OT - NO POLITICS Off Topic 2020 part XXI - Punxsutawney Phil says EARLY SPRING!!!!! ( We are doomed )

[Terrier]

Do you have any links on the Super 8 that are not from the Globe, by chance? I'm trying to see results and can't navigate the Masslive website for the life of me.

masshshockey.com

 

[Deleted]

Last time I learned a language from scratch was in college when I was 21, so not quite an "adult", but not quite a kid - I had to take two years of "intensive" (ie 5 days a week for an hour) Spanish thanks to a distribution requirement and the fact that my parents forced me into Latin in 7th and 8th grade. My high school dumped Latin, and what did I pick? French? Spanish? German? Nope, Japanese. It was run by a broadcaster from Japan - nice guy, but always smelled like cigars. We basically learned "Japanese I" over and over again for 4 years, so I had zilch in terms of language going in to college. Since I was going to have to start Spanish from the beginning anyway, I delayed it to sophomore/junior year. My first semester was awful - naturally, native speakers and others who didn't feel "confident" in their language skills were in my class, while I was literally learning all the vowel sounds from scratch and having to watch a horrible cheezy PBS telenovela - and this was in the days when you'd have to GO to the language lab and watch it on VHS.

For yucks, I actually re-watched some of the telenovela - over 25 years later, they STILL run it on PBS! I even downloaded Duolingo to brush up on Spanish and see if I could learn French. Admittedly, I gave it up after a month or so.

If you're looking to review vocabulary, there's a flashcard program called anki. It's free for laptop/desktops, but I think it's like $25 for mobile. I actually use it to memorize name/jersey number combos for the Bruins. It's based on the concept of a Leitner box - the idea being that if you get a card right, you "promote" it to a box where the number of days until you review it next is a little bit longer. If you get it wrong, you review it tomorrow, and then when you see it again, if you get it right you promote it to a box that you see in 3 days, 6 days, 10 days, etc., each time increasing the spacing.

It's funny cause learning Irish is compulsory here throughout all Primary and secondary education, so every single Irish person who has gone through the Irish education system has spent 13 or 14 years learning the language yet very very few people here can actually speak it!

There is obviously something seriously wrong with how they are teaching the language and it just boggles the mind that they haven't investigated and corrected whatever it is. I spent three years learning French in secondary school and one year of German and I can speak as much if not more of those two languages than the one I spent 14 years learning.

It will be different for my daughter as rather than having Irish lessons in an English speaking school she will be going to an entirely Irish speaking school where everything is taught through the language. This approach has a much higher success rate which I suppose is self explanatory.

Anyway I'm going to give Duolingo a go and there is a Pimsleur audio book that has been recommended to me aswell.

I'm excited for my daughter to be bilingual as being so is supposed to make learning additional languages far easier down the road.

 

[TD Charlie]

I don't know if they put the RE2 remake on Switch, but if they did, it's phenomenal. They are redoing RE3 as well, and it comes out in March I believe.

i haven’t looked into it much, but i believe the available titles are 0, 1, revelations 2 (whatever that is, a DS port maybe?), 4, 5 and 6

ive only finished 1 through 3, and played Code Veronica for hours and hours before giving up and not having the time. I’ve never even played anything beyond 3

 

[Fenway]

It's funny cause learning Irish is compulsory here throughout all Primary and secondary education, so every single Irish person who has gone through the Irish education system has spent 13 or 14 years learning the language yet very very few people here can actually speak it!

There is obviously something seriously wrong with how they are teaching the language and it just boggles the mind that they haven't investigated and corrected whatever it is. I spent three years learning French in secondary school and one year of German and I can speak as much if not more of those two languages than the one I spent 14 years learning.

It will be different for my daughter as rather than having Irish lessons in an English speaking school she will be going to an entirely Irish speaking school where everything is taught through the language. This approach has a much higher success rate which I suppose is self explanatory.

Anyway I'm going to give Duolingo a go and there is a Pimsleur audio book that has been recommended to me aswell.

I'm excited for my daughter to be bilingual as being so is supposed to make learning additional languages far easier down the road.

In prep school, I took 4 years of Quebec French.

When I go to Montreal I just need to be in a Metro car or in a restaurant and it comes back. I can read a French newspaper but speak it?

In Paris last year I was glared at by an attendant in the Paris Metro who said

Sir please speak English - Quebec French is painful enough but added with a Boston accent is intolerable

 

[DKH]

Anyone ever purchase Talenti Gelato ?

