Profile for Custer
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Displayed name | Custer |
| Member number | 3151 |
| Title | Bob's Big Date |
| Postcount | 2367 |
| Homepage | http://desperance.net |
| Registered | Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
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| Beta Call for Mad Ambition in Blades of Avernum | |
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Bob's Big Date
Member # 3151
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written Monday, May 23 2005 00:34
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Call it funny, just to be safe. -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| Woah Crazy!! in General | |
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Bob's Big Date
Member # 3151
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written Monday, May 23 2005 00:21
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quote:Remember: she also said intelligent, well-spoken, and kind. -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| Capitalism ho! in General | |
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Bob's Big Date
Member # 3151
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written Sunday, May 22 2005 21:08
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What use does an investment bank have for an island? -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| Coffe or Tea? in General | |
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Bob's Big Date
Member # 3151
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written Sunday, May 22 2005 17:55
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quote:Are you nuts? The French use a double negative as a matter of policy - je ne X pas is the grammatically correct way of negating, as opposed to the common but incorrect je X pas. Still, I do not get what "Je le n'est l'ecole pas" would even mean if you were to be charitable and respell it - "I it am not the school". I mean, you could drop the le (what the hell is it there for?) and properize the negation and conjugation - "Je ne suis pas l'ecole" - but that doesn't say anything that isn't already obvious. Speaking French dead is a heinous crime! ALSO: On the subject of remembering random genders, there's usually some kind of perverse rhyme or reason to gendering. If it's not based on spelling somehow (see French - words ending in -e and not -re are feminine, except for a few exceptions, and with a few extra), it's based on some deep-buried level on activity. Feminine nouns tend to become objects, masculine nouns tend to become subjects. (Masc. nouns do things to fem. nouns, basically.) ALSO 2: Accents are something you get very used to when you speak the language. One makes the sound long, one makes the sound short. [ Sunday, May 22, 2005 17:59: Message edited by: Custer XVI ] -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith in General | |
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Bob's Big Date
Member # 3151
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written Sunday, May 22 2005 17:47
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Cheesy but not unbelievable? Please. The acting quality is exceptional, but when given lines like "From my point of view, the Jedi are evil!"... well. Here's what I find unbelievable: the struggle of loyalties Anakin goes through when he realizes Palpatine is a sith lord. (Was making Palpatine a sith lord truly necessary? I have to wonder - it just seems far-fetched.) If he was willing to tell the council that Palpatine was a sith lord, he's bright enough to know that the result is going to be the ineluctable destruction of either the Council or Palpatine's government, and that Palpatine's government is in the wrong. I don't understand how he would go from telling Mace Windu Palpatine was pure evil to struggling to decide who to help when he found Windu and Palpatine in pitched battle. Yes, there's the 'justice' element, but that came off as an excuse; being a Sith lord is apparently a crime suitable of death in the Republic, and he both confessed to it to Anakin and pretty much completely revealed it with the force-lightning stuff. Yes, there's the Padme element, but he has to know she's on the jedi council's side - and that by taking Palpatine's side, he will lose her anyway. I just don't get it. If he were conflicted yet leaning towards the dark side, he wouldn't have told Mace Windu in the first place; if he were conflicted yet leaning towards the Jedi, he would have interceded in Windu's favor. My big problem with that part of the movie (I've got other big problems with other parts, but they should be relatively obvious) is that the way the capstone of the conflict is set up doesn't make a whole damn lot of sense. Granted, the post-resolution stuff was powerful enough (the re-naming, the temple scene, etc.), but I didn't like or really even get how Lucas got there. -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith in General | |
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Bob's Big Date
Member # 3151
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written Sunday, May 22 2005 15:44
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Okay, so I saw Episode III. George Lucas, as usual, is a terrible dialogue writer. He lays the absolutist good v. evil thing on with a trowel. I would have considered the movie awesome if it had done one of two things: a) Ended with the rebirth of Vader instead of the rebirth of Luke - you know, just cut to the credits as soon as you first hear the respirator. That would have been awesome in the extreme; I have a bone with Lucas ending with Luke, because the prequel trilogy is about Anakin. It would be as silly as ending Episode VI as soon as Darth Vader bit it. b) Just gone the balls-out route and eschewed the rest of the trilogy altogether; have Anakin strike Palpatine's withered ass dead and the Republic collapse into (real) civil war. If Lucas had, after 30 years, ended Star Wars without the staunch fatalism - it would have basically been the most supreme steel-balls badassery in the history of Amerian cinema. Which is, of course, why it didn't happen. I don't know. I just felt like he was taunting us with the line "I sense Count Dooku", because at that point pretty much everyone in the audience must have. -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| Undead Valley in Blades of Avernum | |
