Why is there a tartan over Portugal?

Magneto’s powers are stupid

Generalized world wide.

This is grim and a lot of dirty politians want it back.

Disgusting.

My country allowed foreign cinema “only” with subtitles because most of the population was illiterate and the idea was to keep viewership of such media low without resorting to very harsh censorship, although it existed at the time.

It backfired so bad the general population developed a knack for acquiring foreign languages, through those media. Being a latin language country we score very high on the domain of english as a foreign language. Many of us also speak a bit of french and a large majority knows at least how to curse in spanish to return the love.

It was a common recommendation when I was a kid to expose children to non-dubbed media to develop foreingn language and reading skills.

And I can personally vouch for this, as I started developing basic english domain very early through cartoons and movies and the need to follow the subtitles helped me develop my reading skill and speed.

Regarding the quality of dubbing, I can only say something always gets lost in translation. More recently, I’ve followed a couple of series, both subtitled and dubbed, and the end result is completely different. Subtitled, you can follow the emotions in the original actors voices and postures. No lag, no difference, no adaptation. Dubbed, it often feels like watching a completely different show. And the voice over actors are professionals, obviously. But it is common for the voice over team to take some liberties.

[…] the other choice is better

That’s your choice and point of view.

I enjoy watching a work in it’s most original form, even if I can’t completely or even not at all grasp what is being said, I can still infer emotions from the tone of voice of the actor.

There is a learning curve.

Many brazillians I know have defended that hypothesis. Brazil has a very strong and inwards turned cultural production industry. They cater to themselves and keep 95% of the population satisfied.

I’ve heard a few songs, originally in english, being performed by brazillian artists, with varying degrees of success on the lyrics translation. But most music passes unadultered. Most people only cares about the sound, not the story in a song.

There’s a meme of guy calling a local radio station to request a song. He wanted to hear a song he called “Anteontem fez frio” (literally “yesterday was cold”). No band, no other reference. The DJ asked him to sing a few words, as they did not know such song. He does. It was Queen’s “I want to break free”.

And what is the concern regarding the “th” sound being absent in portuguese?

I can get good quality subtitles for most movies in my language. The best comes from cinema enthusiasts that put in the effort to make superb quality subtitles, even for obscure movies.

Nowadays, if I’m stupid enough to be watching television, it’s easy to spot machine-generated subtitles, due to poor quality. And dubbing is also on the rise. I’ve followed the same series fora few episodes, first in the original language with subtitles, then dubbed, and it was like watching two completely different shows.

Germans and Brazilians are one of a kind, apparently.

Why read a subtitle if you can just dub over the original?

I had to go the extra mile to find “Die Welle” in original format and matching subtitles, to actually get to watch the movie as it was made.

Dubbing is a curse in disguise.

I developed a technique over the years where I run a finger along the urethra after I’m done to push whatever fluid may be left, regardless if I’m standing or sitting down. When no TP is available, it really helps.

I do.

I cook a lot and often by nose, as in I can gauge how weak or strong the seasoning of my food is by the smell, and it rarely fails me.

I also know when I’m sick or sick-ish by not smelling or not finding as pungent the odor of the nasty stuff.

You do get desensitized over time and the smells become more tolerable. I’ve met guys that can tell if a given place is going to be troublesome to clean just by smelling the odors wafting out and looking at the colour. Others never stop feeling nauseated or even gagging when some particularly nasty smells hit them.

Got any questions I can answer for you?

My mind has a single track, runs at low speed and revolves on a predictable cycle.

A long, convoluted way to say I’m disgusting.

I am not into competitive gaming but I’ll be damned if I understand why the the anti-cheat modules are built into the game instead of being an aditional package that is installed and verified through the tournament platform.

You be the judge of it:

• punched through a tempered, textured, 3mm thick glass, leading to several cuts on a hand and wrist
• kicked a glass panel on a door and got a nasty cust on my toe
• several instances of cutting myself on different types of thorny bushes
• perforation with glasses rim on my eyebrow
• severe cut on my other eyebrow, another on the bridge of my nose
• broken arm, twice
• fall from a 1st floor balcony, landing on a bush, after breaking a cabinet with my back and legs, until finally reaching the ground
• hundreds, if not thousands, of small scrapes and bruises
• bitten by dogs, leading to deep gouges, on my calves
• severe tear on the back of my left hand, with a broken bone, not exposed, leading to surgery
• many, many, many sprained ankles and wrists
• three pulled teeth plus all the bleeding from losing my baby teeth
• minor burns on hands and fingers, from cooking
• several nasty cuts from kitchen knives and a perforation by a lobster spike, which led to a severe infection, with a piece of lobster shell stuck underneath a finger nail
• a few near choking to death episodes
• two electrocussion incidents (230V), for mere seconds

I’m going to risk there is none.

Many hand to hand combat weapons were bespoke to the user.

Using an example I’m fairly familiar with:

In Portugal, we have a martial art called jogo do pau. It uses a simple wooden staff. Today’s schools insist the staff has a standard lenght, width and shape.

An old school practitioner I had the pleasure to meet taught me the staff was always made to fit the wielder, not the opposite.

As a general guide line, it should have the lenght of the distance from the wielder’s armpit to the ground but there would be people that prefered longer or shorter staffs. Some people would prefer thinner staffs, nearly cylindrical in shape, others would prefers heavier, thicker, almost eliptical in profile. The amount of customisation and variation capable of being put into the weapon itself was so diverse, it made each staff unique.

I’d risk this same logic would apply to more classic weapons, like the flails you ask about.

I’m not against supporting a software in a recurring form but the web browser is essentially the lock and key of accessing the entirery of what exists outside your machine.

That would garner an immense power to whichever entity developing one. Remember Microsoft and the IE case.

Firefox is not perfect and apparently on a downwards spiral but what made it stand out was because it wanted to be free and for all. Chrome is far from being a good thing.

Hey, Nelson! How are you doing? Are they busting your chops?

Debian is my daily driver and for regular people I help. Comes with a service card saying “it will work and you will like it”.

I help for free. If someone does not like it, they can pay to have what they want done. But they don’t get to ask for help again.