WTF is it with the lids ? Is this a joke.

I will never buy another

 

[Glove Malfunction]

All this talk of video games...My kids got me an xBox for Christmas, as another way to stay in touch with them. I downloaded Call of Duty, and finally got the settings right so it wouldn't hibernate on me overnight. Played my first real multi-player game this past week, and boy am I terribad at it. They groupme'd that they were playing, and that they should all get blackout drunk to make it fair when I'm playing. I'll bet I kick their asses at Pitfall though!

 

[LSCII]

I only came here to do two things, man: kick some ass and drink some beer.

Yeah, well, listen. You ought to ditch the two geeks you're in the car with now and get in with us. But that's alright, we'll worry about that later. I will see you there. All right?

 

[nazartp]

All this talk of video games...My kids got me an xBox for Christmas, as another way to stay in touch with them. I downloaded Call of Duty, and finally got the settings right so it wouldn't hibernate on me overnight. Played my first real multi-player game this past week, and boy am I terribad at it. They groupme'd that they were playing, and that they should all get blackout drunk to make it fair when I'm playing. I'll bet I kick their asses at Pitfall though!

Call of Duty!? Man, get them hooked up on Gears of War. The last two installments are too cheerful for my liking, though.

 

[ODAAT]

Yeah, well, listen. You ought to ditch the two geeks you're in the car with now and get in with us. But that's alright, we'll worry about that later. I will see you there. All right?

still plays well to this day, great flick with some scenes that I still spit my coffee out when I watch it

 

[DarrenBanks56]

All this talk of video games...My kids got me an xBox for Christmas, as another way to stay in touch with them. I downloaded Call of Duty, and finally got the settings right so it wouldn't hibernate on me overnight. Played my first real multi-player game this past week, and boy am I terribad at it. They groupme'd that they were playing, and that they should all get blackout drunk to make it fair when I'm playing. I'll bet I kick their asses at Pitfall though!

my fav game of alltime was probably adventures of lolo on nes. i put so much time into that game. now i just found it on google play store for free. its call quest of lala. im addicted again.

 

[LSCII]

still plays well to this day, great flick with some scenes that I still spit my coffee out when I watch it

Yep. One of my top ten favorite movies of all time. Any time it's on tv, I watch at least a few scenes.

 

[Glove Malfunction]

We watched Good Will Hunting last night - Another one I'll stop what I'm doing and watch. Also saw Catch Me if you Can for the first time. Amazing that was a true story.

 

[TD Charlie]

All this talk of video games...My kids got me an xBox for Christmas, as another way to stay in touch with them. I downloaded Call of Duty, and finally got the settings right so it wouldn't hibernate on me overnight. Played my first real multi-player game this past week, and boy am I terribad at it. They groupme'd that they were playing, and that they should all get blackout drunk to make it fair when I'm playing. I'll bet I kick their asses at Pitfall though!

I was never any good at shooters. I can play them on adventure mode or campaign mode or whatever they call it now. But as soon as another human is introduced, especially with how crazy good kids are at these games now, forget it.

i think having a Switch was the right move for me. I’m not big on multiplayer

 

[Chief Nine]

In prep school, I took 4 years of Quebec French.

When I go to Montreal I just need to be in a Metro car or in a restaurant and it comes back. I can read a French newspaper but speak it?

In Paris last year I was glared at by an attendant in the Paris Metro who said

Sir please speak English - Quebec French is painful enough but added with a Boston accent is intolerable

That’s a hell of a thing to say

 

[Pay Carl]

All this talk of video games...My kids got me an xBox for Christmas, as another way to stay in touch with them. I downloaded Call of Duty, and finally got the settings right so it wouldn't hibernate on me overnight. Played my first real multi-player game this past week, and boy am I terribad at it. They groupme'd that they were playing, and that they should all get blackout drunk to make it fair when I'm playing. I'll bet I kick their asses at Pitfall though!

that game is too damn hard

Overwatch is a fun game and is pretty friendly towards newer players since not all of the characters require great aim

 

[Chief Nine]

This guy and the homemade rocket guy are leaders in the clubhouse for the Darwin Award

Apple engineer killed in Tesla SUV crash on Silicon Valley freeway was playing videogame: NTSB

 

[Fenway]

Our Canadian posters will be amused

 

[Aussie Bruin]

In prep school, I took 4 years of Quebec French.

