|
Pardon the awkward title. I was referring to a story I read : After two girls gossiped about a man in an elevator, his unexpected response led to the 'loudest scream'[^]. The scream was because he revealed to them he had understood everything they said.
I have heard two similar stories from the individuals directly involved. They are rather amusing, even more so when they tell them.
1. A friend was attending San Jose State and was between classes so he sat on a bench in a square between buildings. He is not Asian but he grew up in the Bay Area and picked up a fair amount of a Vietnamese language (Viet?) from his neighbors. A group of Vietnamese girls were sitting nearby and commenting about his appearance and the size of his biceps. He acted like he didn't understand a word they said until he decided to leave. He walked by them and said, "have a very nice day, girls" in Vietnamese. He said their mouths dropped open and they were very embarrassed to the point of turning pale.
2. Another friend is nearly six-feet tall and a former Marine. One time when she was still in the service she went to a grocery story to pick up something. Two Mexican guys were in line behind her and they were both barely over five-feet tall. They were talking in Spanish about how big she is and how they'd like to climb her and ... Finally, she turned around and said, in Spanish, "I may be a gringa but I'll kick both of your little asses if you keep it up." Apparently their reactions were quite similar to that of the Vietnamese girls.
Funny stuff. Have any of you heard similar stories?
"They have a consciousness, they have a life, they have a soul! Damn you! Let the rabbits wear glasses! Save our brothers! Can I get an amen?"
|
|
|
|
|
Indeed, my wife and I were at a Greek festival where my wife bought some Loukoumades[^] and hands the person $20, the cashier gives change for $10. My wife mentions the discrepancy, and the person mutters something like "you cheap, thieving American" in Greek, thinking that we are trying to rip them off. At which point my wife tells them "I'm neither cheap nor thieving nor blind" in Greek. Their expressions were priceless. 
"the debugger doesn't tell me anything because this code compiles just fine" - random QA comment
"Facebook is where you tell lies to your friends. Twitter is where you tell the truth to strangers." - chriselst
"I don't drink any more... then again, I don't drink any less." - Mike Mullikins uncle
modified 4-Feb-21 16:08pm.
|
|
|
|
|
In the mid 1980s I was based in Singapore for a couple of years and picked up a smattering of various dialects. For some reason the only Cantonese I knew (outside of ordering food and drinks) was very rude.
One day in Hong Kong I was crossing the street and a cab driver yelled at me "Go ![Elephant | [mastadon]](https://www.codeproject.com/script/Forums/Images/elephant.gif) your mother", a general purpose insult. He almost drove up the nearest lamp post when I shouted back "And the same with your father", the traditional rejoinder.
Software rusts. Simon Stephenson, ca 1994. So does this signature. me, 2012
|
|
|
|
|
Yes,
Some years ago I was out for dinner with a Norwegian colleague and his wife. They are constantly making fun of 'Fat Americans' and our excessive lifestyles. We were waiting for the pedestrian signal to cross the street and there was a very large woman waiting with us. They were laughing and making fun of her weight (in Norwegian) and for some reason her hair. When the pedestrian signal changed the large woman turned around and fluently thanked them for their kind words. The large lady was Norwegian. There are only about 5 million Norwegians in the world so for the rest of the night we discussed the probability of the encounter.
|
|
|
|
|
Not only heard... I have been involved in several of them... in several combinations.
Being the one embarrassed and being the one embarrassing others. With Spanish and with German in several lands.
It might be very funny, yes 
Specially if you are a bit evil 😈
M.D.V. 
If something has a solution... Why do we have to worry about?. If it has no solution... For what reason do we have to worry about?
Help me to understand what I'm saying, and I'll explain it better to you
Rating helpful answers is nice, but saying thanks can be even nicer.
|
|
|
|
|
When I was studying in the nineties we had a guy in the student house that was half Swedish and half Czech.
He used to spend his summers in Czechia, and as a student he worked in the summers as a tourist guide in Prague.
He used to bring the tourists to various restaurants in town and helping them to order food.
