Chit-Chat

[vreihen]

US-spec German cars are also made in the UK.

Oh, and before somebody says that the new Mini Cooper should be considered a British car, I want to point out that there are no puddles under them and that alone makes them German cars.....

 

[Uwe]

...and both involve a female wooly mammal.

Actually, no, only one of them does.

-Uwe-

 

[jyoung8607]

I'd play it safe. If I had to call, I would address you as Mr. Ross.

Now why didn't I think of that? Simple, elegant and respectful... avoids the shibboleth and stays out of the personal-pronoun minefield.

I think I managed to blurt out the suggested Americanized version last time, but I may fall back to this if we speak again.

Jason

 

[Uwe]

Honestly, unless you're still a minor, "Mr. Ross" doesn't appeal to me much.

-Uwe-

 

[jyoung8607]

Honestly, unless you're still a minor, "Mr. Ross" doesn't appeal to me much.

Okay, now you're just messing with me.

Nah, there's only one mispronunciation that actually annoys me, and there's only one misspelling that gets under my skin.

Uh -- no. I don't think so.

Actually, no, only one of them does.

You know, after a certain number of cryptic evasions, we are legally allowed to call you Rumpelstiltskin.

Jason

 

[Uwe]

 

[Flaps10]

Touaregs are built in Slovakia.

-Uwe-

You're shitting me. First I do surgery to replace the valve body and find the transmission is an Aisin, now this. Next you're going to tell me there is no Santa Claus or that my Boxster was built in Finland.

And will someone PM me the proper way to pronounce Uwe's name? I was going sheep all the way.

Edit: NM! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KLaZNpS6_Ek

I've even taken some German. I should have been able to figure that one out. The one thing I love about the language is that if you can read it you can pronounce it, and if you can pronounce it you can spell it. Nouns however, crack me up. muddle together some descriptions. Airplane = fly thing for example

 

[Uwe]

Edit: NM! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KLaZNpS6_Ek

Yeah, that's pretty good, except that most native English speakers can listen to that a hundred times and still don't get it right, at least not consistently.

I've even taken some German. I should have been able to figure that one out. The one thing I love about the language is that if you can read it you can pronounce it

Right -- but only if you learned it as a kid.

 

[DV52]

The one thing I love about the language (German) is that if you can read it you can pronounce it, and if you can pronounce it you can spell it.

I agree that phonetic languages are much more elegant, and a lot easier to use (lots of them in Europe). One of the sublime ironies in the English language is that even the word "phonetic", isn't.

 

[Uwe]

Please don't remind me of the trauma I suffered trying to lean to spell in English (not to mention the insane system of weights and measures) when I was transplanted here in the middle of second grade.

-Uwe-

 

[jakematic]

Yeah, that's pretty good

Damn it... I was right !
Neither one of you batted an eye so I let it go

 

[DV52]

Uwe: as a young child of about 6 or 7, your brain would have been "plastic" enough to make learning English comparatively easy. The real problem would have been with your folks!

As for the system of measurements in the USA, I'm not the first to make this observation, but as a casual observer from across the pond, it seems that the American war of independence wasn't a completely decisive victory! We were also a colony of England and we still retain our Head-of-State as an appointment of the Crown, but we made the move to the metric system years ago. I'm at a loss to understand what insanity makes you guys retain your archaic and arcane set of measurements (sorry for being blunt)

 

[Uwe]

Uwe: as a young child of about 6 or 7, your brain would have been "plastic" enough to make learning English comparatively easy.

Correct, it only took a few months to be able to get by and no American I've run into since about a year after being transplanted here has a clue that I didn't speak a word of English until I was 7-1/2 years old. People who are students of American accents typically think I'm from Philly, which is essentially correct if you ignore the "I'm actually from Germany" part.

I'm at a loss to understand what insanity makes you guys retain your archaic and arcane set of measurements (sorry for being blunt)

I agree completely!

 

[romad]

Uwe: as a young child of about 6 or 7, your brain would have been "plastic" enough to make learning English comparatively easy. The real problem would have been with your folks!