When I go to Montreal I just need to be in a Metro car or in a restaurant and it comes back. I can read a French newspaper but speak it?

In Paris last year I was glared at by an attendant in the Paris Metro who said

Sir please speak English - Quebec French is painful enough but added with a Boston accent is intolerable

Did the attendant know you were from Boston? Because if not that's incredibly impressive that they could work that out despite not being American and having to pick it up through you speaking a different language.

Native French are notorious for thoroughly disliking the Quebecois accent and dialect and looking down on it as rustic, unpleasant and the product of backwards colonials. Australians cop the same sort of thing from our British cousins despite the fact that most of us don't actually speak with the broad Steve Irwin-esque accent that people most associate with our country.

It's interesting actually that when my wife and I go to America, most people can work out that we're not from their state, but not necessarily that we're from an entirely different country, because our accents aren't stereotypically Australian and could plausibly be American, just a different part not overly familiar to the person we're talking to. Given the size of the US and the diversity of accents within it, this is perfectly understandable!

 

[Kovi]

Note. If you ever need your resume looked over and improved....ask Glove Malfunction. Dude stayed up until 2am with me......
looking at a Communications job which would be a huge step up from where I'm at. Although I love 85% of my job right now.

 

[Deleted]

Did the attendant know you were from Boston? Because if not that's incredibly impressive that they could work that out despite not being American and having to pick it up through you speaking a different language.

Native French are notorious for thoroughly disliking the Quebecois accent and dialect and looking down on it as rustic, unpleasant and the product of backwards colonials. Australians cop the same sort of thing from our British cousins despite the fact that most of us don't actually speak with the broad Steve Irwin-esque accent that people most associate with our country.

It's interesting actually that when my wife and I go to America, most people can work out that we're not from their state, but not necessarily that we're from an entirely different country, because our accents aren't stereotypically Australian and could plausibly be American, just a different part not overly familiar to the person we're talking to. Given the size of the US and the diversity of accents within it, this is perfectly understandable!

It's funny how every country has the stereotype accent that non natives associate it with. I've heard more than my fair share of "diddly dee potatoes". For me when I think of an Ozzie accent I by default hear Alf Stewart from Home and Away saying "ya flamin gallah". Having lived in and travelled around Australia a little bit though I never really heard a huge difference in the Australian accent between say Sydney and Perth! Is that diversity there and I just didn't pick up on it or is there a fairly consistent accent across the whole country?

Given the size of the US and it's history of immigration it's understandable that there would be a huge range of accents there but I always find it amusing the sheer scale of the diversity of accents here at home in Ireland and also over in the UK given both are incredibly small countries compared to say the US. It isn't down to immigration as we were the ones supplying the immigrants back then so I often wonder where that diversity comes from.

 

[LSCII]

We watched Good Will Hunting last night - Another one I'll stop what I'm doing and watch. Also saw Catch Me if you Can for the first time. Amazing that was a true story.

It's not your fault, Trevor...

 

[LSCII]

This guy and the homemade rocket guy are leaders in the clubhouse for the Darwin Award

Apple engineer killed in Tesla SUV crash on Silicon Valley freeway was playing videogame: NTSB

Gotta love the hustle of that flat earther. Wanted so badly to prove the earth isn't round that he built a homemade rocket and then launched himself up. Real stunner that it ended with him blowing up. Who could have seen that coming? Well, aside from Stevie Wonder...

 

[ODAAT]

Our Canadian posters will be amused

not typically a Family Fued guy but Gerry Dee is hilarious and I have tuned in for a few episodes and found the banter and answers to be far less calculated

check this out

[Video] Manitoba Family Goes Viral After Wrong Answer On Family Feud Canada

 

[Chief Nine]

Gotta love the hustle of that flat earther. Wanted so badly to prove the earth isn't round that he built a homemade rocket and then launched himself up. Real stunner that it ended with him blowing up. Who could have seen that coming? Well, aside from Stevie Wonder...

It's amazing that someone who's supposedly "smart" enough to build a freaking rocket thinks the earth is flat and is stupid enough to climb into that 100% certified deathtrap

 

[ODAAT]

Note. If you ever need your resume looked over and improved....ask Glove Malfunction. Dude stayed up until 2am with me......
looking at a Communications job which would be a huge step up from where I'm at. Although I love 85% of my job right now.

nice, might you ask if I can forward my current resume via PM, having a bi*** of a time getting a sniff at a HR job in spite of working with "career counsellors" who literally put together my current resume