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Bob's Big Date
Member # 3151
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written Sunday, May 22 2005 12:15
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Just so you know: Imban says you do not include a change-log. You should; it's impolite to make players run through the entire scenario looking for changes. -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| Woah Crazy!! in General | |
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Bob's Big Date
Member # 3151
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written Friday, May 20 2005 01:32
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The thought of Spring flirting makes me laugh, and I can't stop. -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| Are people inherently amoral? in General | |
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Bob's Big Date
Member # 3151
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written Thursday, May 19 2005 21:45
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Human beings on the whole are not inherently moral; as has been said, they are born without a conscience and don't develop one for years. However, the capacity to develop a morality defeats the assertion humans are inherently amoral, also. I know some people, for whatever reason, never develop an assertive superego; sociopaths etc. But that's a physical-chemical dysfunction. Just because people can be born without functioning vocal cords doesn't mean they're inherently mute, either. I'd say inherent morality boils down to the realization that one is not divorced from the rest of the human experience. I doubt if any successful society has been individualist to the point of most people honestly doubting if their neighbors are equally human. In short: humans are neither inherently moral nor inherently amoral; there exists a universal root of morality, which defeats the amoral argument, but there exists no universal morality, on the flip side. Then again, I tend to view claims that people are inherently anything as specious. Unless there's a disorder of some kind involved, people DO have agency in their inner workings and CAN change. I don't feel as if there are subconscious bounds that the conscious cannot overstep given enough effort. -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| Drakefyre, Mariann, Jeff, Linda.. you're all dead. in General | |
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Bob's Big Date
Member # 3151
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written Thursday, May 19 2005 21:39
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The cake is actually German chocolate, which, confusingly, seldom has much to do with either Germans (as the genuine articles say, they've never lain eyes upon such a thing) nor chocolate (it's mostly caramel, coconut, and pralines). Still my favorite flavor. -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| strange question in General | |
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Bob's Big Date
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written Thursday, May 19 2005 11:55
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Two very nice posts, both wrong. Communism is the merger of economic and political theory proposed by Marx: namely, that the oppressed classes will rise up and overthrow the oppressing classes, beginning with despotism and ending with world utopia. This is the concept of the dialectic: that class conflict drives history, and class revolution is a historical inevitability. The utopia of Marxist communism is a society in which no property exists; there is no state, because it is unnecessary; each produces as he is able and consumes as he needs; and all men are treated as equal. Now, that is the theory behind communism. The reason communism is associated with totalitarianism (Stalin, Mao, etc.) is the concept of vanguard theory, which advocates a 'temporary' dictatorship by an elite intellectual class in the name of the revolution - thus speeding up the historical inevitability of revolution and global utopia. The implications of vanguard theory are pretty steep; but since it's proven the only effective way to get a communist government into power, that means the majority of communist states have been run by authoritarian ideologues. That's the theory and historical fact of communism. Socialism, on the other hand, is a system of economic mixed government which advocates society controlling industry for the common benefit. Socialism can be authoritarian - e.g. Mussolini's incorporation of industry into the Italian state - or democratic - e.g. the modern governments of Europe, especially Scandinavia. However, the basic idea behind socialism is not to promote a distant utopia, but rather strive towards the greatest economic justice in current terms. The idea of "we're building up a good society" lends itself less well to tyrannical abuse than the idea of "we're serving a great future utopia", so socialism has generally been viewed more positively and expresed more democratically. Differences to note: most first-world countries have a major Socialist party (the U.S. and Japan being prominent exceptions), but Communist parties in democratic countries are, by and large, artifacts of history. Socialism has a greater degree of flexibility than communism; it has no ideological conflict with harmless free industry. 'Socialism' is far vaguer; by the loosest definition, e.g. mixed state and private control of the economy, most first-world governments are socialist. By more strict definitions - high tax rates, high degrees of state industry - you could well restrict socialism to Scandinavia. Communism, on the other hand, is distinct and defined by adherence to a certain ideology. A government is either Communist or it is not; there is no gray area. So in essence: socialism represents a social dogma ('the government should help the people') translated into economic policy ('the government intercedes when free enterprise's benefits are oustripped by its harms'); communism represents an ideological dogma ('revolution will produce an ideal society') expressed most commonly through an abusive and peculiar form of dictatorship ('sacrifice your freedoms today for utopia tomorrow'). The former is a common policy of government in democracy, where the latter bears more resemblance to religious fundamentalism. [ Thursday, May 19, 2005 11:57: Message edited by: Custer XVI ] -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| Capitalism ho! in General | |