After having discussed the orders, in Swedish, with the tourists and ordered the food in perfect Prague dialect, he usually got a lot of apologies from the servants for bringing him the wrong menu.
You see, in those times the prices differed between English, German and Czech menus. To make it possible for the locals to eat out more often.
|
|
|
|
|
Jörgen Andersson wrote: You see, in those times the prices differed between English, German and Czech menus. To make it possible for the locals to eat out more often.
Not exactly the same..
but having some German guests in Spain before the Euro-Devise, we went out to have lunch with typical "Tapas"... when the bill came in pesetas, he looked us asking how much that would be in DM (German Marks) when my father calculated the exchange... he asked for a second round.
M.D.V.
If something has a solution... Why do we have to worry about?. If it has no solution... For what reason do we have to worry about?
Help me to understand what I'm saying, and I'll explain it better to you
Rating helpful answers is nice, but saying thanks can be even nicer.
|
|
|
|
|
My wife and I were taking a scenic ferry ride across Sydney Harbour recently. Two Japanese girls seated behind us talking about friends and many other things... some "interetsing".
As we were leaving the ferry at the destination I turned to them, greeted them in Japanese and wished them well. The looks on their faces were like what has been described in other replies.
Of course they couldn't have known that I worked in Japan for 9 months some 46 years ago.
|
|
|
|
|
I've often said that I want to learn Spanish for no other reason than to listen in on others during an elevator ride.
"One man's wage rise is another man's price increase." - Harold Wilson
"Fireproof doesn't mean the fire will never come. It means when the fire comes that you will be able to withstand it." - Michael Simmons
"You can easily judge the character of a man by how he treats those who can do nothing for him." - James D. Miles
|
|
|
|
|
The Opposite. Circa 1994, I was in Russia with 2 Friends. We did NOT speak the language, LOL.
We got in the WRONG Line for a boat around St. Petersburg. Without knowing.
And 5 minutes into the trip, we are doing a B-Line to "somewhere". We went from "relaxing and joking" to "Hair standing up on our necks"...
We simply cannot find out where we are going. OMG, I am almost crying right now, typing this.
We get CHASED off the boat (we tried to stay, but they FORCED us off). and then I heard it...
The QUEENS ENGLISH... Amazing with all of those people, my brain picked up SOMEONE speaking English.
I pushed through the line, and found an Englishman and his wife, holding a book of poetry...
I said:
"This is going to sound incredibly American... But where are we?"
They ROARED... Explained it was the Summer Palace... and it was HONESTLY one of the BEST DAYS we spent in Russia. Beautiful, Peaceful... Incredible.
They got a good laugh out of our story... As did we...
|
|
|
|
|
That is very good one. 
Curiously, I studied quite a bit of Russian in high school and college. I have had a few cases of understanding bits from people talking nearby but never an embarrassing kind of thing. One time was rather funny - I was sitting in an airport waiting area before boarding and some people were speaking Russian nearby. They said something rather funny and when I chuckled along with them I got some very odd looks. I just smiled at them and when back to my surfing.
My sister went to Russia, when Gorbachev was in charge, and I still regret not joining her on that trip. I have no interest what so ever in going now.
"They have a consciousness, they have a life, they have a soul! Damn you! Let the rabbits wear glasses! Save our brothers! Can I get an amen?"
|
|
|
|
|
I've not used dual displays since the early 90s (back then We would use OutputDebugString() to send debug text to a second mono monitor). I would like to try my hand at using two displays again for the extra screen real estate they would provide. I'm thinking of purchasing a new computer that has 1 HDMI port. Would it be better to install a video card that has one HDMI port for the second monitor to use, or a video card that has two HDMI ports for both monitors and just not use the one integrated in the motherboard?
Thanks.
DC
"One man's wage rise is another man's price increase." - Harold Wilson
"Fireproof doesn't mean the fire will never come. It means when the fire comes that you will be able to withstand it." - Michael Simmons
"You can easily judge the character of a man by how he treats those who can do nothing for him." - James D. Miles
|
|
|
|
|
I am using a laptop with a USB-C dock which support 2 HDMI and 1 Display Port video outputs.
