Just trying to bridge the gap
A translator that sails. FCIL, FITI, @CIOL_Linguists Council & membership cttee. RHBNC & Uni of Surrey alumna. Into Romansch, sax 'n' violins, amateur genealogy, books. Susceptible to rabbit holes. Posts are own views. Usually found up a Swiss alp.
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Just trying to bridge the gap
I just can’t do more than 60 mins at a time (I really only get to listen to pods in the car to Zurich). So do two-parters: I get 2x one hour and you get to put more in. Problem solved 😉🙂
Superglue rather effectively stopped him pissing around 🤣
I still remember how unpleasant chickenpox was when I was 7. Otoh I was carted to every mumps party going and never did catch it. A vaccine for chickenpox is very good news indeed
Well we know what the acronym BOAT stands for
Indeed
I’m glad to hear there’s precedent. As long as that option is on the table, fine
Aww bless
Does that outweigh performance in the job? They stayed on merit when the heriditary numbers were slashed. Would you rather have someone elected because they're popular but performs terribly?
If you're looking for an equitable solution, then simply reversing the criteria doesn't achieve that
It's a pragmatic thing. Never said they were disadvantaged; I said the HoL could lose much needed expertise. It's similar to companies changing goalposts and insisting on RTO. Is it really sensible to lose institutional knowledge, skills etc. just because a person lives too far away?
Hence my question: what is the goal? What is the HoL for? Decide that and appoint members accordingly. Their origin should be immaterial; their knowledge and expertise *for the purpose of the body* should be all that matters.
The HoL as a revising chamber needs knowledge & expertise. It doesn't need people who never attend but have seat through political patronage. I would also advocate for a full separation of parliament & honours, i.e. Lords should be appointed for expertise; gongs shouldn't automatically = seat in HoL
They didn't choose who to be born to. Any more than an "ordinary worker" chooses who to be born to. I have no problem with abolishing automatic seats for accidents of birth from now on. I do have a problem with expelling people with a long track record of hard work & commitment, & losing expertise.
They were elected by their peers to hold one of the 90(?) seats for hereditary peers... But far more importantly, what is the goal? Is it simply to get rid of people for something beyond their control? Or should it be to get rid of people who don't do anything? Baby... bathwater.
Thing is, some of the hereditary peers work v hard in their HoL roles. Kicking them out for an accident of birth is surely as bad as giving them an automatic seat for an accident of birth. Is the plan to give the hard workers life peerages? Lots of commitment & expertise lost otherwise
And then there's this hatchet job by Sky News yesterday, still up bsky.app/profile/ling...
I walked past that exact spot in March and assumed it was the foundations for yet another tower block. Never imagined it was an archaeological dig
Snap 👀 bsky.app/profile/ling...
What a shockingly dangerous article 👀 Justice is supposed to be blind and the UK judiciary is independent of politics, unlike the US. The insinuation of political bias shaping judges’ rulings seems designed to undermine public confidence in the legal system news.sky.com/story/politi...
Oh bother 😢 All the best for whatever’s next Still doing ALILI though, I trust?
Leaving? Or was it a fixed-term contract?
@nickwithheld.bsky.social
Security camera.
That is so accurate it’s hard to believe it’s a painting not a photo Spent years in that uniform as a kid
I saw Jools Holland at the 1989 Summer Ball; went to his Zurich gig a year or two ago and it brought back memories
Worst thing living in Founders was all the fire alarms. At least 1 a week if not 2. Haul self out of bed in PJs, wait near the main entrance for Egham fire brigade to arrive and give the all clear, trundle back to bed, lather-rinse-repeat
In all my years there, I don't remember ever making it out to Kingswood. Of course, Kingswegians were something of a tribe unto themselves, and IIRC their parties were legendary
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A useful reference thanks! Our first long road trip in ours will be Italy in Nov. Coverage good but pricing looks 50% higher than you paid @nickwithheld.bsky.social
No relation. There was a Piers Gledhill in the German dept who graduated in my 2 year
Yes, maths/history/social policy isn’t there yet in that pic, nor is psychology, otherwise much as I remember. I think the place is very different now and even the Arts building has gone I was in Founders in my 1st year and Cameron in 2nd
I was 88-92, just post-merger
Today can't decide whether it's hot and sunny or wet and stormy. So Captain Carrot is staying close to the house #Caturday
Do I know anyone here (or someone who knows someone) working as a client adviser/relationship manager in a bank, either now or in the fairly recent past? Reason I ask is I'm looking for 3-5 such people to interview in the next couple of weeks for a study paper. Grateful for any contacts! TIA
Computers must not be allowed to make management decisions because computers cannot be held accountable IBM 1973 (That may be a very slight paraphrase but not much. I guess it might also be apocryphal - I don’t know, but it seems apt anyway)
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@nickwithheld.bsky.social
One of my favourite accounts quoting one of my favourite musicals
One of your best ever 😂❤️
Thank you! Downloaded
Now we know where Captain Carrot actually came from @nickwithheld.bsky.social
Switch off (I try to have at least one day a week off grid) Dive into a different world (aka book) - this year seems to be a mix of sci-fi and golden-age detection
Seeing the UK from outside these days, the lack of investment (among other things) always feels so much like knowing the price of everything but the value of nothing
@nickwithheld.bsky.social
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I think it’s time to resume using the word “refugee”. “Asylum seeker” (although maybe technically accurate) has become far too politically charged as you explain
Congratulations and have fun! (But not too much fun 😉)
As a wise tutor pointed out, AI can’t do psychology. Selling is psychology. Usability/UX is psychology. Writing/language is psychology. Humanity is psychology.
Casablanca is amazing on the big screen
Or just refer to it as a W?
