Month: June 2002

American Dialects

Ashley Bischoff1 Comment

Via silent-tristero, I discovered this article in the LA Times on a recent study on dialects in America. You might think that it’d be mostly common sense but, there were some surprises as well:

Work on the atlas already has begun to unveil some surprising facts about the state of North America's dialects, such as the sharp boundaries that exist between them. Some linguists have argued that pronunciation patterns should vary along continuums, the way the northern prairie gradually becomes the southern desert. Labov has found that dialects tend to abut sharply, more like cold and warm weather fronts.

“When you drive from Akron down to Columbus, Ohio,” he said, “you’re crossing one of the great American divides [from the Northern to the Midland dialect], even if you're not aware of it.” [...]

The article also links to the web version of their dialect atlas. There, you can see, for instance, that Oklahoma City is part of the South Midland dialect — the same as Cincinnatti — not the Southern dialect. And, El Paso is part of the West dialect — same as Sacramento — not the Southern dialect either.

Monster Garage

Ashley Bischoff10 Comments

I’ve recently discovered Monster Garage on the Discovery Channel, and it’s excellent. It’s similar in some ways to Junkyard Wars, but maybe even better (if that’s possible).

The premise is that a team is given a vehicle, $3,000 (for buying parts) and a challenge. For instance, in one show, they had to turn a Eddie Bauer edition Ford Explorer into a working garbage truck that had to be able to grab trash cans and empty them into truck. In another challenge, they had to turn a Lincoln Towncar limousine into a working fire truck.

But, the catch is that the vehicles have to appear stock from the outside (until the machine goes into action, of course). So, in the example of the of the fire-truck limousine, the team had to build a retractable nozzle that would come out of a panel in the roof of the limo.

And, the team members are incredibly smart people — world class gearheads, hot rodders, and mechanics. Their skills, from welding to hand-machining parts, were truly impressive.

Anyhow, Monster Garage airs Sundays at 4pm EST / 3pm CST on the Discovery Channel. Check it out.

Peanut Butter and Banana sandwich

Ashley Bischoff16 Comments

Jason was musing about a peanut butter and bannana sandwich that he had the other day. He seemed to quite enjoy it, so I asked him about it:

Alex: Seriously, are they any good? I’ve never tried peanut butter and banana together, so I have no idea :-/. Neither product is particularly sweet, though I imagine the slight saltiness of the peanut butter might act as a sort of “seasoning” to the banana?

Jason: Well… I like it. It’s probably just something you have to try and see if you like it yourself. Actually it’s pretty similar to the old stand-by of peanut butter and jelly, except the jelly part is a bit firmer and not quite as sweet ;-)

Alex: So, how much peanut butter do I apply? Just enough to cover the bread, or do I slather it on?

Jason: Um... somewhere in between, I guess :-/ …probably another “personal preference” thing.

Alex: And, about 1/4“ slices for the banana, eh?

Jason: I’ve found that slicing the banana once lengthwise, and then each of those pieces in half, gives you four pieces that fit nicely on a slice of bread, and is easier than cutting it into many coin-shaped slices. Not sure if that makes sense... wish I could do banana-slicing diagrams in ASCII.

Alex: I’m not used to typing “banana”, and you wouldn’t believe how many times I ran into the banana problem during this e-mail <g>.

So, that covers the exposition. Fast forward to the present: I’m jonesing for a peanut-butter-and-banana sandwich. And, I’m stoked because I see that there’s still a banana left on the countertop. So, I trod downstairs and open the fridge — but, there’ no peanut butter! Feh. My hopes are dashed. (Well, ok, there was a smidgen of peanut butter left, but still not enough to make a sandwich)

So, if I go to Kroger tomorrow or within the next few days, maybe I’ll buy some more peanut butter. I'll have to ask Jason which kind he prefers. Really, I haven’t had peanut butter since I was a kid, primarily because of its high fat content (16g/serving, yikes!). However, most of that (13g) is actually unsaturated fat (the less-bad fat) and peanut butter apparently has no trans fatty acids either (the hella-bad fat). So, maybe I’ll have to give peanut butter another chance.

Thinking it over, I recall Jason saying that I could add condiment x to make the peanut-butter-and-banana sandwich even better. Now, what was it? Salt? Sugar? Cinnamon, or something? Maybe I just have peanut butter on the brain, but I just can’t think of it at the moment. Hmm.

Update: In the comments, Jason mentions that condiment x == honey. Aha.

Minority Report

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I saw Minority Report yesterday, and it was generally quite enjoyable. I still hold that “PG-13” and “good action movie” are two mutually exclusive concepts, and this was no exception. The key here, of course, is that Minority Report was more of a sci-fi flick than a pure action movie.

Favorite bit: the cereal box. In some ways, it reminded me of Eddie Valiant’s reaction after he hits the fire hydrant in Toon Town.

Least favorite bit: the snot. As Americans like to say, that was “uncalled for”. I thought it was unfortunate that the film used the “gross is funny” philosophy of humor from time to time. See also: the scene with the floor grate.

Overall, it was a good movie, and I’d recommend it. The story is intriguing, and the effects are impressive. At many points, the CG cars looked like models to me, in the way that they accurately reflected ambient light. And, for CG, I can think of no higher compliment.