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Bob's Big Date
Member # 3151
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written Thursday, May 19 2005 07:28
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It is a far better idea to get a loan and deposit it if you need extra money than to get a credit card; the interest rates are about 10-15% better. -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| Capitalism ho! in General | |
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Bob's Big Date
Member # 3151
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written Wednesday, May 18 2005 21:28
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$28 and a dream, my friend. $28 and a dream. -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| Undead Topics Need Loving Too (aka "Give Me Your First-Born") in General | |
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Bob's Big Date
Member # 3151
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written Wednesday, May 18 2005 17:01
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quote:  [ Monday, May 23, 2005 20:44: Message edited by: Imban ] -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| Drakefyre, Mariann, Jeff, Linda.. you're all dead. in General | |
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Bob's Big Date
Member # 3151
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written Wednesday, May 18 2005 16:55
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 -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| Hello Everybody! in General | |
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Bob's Big Date
Member # 3151
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written Wednesday, May 18 2005 16:51
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Ashby, you son of a whore: give me back my Goddamn trousers. My legs are growing cold, there is a stigma on nudity, and they're not even your size. You have to use not one but three freaking cords to keep them on your puny frame, and if it weren't for sheer cussedness you'd have no reason to continue wearing them - and in so doing, deny them to me - except for fetishry. They're not particularly expensive, and if you want I can scrounge together a good AU$20 and get you a nice, sturdy pair of jeans - jeans which will be yours, rather than mine, and have the added bonus of not fitting you as if you had lain a death-blow upon a bruin and donned his pants as he lay dying in order to preserve his inhuman strength as your own. I swear if you don't give them back I'm going to seduce your mother on general principle, and once I'm through I'll never call her. -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| Bahss Rated... in Blades of Avernum | |
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Bob's Big Date
Member # 3151
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written Wednesday, May 18 2005 16:07
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An opinion can be wrong when it's not an opinion but rather a statement of fact. In my opinion, BoA encourages dogged persistence more than anything else. It's a miserable engine to deal with, and exploiting the power it offers is beyond the technical abilities of most. For the most part, Canopy and Bahss are not so much good as large and solid; the kind of ratings we're seeing for both seem to represent more a sense of respect than a sense of entertainment. Of course, as Kelandon will not hesitate to remind you, I'm wrong (and also: screw me) and he is actually the crown princess of Avernum. TM will then turn around and insist it is he who is crown princess of Avernum. And around and around we go. I think we could improve the BoX community a lot by taking the more pigheaded designers - TM, Creator, Kel, et al - out and shooting them. They've done relatively good work, but their intolerable arrogance isn't justified based on that, and once people start fighting to the death under the presumption they're doing it for the lordly right to reshape an entire design continuum at will, it's definitely time for a reality check. Oh, and once we're back in sanity-land, allow me to just point out to Kelandon that TM initially had a valid point and dismissing it as the ramblings of an 'elite intelligensia' is not going to solve the problem. [ Wednesday, May 18, 2005 16:15: Message edited by: Custer XVI ] -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| Accident! Eagle, in pain! in General | |
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Bob's Big Date
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written Tuesday, May 17 2005 07:34
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Sleep is for the weak. You spend a good 30 years of a full life sleeping, after all. Too many, if you ask me. -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| Your Name's First Google Image Result... in General | |
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Bob's Big Date
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written Tuesday, May 17 2005 07:24
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 ROCK HARD -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| Undead Topics Need Loving Too (aka "Give Me Your First-Born") in General | |
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Bob's Big Date
