Archive | January, 2005

Well today was a very special Monday, more special than most..most people have a disdain for Monday’s, myself included but today topped it.

I woke up for work as normal..but I had a horrible Migraine so I decided to call in sick and take some rest at home..I slept until pretty late and dragged myself out of bed to go and get some food, I was still feeling pretty blur and sleepy and probably should’t have gone anywhere, but well I did.

I rolled out to get some food and drink and disaster struck as I was turning onto the LDP.

There is a junction where you turn out and cars are also coming fast from the right, bypassing a jammed junction (they shouldn’t but they do), you can fit 2 cars down this stretch though so as long as you make a tight turn it’s fine.

There was a puke green kancil in front of me that should have been pulling out, I was checking the right for lorries, turned back to go forward and realised (too late) the Kancil in front of me for no apparent reason decided not to go anywhere..bang, fuck, WTF my bonnet?!?

It was a 10km/h collision, no one was hurt thankfully (apart from my pride and my wallet) and all is ok. Typical for me, I’ve done a similar thing before (last time I blamed it on sun shining of a rainy road surface..)

But in all honestly I’d prefer to have this kind of minor accidents now and then rather than something serious, no one is hurt, no major damage to the car.

The bonnet is wrecked, the front wing too, but both side panels are ok and most importantly no damage to the engine, radiator is fine.

I mean I hit a freaking Kancil but from the damage you’d imagine I’d driven into the back of a tank..

I think it’s because I hit it at a weird angle and it was downhill, seems like the bonnet took most of the impact..

Oh well another day another dollar..

I did manage to finally buy a nice looking ergonomic and reasonbly priced office chair for my now clean office..just need to fix my damn PC!

I have some other stuff to blog about, but this takes precedence..

My beautiful car is no longer beautiful, but well after repairs I’m hoping it’ll be more beautiful than ever.I can also get the windscreen replaced as it has a crack in it the size of the nile.

There are a few other dents and scratches I can sort out at the same time too seen as though I’m claiming insurance..

It’s my first year of insurance here so I have no NCB to lose, I’ll just lose the 25% discount I would get after the first year with no claims.

That’s a hell of a lot less than paying for the damage to my car and the minor damage to the puke green Kancil. At least this country has no excess..

But what is this bullshit about having to pay to make a police report? That’s one of the stupidest things I’ve heard…what incetive do people have to settle things through the correct channels with such stupid beauraucractic legislations as this. PAY to do the RIGHT thing…that’s back to front no? You should PAY for doing the WRONG thing.

Hopefully it won’t take too long or I’ll be stranded and carless..Holiday season is coming soon too, will need to do some driving around to collect Ang Pows 🙂

That’s all for now folks..

ARGH FUCK MONDAYS FUCK THEM IN THEIR STUPID ASSES!

Following the recent debates in the Summons post[/url] (Woo 59 comments), I was thinking about language and semantics, there are always debates about what is a word or not, the correct usage and so on. This is due to the fact even language itself it’s partially subjective. There is room for adding your own personality to the way you write or speak.

But how can one person say it’s right or wrong, I am fond of a saying (as is KY), if the other person can understand your meaning, what you are trying to convey, then it’s correct. This is the purpose of language no? To convey information or feelings or something at least to another being.

Much like computer programming, computers also have languages so when you transfer these procedures between machines they are still understood by the interpreter (C++, Java, Delphi etc.). There are ‘proper’ ways to write code and not so proper ways, but if the program works and doesn’t crash it’s good no?

The same goes for the spoken word, we all speak differently, we all interpret things differently, this is what gives us character and personality and stops the world from being a place full of replication and let’s face it, it would be boring.

An example would be this (a pretty extreme example):

Information: https://www.mrc-cbu.cam.ac.uk/~matt.davis/Cmabrigde/[/url]

If you look at it, it’s a complete mess, but if you try and read it, it’s not actually that difficult.

Anyway back to the original point, sometimes I use words that totally don’t exist, I just made up on the spot, generally extensions of existing words…and people understand the, so surely that’s ok? It’s correct usage of language as it’s intended, to convey a message.

Language evolves, that’s what at does. With each language, there are many dialects, these are proofs of the evolution, there are colloquialisms, localised versions and many other weird and wonderful variations. For example even in the UK, get a Geordie talking to a Londoner and they will have trouble talking to each other, even though they both speak ‘English’.

One of the most famous recent example would the term Google, it has seemingly replaced the phrase ‘Search the Web’. Now the majority of people simply say ‘Google it’.

This is reinforced with such images:

And sites such as https://www.justfuckinggoogleit.com/ [/url]

As can be seen from the Oxford English Dictionary many new words are considered for addition to the dictionary, thus defining them in many peoples eyes as truly real words.

The list of recent editions can be found HERE at AskOxford.com.

Notable ones being..

blogosphere
n. (the blogosphere) informal personal websites and weblogs collectively.

bumsters
pl. n. trousers that are cut very low on the hips.

cybercrime
n. criminal activities carried out by means of computers or the Internet.

designer baby
n. a baby whose genetic make-up has been selected in order to eradicate a particular defect, or to ensure that a particular gene is present.

health tourism
n. the practice of travelling abroad in order to receive medical treatment.

metrosexual
n. informal a heterosexual urban man who enjoys shopping, fashion, and similar interests traditionally associated with women or homosexual men.

spyware
n. Computing software that enables a user to obtain covert information about someone’s computer activities by transmitting data covertly from their hard drive.

As you’ll notice most of these terms are already accepted in informal language usage, everyone understands their meanings, when this happens language has evolved and when they are inserted into the OED, this truly means they have become part of the English language. Most languages are Creoles anyway, meaning they are mixtures of other languages. A brief history of the English language can be found HERE.

There are also words I believe should not be uttered, for me they are mostly MBA graduate, pseudo-marketing bullshit words that don’t really mean anything like SYNERGY and CHANNEL..fuck off please.

Lake Superior State University[/url] has a nice list of banished words HERE.

Highlights for me are:

ENEMY COMBATANT — “Makes no sense. Do we have friendly combatants? Neutral combatants? Or how about enemy bystanders? If they are your enemy, just say so.” — Bill Sellers, Hampton, Va.

‘IZZLE’ — SPEAK — By far, the abomination that received the most nominations. Some sort of ‘Rap-Latin’ suffix, as in fa’shizzle, which means ‘for sure.’ “It was clever for about five minutes, or should I say five ‘minizzles?’” — R. Glover, Waterford, Mich.

ALL NEW — referring to television shows… “Of course it’s all new. Why can’t they just say ‘new’? There are no partially-new episodes, no repeat of last Tuesday’s episode with a slightly reworked Act 2.” — Greg Ellis, Bellevue, Wash.

You can submit your nominations for 2006 HERE.

There are also some notable example of devolution of language, such as the great George Dumbya Bush. His saying of dumb things has been so prolific they are acutally known as Bushisms.

There is a good collection here https://supak.com/bush.htm

Google for the term Miserable Failure and see where you end up..

Anyway back to the point, language is language, if you understand what I’m saying it’s all good. Pedants are everywhere.

What are your thoughts on this?