Didn’t you know dog can spell?! 😉 We take ours for a toddle - but then he usually tells us when we’re going so no need to spell it out
Plus ça change 😢
Ooo that I’m looking forward to!
Was he the guy behind Theresa May’s “citizens of nowhere” slight?
Damn you, you just took me down an hour-long linguistic rabbit hole! 🤣
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I’d like one that highlights “purposefully” (actually “purposely” too) & asks whether the writer simply means “deliberately” or “intentionally”.
Actually it’s driving licence 😉😝
They need the Jazz Police then @apiln.bsky.social open.spotify.com/track/3MmtFo...
For those that wish @nickwithheld.bsky.social
Why ditching languages & the humanities is a crisis in the making. When we lose them, we lose how to think. Read the full piece: medium.com/@abacustrans... #HumanitiesMatter #LanguageLearning #CriticalThinking #EducationCrisis #WhyLanguagesMatter #SayNoToDuolingo #Britain
Black Bear enjoying trampolining 🐻 by Daniel Schultz
Peak Pride & Pred was reached in 1995. There should have been a ban on ever trying again 😍
I swear by GPS trackers now (we use Tractive). It has quite literally saved Captain Carrot’s life twice now
Take heart - they're probably bots and/or run through ChatGPT. Me, I've got better things to do with my life than make windows into people's souls
There's certainly a law about not keeping social animals alone unless the individual's character makes it impossible. I don't specifically know of the rent-a-guinea-pig thing, but wouldn't rule it out
Congratulations Danny! Heck of an endorsement/review
With Tom Lehrer's passing, I suppose this is a moment to share the story of the prank he played on the National Security Agency, and how it went undiscovered for nearly 60 years.
In which case, enjoy this LinkedIn thread of some of the world's top linguists skewering the claims of a major agency about their AI/MT/LLM translation machine www.linkedin.com/feed/update/...
Thank you, I'd never seen that article before. There definitely seems to be a contrast in attitude between people who view migrants of all types as "on the make" and somehow aiming to take advantage of their hard work, and those who take a more compassionate view. There but for the grace of God...
Hmm. Since listening to Thursday’s @quietriotpod.bsky.social I’ve been reflecting on usage of the terms asylum seeker vs refugee. The former seems to imply “wanting sth from us”, the latter “fleeing from sth”. Sounds quite Tory vs progressive based on this research. Time to revert to “refugee”?
As someone who’s returned to p/t postgrad study at 55, my flabber is always gasted at why you wouldn’t want to learn for yourself when you’re spending so much money? And as a linguist, I can spot a machine translation a mile off. Work will find you out eventually anyway
I loved it as a teen, but I re-read it during Covid and was shocked at just how in-your-face didactic it was. I guess there's an element of the geography, environment and era shaping that, but to be honest it put me off.
I see grocery/takeout shaming discourse going around again, so this is your periodic historian reminder that cooking from scratch daily while working has never been sustainable, and for millennia everyone either relied on takeout & restaurants or ate in huge households w/ big dorm-like group dining.
Germany gave people €1,200/month no strings attached. They kept working, slept better, switched to better jobs, and even gave more to others. Turns out, when people aren’t drowning, they swim further. #UBI doesn’t kill ambition, it frees it.
SÉANCE FOR A CATTE: "Mr. Whiskeres, art thou heere?" [glasse ys knocked off of table]
14. If you are very 'online' and you haven't yet read Because Internet: Understanding the New Rules of Language by @gretchenmcc.bsky.social.... What are you doing? It helps you think through how internetspeak has evolved over time and, at least for me, made me deeply nostalgic for the old internet.
Same here
And @number10cat.bsky.social
Also can’t believe I forgot @niallharbison.bsky.social
@themerl.bsky.social
We can't say the C-word in this house either; the hound will jump up from deep sleep on his back - broken toe or no - at the word. He's also a C-word THIEF. Aren't you Shadow?? #galgos #dogsofbluesky
If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough. I'd say this lad understands it thoroughly.
@nickwithheld.bsky.social
It rarely is!
My grandmother was a great one for spoonerisms, to the extent they went into family vocabulary and I have trouble pronouncing the non-spoonerised version. Probably the deepest rooted is the two play wug
I think people also forget that it’s taken years and decades to get into the parlous state and that doesn’t get reversed in a few months. It’s understandable though to keep shouting when it doesn’t *feel* like any progress is being made yet you still have to endure (@jonnelledge.bs today)
Well, obviously Life on Mars ;)
Turning a mass noun into a countable… second only to “trainings”
I hate the hold messages saying "please find the information on our website". If I could find it on your wretched website, would I be calling you? Worst of all: internet is down, so call ISP. "Please check our website...". I can't - I'm calling because the bloody internet is down
If you always let perfect be the enemy of the good, then you’ll never get achieve anything
Now it just needs Civics to be a compulsory part of the national curriculum
It does the country’s rep good and makes people feel better about their homes. 🇨🇭 makes repairs/renovations tax deductible and it’s noticeable how the whole country/all the buildings (with v few exceptions) just feel looked after. That does a lot of psychological good to the population too
You would have to make renovations to an average (not luxury) standard tax deductible. Retains the incentive to do up, levels the playing field between buying & renovating, and it’s in the country’s interest to incentivise keeping the housing stock in good condition
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Who are you and what have you done with Beth “Starmer can’t do anything right” Rigby? “Immigration is a top-three issue in the country” - well only because the media keep telling people it’s a bad thing Signed: an immigrant/emigrant news.sky.com/story/migran...
Shame I need to run across the track and add the missing apostrophe.
Oh silly hound (broken toe) who’s now feeling rather mis and sorry for himself, and also slightly high on painkillers
