

Evan though I was also such kid, my OCD kept preventing me from reading fast due to not willing to just skim a line I couldn't comprehend.

On 12/6/2013 at 2:04 AM, thekernel said:

I think it varies a lot. In scripts, all you really need is to be descriptive of the scenery and have the dialogue be true to the characters. If one of the characters has bad grammar or a regional dialect, they wouldn't speak "perfect" English.

 

In terms of novels and the first-person perspective, the writing should reflect what the character's thoughts and words are, and not necessarily in perfect-English terms. However, I think the other writing perspectives ought to be as close to perfect as possible.

I remember the first time I am trying to read English literature in their native language and I chose Harry Potter. Almost gotten put off by the way Hagrid spoke.

On 11/12/2013 at 8:15 AM, MyDigitalpoint said:

I believe that some terms don't need overall recognition but it's enough that you and people around you know what your invented, mispelled-on-purpose or distorted words mean.

 

A friend of mine whose name starts with "Z" likes to change everything thiZ way, and all of us around her know what she meanZ by MiZiZiPi, MaZachuZetZ or any other thingie that she inventZ including her nickname "Gatey" rather than the Gate Keeper she is

I wonder how old she was at the time...

Is the length based on how many letters or how many syllables? Because if it's based on the latter, I am surprised no one here has mentioned "responsibility".

On 12/1/2013 at 7:56 AM, LauraM said:

If anything, I give them a pass as I realize they are probably feeling some anxiety or nervousness which can possibly be perceived as rudeness.

This. I have a bad habit of keeping my head down when I am walking due to anxiety and nervousness and I hate it when my neighbor (who also happens to be my coworker) judges me as feeling uncomfortable just because of said habit.

Haha... In a math forum I'm a member of, there is a joke board where one of the admins posts jokes everyday, and I could only comprehend about half of each post.

I remember when watching Power Rangers Dino Charge and Tyler (the Red Ranger) took a selfie underground near lava while dying and sent it to his teammates. After he came back safe, her girlfriend Shelby (the Pink Ranger) called him out "Did you just take a selfie there?". I checked the fandom not long after the episode ended and found some of them surprised, "Did I just hear the word 'selfie' on Power Rangers?".

On 11/24/2013 at 8:32 AM, sidney said:

I think that idioms aren't meant to be sarcastic, although I agree that a sentence can be well meaning or sarcastic depending on tone of your voice and how you say it. Like the other day, a friend of mine said "Good luck" to me in a sarcastic tone, because he thinks that I won't be able to do something right. So I guess the real essence or intent behind a sentence all boils down to the tone of the voice and how it was said.

My best way to deal with sarcasm is to act as oblivious as possible, pretending I don't know that it was meant as a sarcasm.

On 11/12/2013 at 6:58 AM, jcannon said:

I've been asked for the water closet a few times and that always confuses me. It sounds like it's right out of the 1700s!

Well, we Indonesians are stuck with "WC".

So, I see most people here said that both "but" and "and" can be used to start as sentence. But, all examples I got here are regarding "but". Can someone give me an example of the "and" one?

I do like English by default of it being the international language. Thus, if I know English I can get access to any knowledge resource far easier than if I use one of my target languages (Arabic and Japanese).

I read The Hunger Games and the book uses present tense. At first I thought it was just because the story was told from the first-person's point of view, but when I read Fifty Shades of Grey, which was also told from the first-person's point of view, it uses past tense. So, which one is proper?

I got called out by my coworkers about this because I did it out of habit. Not only about using English, but also using polite, formal version of our own native language. They want me to use my native language in the most casual form, but it's kinda hard to me since I use it at home everytime when I talk with my parents. Also, both my older and younger siblings took English department in college thus making me getting used to speak using it at home.

On 10/1/2013 at 1:54 PM, sayitwell said:

i have never heard anyone use the term buffalo to describe someone who is slow and lazy.  that is kind of a cool word to use instead of "bum", "slug" or "sloth".  the word that i personally use to describe someone who is slow is "sloth".  or i will say "he's as slow as molasses".

We Indonesians (at least Javanese) also use "buffalo" to refer to such kind of person. We don't use "sloth" because the animal is rarely seen in our country. Also, Indonesians don't even have distinctive word to distinguish between a "snail" and a "slug". When they see a slug, they will either mistake it for a leech or refer to it as "naked snail".

On 9/7/2013 at 3:08 AM, LauraM said:

"Our language is funny – a 'fat chance' and a 'slim chance' are the same thing."  -- J. Gustav White

They are? Damn, all along this time I thought 'a fat chance' refers to something like 98%.

For me, it's the overuse and misuse of the word "literally".

On 11/1/2013 at 10:35 PM, linguaholic said:

I am having problems with the pronunciation of words starting with "th". I hate to say words like "thread" or "throbbing"  :grin:

Including "the"?

On 10/12/2013 at 9:19 AM, LauraM said:

I know a boy named Tate

who dined with his girl at eight eight.

I'm unable to state what Tate ate at eight eight

or what Tate's tête à tête ate at eight eight.

What is "tête à tête"?