zompist bboard

I don't see any reason to stop before it's full. http://i.imgur.com/YaCjode.png The Republic of Federated Lands - ROFL for short - is a rather dull Northcentrican country. It consists of numerous small, fiercely independent lands - called "cantons", each lead by a king - who have federated together ...

All of you who claim to have two schwas, a high one closer to the PIT vowel and a low one more closer to the STRUT vowel, i.e. the Rosa's-roses distinction - should take a read of this language log post . While the post is aimed at a slightly different central point, most of the material is directly...

A beautiful orthography is one that strikes a balance between the following three points: a) One-to-one letter/sound correspondence b) Avoidance of too many uncommon letters c) Systematicity With all respect to you, that is, to me, a rather robotic standard of beauty. Spelling/orthography is more t...

One tip: Earth's continental coastlines are only a mediocre fit to each other if you move them back to where they came from; South America only vaguely matches up to Africa, for example. But if, instead, you look at the edges of the continental shelves, the fit gets way better. The lesson to be lear...

There's also the pre-stopping found in Icelandic, which what gave us [tl] medially and [tɬ] finally for <ll> in Eyjafjällajökull, which I hope I have spelled correctly.

Chairman for Life Sukmidik, speaking drunkenly from his palace in the FFFF capital Yuleminao, has proclaimed a day of public rejoicing and revelry, in celebration of anticipated profit from the ongoing war.

To the best of my understanding, the claim about the Pirahã is not that they are unable to learn to count in principle, but that they find it hard to maintain interest in the topic long enough to get very far with it, in much the same way that most people even in developed, educated countries find i...

http://i.imgur.com/k222pru.png In the center of the central continent lies the small nation of Hutaz. It is populated by owls. It is ruled by owls. Its main export is, similarly, owls. Its unit of currency is the field mouse, and its form of government is constitutional hootocracy, in which the owl...

"loads of" is not innovative. what are you talking about? I'm talking about number agreement . Specifically, which of these sets does it belong to? Set 1: Bottles of water are/*is in the fridge. Boxes of junk are/*is stacked up in the corner. Set 2: Lots of water *are/is in the fridge. Tons of junk...

5. The little red exclamation icon on the bottom of your post is for reporting people who break the rules. It is NOT a way for you to announce your post or make it look more exciting. Only moderators will even see the fact you clicked it.

You didn't miss it, it wasn't even here - not until it got necroed. It probably would have been best to leave it to rot in the depths of long-forgotten pages of the forum...

There's an island south of Mykonos that's differently colored than it had been. Accident?

http://i.imgur.com/mhwNeae.png The central Eastern Continent is suffering from Acute Pancreatitis, a relatively rare condition consisting of inflammation of the pancreas, which is located between Boingia and the People's Republic of People. The prognosis is grim, and the nation's once-lively busine...

Well, yes, agreeing with the last noun instead of the head is a known thing. But if you have that consistently, it only makes the usage distinction I brought up irrelevant to your variety of English - so you have nothing you can really say about it, thus your post does not represent a data point wit...

From: http://news.discovery.com/earth/videos/earth-mt-rainier-faces-grim-future.htm I have found an example of singularized "loads of". Specifically, "loads of sediment was dumped downstream". Various head nouns with following "of" have been reanalyzed as quantifiers, giving us singular "lots of", "...

http://i.imgur.com/hWYjvTD.png Occupying an elongated plateau in the center of the Northern Continent, Ding Dong is a lightly populated nation of mountain-dwelling, goat-herding, and dairy-eating people. The chief exports are balls, liquid courage, and milk. Quite often, its armies gather and invad...

Whoops, better redraw Mysidia.

ubunguital.png Italy is a nation situated on a peninsula in the Eastern Sea. Italy's capital and largest city, Rome, has for centuries been one of the leading political and religious centres of Western civilisation, first as the capital of the Roman Empire and later as the site of the Holy See. Aft...

ubunguffff.png Federation of Fakisaki Faidala Foyujiai The FFFF is a populous but poor nation between Kluk and Jaawi Ruusih. Most of the banana republic's income, which is almost entirely kept by a handful of extremely rich men called the Madafakas, who tend to spend it on expensive foreign booze. ...

Don't worry, Brandrinn is talking out of his ass. He grew up in the US, so he can hardly help but be well aware that virtually all houses have a dining room or at minimum a dining area partially sectioned off from the kitchen.

ubunguhyjj.png The Glorious People's United Teenage Mutant Ninja Republic of Ougistaki, No U, and Underwhelma, also known as Hÿÿjattataouiakptat for short, is the best country of all! The current king of No U and emperor of the Holy Hÿÿj is called Momuyumb, and boy does this theocrat know how to pa...

Sounds like the one that got me yesterday. 32 bites on my side and belly, 10 more on my arm.

Give it up, Rusanov. The discussion's been won long since. You're the only one left who can't see how full of shit you are.

Glottal stops* only occur in utterance initial position when speaking English, and that's because they result from us opening our mouths to say shit. Where do you get that idea, out of interest? I've seen it floating around before, and I can only surmise it to be based on a misconception that a glo...

So long as we keep it straight that the answer is very different for phones than it is for phonemes, and that the above "pronounced at the same time" answer is suitable only for discussing phones, then it's an okay answer. But the articulatory reality is a mess. Across languages, you find all of the...