As for the system of measurements in the USA, I'm not the first to make this observation, but as a casual observer from across the pond, it seems that the American war of independence wasn't a completely decisive victory! We were also a colony of England and we still retain our Head-of-State as an appointment of the Crown, but we made the move to the metric system years ago. I'm at a loss to understand what insanity makes you guys retain your archaic and arcane set of measurements (sorry for being blunt)

Actually, the U.S. government legally defined the "English" measurements in terms of the S.I. years ago. We had a chance to start using liters when the first oil crisis hit and the gas pumps could not read higher that 99.9 cents per gallon. Meanwhile wine and liquor bottles are 750 mL instead of being "fifths" as before; it is on the highways where the distance measurements are really dug in, i.e. mph, miles, feet.

 

[DV52]

Actually, the U.S. government legally defined the "English" measurements in terms of the S.I. years ago. We had a chance to start using liters when the first oil crisis hit and the gas pumps could not read higher that 99.9 cents per gallon. Meanwhile wine and liquor bottles are 750 mL instead of being "fifths" as before; it is on the highways where the distance measurements are really dug in, i.e. mph, miles, feet.

Romad: thanks for the response. Now there's an interesting value-set - Ok to change the measurement of liquor, but not petrol! Surely you guys don't still use petrol pumps that only price to less than one dollar per gallon. If that's the case, then I'm laying a pipe from up there to down here! We are currently paying something like $ 1.50/Lt.

 

[romad]

No, those were the old style mechanical registering pumps of 30-40 years ago. Today they are all digital so I don't think even a $99.999/gallon price would be a problem. BTW, diesel is down to US$3.799/gallon or US$1.004/liter ($1.145 Australian) here in California (and we are one of the highest states).

 

[vreihen]

I'm at a loss to understand what insanity makes you guys retain your archaic and arcane set of measurements (sorry for being blunt)

The answer is that we won the war, so there!

Seriously though, I'm going to use the same logic against England. Why on Earth do you insist on driving on the incorrect side of the road, and in cars that cost significantly more to make for your market because the steering apparatus is on the wrong side? My theory is that my answer above probably applies to this as well. I've been told that German troops forced the countries that they occupied to drive on the proper side of the road, and that the UK and it's possessions were never occupied hence they didn't convert. Don't know if it's true or not, but national pride does explain why you voluntarily pay more for cars.

As for the metric system, drugs and guns will ultimately force the USA into going metric. Seriously though, I was trying to find a metric tape measure a few months ago, and could not put my hands on one at an retailer locally.....

 

[romad]

As for the metric system, drugs and guns will ultimately force the USA into going metric. Seriously though, I was trying to find a metric tape measure a few months ago, and could not put my hands on one at an retailer locally.....

http://tinyurl.com/n78tgng Amazon

http://tinyurl.com/ny4s9n2 Home Depot

http://tinyurl.com/comqjqs Lowes

http://tinyurl.com/oeusmco Sears

http://tinyurl.com/q6c43 Stanley (Stanley®, FATMAX®, PowerLock®, LeverLock® lines)

I found all of these just by googling "metric tape measure" though the Amazon & Stanley are online but with the internet that should not be a problem. For a quick solution, measure with an English tape, convert the fractional inch readings to decimal then just multiply the result by 25.4 if you want mm or 2.54 if you want cm. So a 17 7/16" would be 17.4375 x 2.54 = 44.29125 cm rounded to 44.3 cm (443 mm)

 

[jakematic]

So a 17 7/16" would be 17.4375 x 2.54 = 44.29125 cm rounded to 44.3 cm (443 mm)

This is what makes my brain hurt - fractions are such a 1600's concept

Metric is actually based on something too, instead of ... oh ... crazy random things.
Sadly I tried to explain this to a friend and she "can't visualize how big a kilo of water is" <facepalm>

 

[romad]

It is 1 liter or .946 quarts!

The meter was originally 1/10,000,000 of a longitude line from the Equator to the North Pole; later it was based on a wavelength of Krypton-86. Today it is based on the speed of light in a vacuum.

Originally all other measurements were defined in terms of the meter, so 1,000 ("kilo") cubic centimeters defined a container 10cm x 10cm x 10cm (slightly under 4" x 4" x4").

BTW, aren't you glad the U.S. defined the inch as 2.54cm, replacing the ENGLISH definition of "3 barley corns"?