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written Saturday, May 14 2005 19:12
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quote:I am, in fact, also a rude lout. [ Sunday, May 15, 2005 00:45: Message edited by: Imban ] -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| So it's finally out?! Have to... in Blades of Avernum | |
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Bob's Big Date
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written Friday, May 13 2005 23:33
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quote:To wit: there are few things an upstanding man can do that are worse than adding an excuse to a failure. As you are clearly unaware of what the words you use mean, bipolar disorder consists of energetic peaks and depressed troughs alternating personality - existing in a maladaptive degree and caused by biochemical factors. Even if you had it, what you described does not relate to it. You are perhaps thinking of dissociative identity disorder, commonly known as multiple personality disorder. And before you jump in and claim to have that (and, perhaps, gender dysphoria as well - but I'm not going to bother challenging that one), it also uniformly involves a lack of conscious knowledge. So that's not it either: rather, your behavior relates to you being what the literature refers to as a retard. Cut it out or do it somewhere else; most people are on record as being sick of it (and, by association, you), and I can't imagine you have nothing better to do with your time. -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| Quick question about a game (AoE II) in General | |
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Bob's Big Date
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written Friday, May 13 2005 23:09
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Neither AoM nor RoN are the same experience as AoE2. They're all relatively fun. But AoM is pretty much a straight pitch to the console crowd - it's pretty heavily dumbed down, IMO, and also IMO comparatively ugly - and it offers a far more reflex-based, hotkey-pounding experience than you'd expect from an AoE game. I was disappointed by it, to be sure. RoN is worth playing, but not worth buying. Uh, bum it from a friend, wink wink nudge nudge - it's got an interesting resource and technology dynamic, and it's certainly very handsome; for the most part, units look like what AoE1 and AoE2 would have done with 16-bit color instead of the 'original game makes love to a pile of polygons' look that seems to be in vogue nowadays, and the music is pretty, well-composed, evocative, and absolutely nothing like AoE's (less electronic, more orchestral). But handsome and novel don't make a game good, and the gameplay is very cloyingly rock-paper-scissorsish. By contrast, AoE2 is rather like AoE, only more sophisticated. There's a soft spot in my heart for it that I doubt any sequel to come is going to harden. If AoE3 uses that same goddamn infantry-rangers-cavalry unit dynamic that the AoE people have been drifting ineluctably into since Rise of Rome, I'm going to encourage people to pirate it out of a sense of civic duty. [ Friday, May 13, 2005 23:10: Message edited by: Custer XVI ] -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| Undead Topics Need Loving Too (aka "Give Me Your First-Born") in General | |
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Bob's Big Date
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written Friday, May 13 2005 10:10
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Juice is a soft drink, milk is not. Generally, over here soft drinks are anything that is not milk, water, or alcoholic. (Oppose hard drinks, which are alcoholic. Used to oppose 'hot drinks', but that's a Victorian usage and survives only in a certain religion's scripture and a few obscure mixers.) 'Soft drink' is also used by default to describe beverages which have no natural cause, such as McDonalds's orange drink and Kool-Aid. However, the more common term for that is either just 'drinks' or 'beverages', or just whatever it is. (It's unusual to have to categorize orange drink and Kool-Aid at the same time, but my gut tells me 'drinks', perhaps 'powder drinks' if I wanted to be specific.) The Israeli usage of referring to powder drink flavors by color - i.e. 'purple-flavored' - is noteworthy and ought, by rights, be spread to at least some dialect of English. quote:Floats here. 'To float X' refers to the process of throwing vanilla ice cream into a carbonated beverage, and 'an X float' is X with vanilla ice cream in it. More exotic ice creams are unusual and I've never heard them used verbally, so I wouldn't know how to express, say, strawberry and Sprite (that is, except with 'vile'). Fun fact: Mountain Dew is an acceptable substitute for orange juice in just about everything that calls for the latter. [ Friday, May 13, 2005 10:16: Message edited by: Custer XVI ] -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| From AOL News 2 in General | |
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Bob's Big Date
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written Wednesday, May 11 2005 14:39
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quote:And also, you're not allowed to caffeinate non-dark sodas. Obviously, Smart cars are illegal because the auto industry doesn't want the competition. The safety BS is just a cover-up. -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
| Star Wars! in General | |
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Bob's Big Date
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written Wednesday, May 11 2005 14:35
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Episode 3 will be the only good movie of George Lucas's late career, and in his entire oeuvre they'll wonder to put it above or below 'Howard the Duck' in the billing. [ Wednesday, May 11, 2005 14:36: Message edited by: Custer XVI ] -------------------- The biggest, the baddest, and the fattest. Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
