From Twitter 06-18-2010

• 05:42:21: @JoexEd the Chat? Is this #fb ?
  
• 05:45:39: @JoexEd OIC. Thank you. I'm not on it... :-(
  
• 05:45:49: @hungskateboy Night-night. Sleep well.
  
• 05:55:35: @JoexEd ...and they now keep you going in the face of...well...diminishing returns?
  
• 05:58:43: @JoexEd time to try other sources?
  
• 06:11:51: @JoexEd You mean a vow of chastity. Celibacy just means not getting married and assumes you're not doing extramarital sex. #PedantsCorner
  
• 06:17:49: @JoexEd i hope you find reason to abandon celibacy ASAP!
  
• 06:20:04: @JoexEd it's always darkest before the dawn #OldSawsStillApply
  
• 06:33:42: @JoexEd I got up at 0515 as the sun rises around 0450 @ the moment. We are @ the latitude of Labrador and get very long days @ the solstice
  
• 06:43:05: @JoexEd Well, time for bed for you then?
  
• 06:44:17: @JoexEd Good; I'm enjoying our conversation.
  
• 06:47:42: @JoexEd I wouldn't dare not to...
  
• 06:57:55: I think I'll go off and make a pot of coffee. Almost time to totally wake up...
  
• 07:22:39: A belated "Morning, all". Got up at 0515 because the sun was already up. Looking forward to going out for lunch and dinner today.
  
• 16:58:11: @jonk i hope the appt. will go well.
  
• 21:07:20: # FF @mariocruzxxx @OahuAJ
  
• 21:11:43: #FF @jonk @se1 @jjjap @BrianHeys @urbanbohemian @jtbritto @KingOfShaves @soveren @Shelbycub @JoexEd
  
• 21:12:05: @mariocruzxxx Thanks for the #ff xxx!
  
• 23:04:47: @soveren Oh, thank you for the #ff. We still have to meet in a real haunt sometime seeing as we're in the same country...
  
• 23:06:16: Of course I can't forget #FF for @superdupershark and also thank him for his!
  
• 23:07:06: @soveren Cue "Land of Hope and Glory" but I don't know any of the rest of the words :-( Will look them up.
  
• 23:20:49: Well, all, couldn't go out for lunch as the district nurse was late in arriving to give me my antibiotic. Had dinner at the Well, though!
  
• 23:21:20: So, then "Say Goodnight, Gracie." "Good night, Gracie."
  

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Happy birthday, cubziz…

…and many happy returns of the day!

Translation

We all know that online translators have their limitations. They are good for short declarative expressions; they are not so good for more philosophical or unclear expressions.

Bad Translation is a site that allows you to test this. I decided to put two limericks in. Here's what I got:

There once was a young man from Brent,
Whose cock was remarkably bent.
When he went to the trouble
He put it in double.
So instead of just coming, he went.

56 Translations Later: Young and burns show properly. Registering a company two years ago.

There once was a man from Madras,
Whose bollocks were made out of brass.
When they jangled together
They played stormy weather,
And lightning shot out of his ass.

56 Translations Later: Health of male teachers. Storm Rapidly from the hip

The entire translation process

Sometimes when debugging a program, it's instructive to see the internal processes by which input data is transformed into output. The Bad Translator site allows you to copy all the intermediate translations. Here is the limerick I most recently tried:

There was a young rector of Kings
Whose mind was on heavenly things,
But his heart was on fire
For a boy in the choir
Whose ass was like jelly on springs.

Some of the internal translations are interesting. The reference to the "young rector of Kings" turns into "Wang, a young pastor" because "Kings" is translated into the proper name "Wang" when the sentence is translated from English to traditional Chinese. The word "ass" is translated into Chinese and then back into English as "butt".

After a few translations into Croatian, Danish, and Dutch we get the English: Wang, a young pastor, life in heaven, but my heart is like spring burning butt jelly babies heart..

Once we get to German, we have "jelly babies" translated into "Gummi Bear", and somehow the game of Lacrosse got into it: Wang, a young priest, life is heaven, but my heart is like a feather, burns in the heart of the Gummi Bear Lacrosse.

After an excursion to Iceland, we have: Wang, a young priest to life in heaven, but my heart is like straw and burned to Feed RSS Bears Lacrosse.

Unfortunately, once we get to Japan the last few words are replaced by what seems to be a phonetic translation of "Bears Lacrosse" and which is not further translateable. And the final one is pretty much gibberish. But, it is all good fun.

The cut doesn't seem to work, so instead of giving you the entire thing, I'll just delete it as it would be tiresome to show it all. The last and final translation is: T space. King, the young monk who is the head of a horse, grass and fodder Beazurakurosu live.

Today's Homosexuality 101 Lesson

This is a craigslist posting; I would normally simply link to it but, in the general scheme of things, such postings tend to disappear. So, here it is (the original link, for as long as it lasts, is the title of the piece):

To the Straight Guy at the Party Last Night.

Date: 2010-06-17, 11:32PM EDT

A mutual friend of ours threw a big party for her 30th birthday, tons of people were there and it was a lot of fun. Somewhere along the line you and I ended up on the balcony for some fresh air at the same time. We started chatting; we talked about sports, books, tv—discovered we both are about to start our masters degrees and spent some time debating the pro’s and con’s of the educational system. We talked about hanging out sometime, and you wanted to meet my girlfriend.

I understand how upsetting it was for you when I blinked mildly in surprise and said I was here with my husband. I know it was a shock to your system, if your face had turned any paler I might have called 911. You made a good recovery though—that hurried mutter of “I’m not like that” was very polite and you only knocked over two drinks and one vase in your hurry to rush to anywhere other than near me. I can’t blame you—I forgot how delicate you straight boys are. So I wanted to give you a few helpful hints about where you went wrong last night.

1) As a general rule we don’t walk around with big signs around our neck proclaiming our sexuality. No scarlet letters, no scent of hellfire and brimstone…sorry about that.

2) We do not generally assume that everyone within 5 feet of us must also be homosexual—it was nice of you to immediately reassure me that you are hetero, but it was really unnecessary.

3) Homosexuality is not infectious. While I am sure you meant no disrespect with your hasty departure; in the future you can rest assured that taking a few extra seconds in your mad dash for safety will not result in you being turned gay. It will however keep you from destroying expensive vases and knocking over senior citizens.

4) This next one may come as a surprise; but you are not, in fact, irresistible. The fact that you have a dick does not instantly turn me into a bundle of uncontrolled lust. Contrary to popular opinion, being in the same room with a straight man does not cause a gay man to instantly lose all common sense and basic common courtesy. Though I am not so sure about the reverse.

5) Homosexuals in general get a little irked when people treat us like some sort of leper. Rushing to another mutual friend of ours and advising him of my sexuality, so he could be “forewarned” was really uncalled for.

6) Upon being told (by said mutual friend) to stop being an idiot and that you were not my type anyway… it generally confuses the issue when you then proceed to become upset that I DON’T find you attractive. Three seconds ago you were running through a crowd of people with your hands cupped protectively over your junk as if I might attack you at any moment with a blowjob. See hint number 4.

7) We homosexuals have an odd sense of humor—I can’t help that. Something about watching you freak out as if all the demons of hell were after you just struck me as vastly amusing.

8) While being pissed at me for dissolving into uncontrollable laughter might be understandable…gathering a couple guys together to “teach the fag a lesson” is not.

9) You might also want to drink a little less and be a little more careful about the guys you approach for your little proto-hate-mob.

10) Assuming the two tall muscle-bound bruisers must be uber-hetero and just as appalled by my presence as you was your first mistake. It was an understandable one though. How were you to know that pflag tshirt the first guy was wearing wasn’t a sports team? Also the rainbow ring the second guy was wearing could have meant anything I am sure.

11) In retrospect I suppose that upon hearing your not very subtle hate-talk and seeing who you were heading for; I could have said something instead of just laughing harder. I apologize for that. I should have just introduced you to my husband instead of letting you walk up to him and ask him if he wanted to help you teach “that fag over there” a lesson. I hope that broken nose heals up cleanly.