With a triple mount I have lots of desk space and 4 displays (if I keep the laptop open).
One is configured for Portrait display for reading documents.
I am using a DELL dock, since I have an XPS laptop, but there are many available on Amazon and other sources.
"Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana."
|
|
|
|
|
I stop using the integrated video if an updated video card is supplied. I like having display settings managed in one place.
|
|
|
|
|
Kris Lantz wrote: I like having display settings managed in one place.
That was my thought process, too, but I did not have anything to back it up.
"One man's wage rise is another man's price increase." - Harold Wilson
"Fireproof doesn't mean the fire will never come. It means when the fire comes that you will be able to withstand it." - Michael Simmons
"You can easily judge the character of a man by how he treats those who can do nothing for him." - James D. Miles
|
|
|
|
|
Even a fairly old video card - I use a NVIDIA GTX660Ti - will have support for at least two displays (but it's worth checking what inputs your monitors will take. You can't "split" a single HDMI output to two different images, just duplicate the same picture on two.
Trust me, multiple monitors make things so much easier: just having one for the internet and one for VS while coding (or one for VS and one for your app while debugging) is worth it's weight in gold.
I run three now: internet (Portrait), VS (Landscape) and a spare for Email & everything else!
Go for it: get a cheap two - or three - output card, and disable onboard. It'll free up your system RAM and accelerate windows display stuff at the same time.
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
"Common sense is so rare these days, it should be classified as a super power" - Random T-shirt
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
|
|
|
|
|
I wouldn't be without a dual display for work. As others have said, the productivity gains are significant.
Point of this post is to put in a word for the multiple desktops feature in Windows. I rely on this heavily and have been up to a virtual 8 or 10 monitors with it - two IDEs open with a lot of stuff in each, best spread over two monitors per IDE, plus documentation, browser windows, email, discreet sanity-preserving displacement activities that that shouldn't be left visible to passers by...
If it wasn't for this feature, I'd be looking at more and bigger monitors and still find them constraining on occasions.
Once the extra desktops have been created (Task View icon which for me is to the right of the Start menu icon, lower left), panning right and left through the desktops array is [Ctrl]+[Windows key]+[Right cursor] or +[Left cursor].
|
|
|
|
|
While I like the desktop feature, these kids don't seem to understand the Rubiks Cube Variant...
I want to use my multiple monitors, with desktops, and organize them in 3D! So I can FLIP UP/DOWN as well as left/right.
This is like workbooks of related tools.
The other frustration is that I have a nice VM Setup, but when it is full screen, it captures the key I wish to apply outside of it. [I Ended up making a keyboard macro to trigger the right ctrl key, then trigger the desktop change to escape out to the parent OS]...
For my large monitor, I love using AquaSnap Pro for repositioning and resizing my windows as though I have 4 monitors, when I just have a HUGE 4K monitor.
|
|
|
|
|
Two Display Ports if you want to be a bit more future safe.
One DisplayPort should be enough since you can daisy chain them, but not to many monitors support that, so you'd need to check that out.
|
|
|
|
|
My choice exactly! And if you buy a new computer, make sure it has a NVMe M.2 SSD drive, not the older SATA SSD drives. NVMe drives are significantly faster. No serial comms. They plug directly into the PCIe bus.
Get me coffee and no one gets hurt!
|
|
|
|
|
I agree about using Display Port. You'll almost certainly get better resolution with it than HDMI.
|
|
|
|
|
Going as far back as Windows has had the ability, people have generally been recommending against mixing video chipsets from different manufacturers together, so that would mean disabling the onboard video and using instead a video card that supports two independent output ports. In reality--and I can only speak for myself--I've personally never experienced any display problem that I could attribute to mixing video cards from different manufacturers together.
Maybe I've just been lucky, but I can definitely see how there could be room for strange behavior when using video drivers and add-on display software from different manufacturers. YMMV, but IMO if you're going to get a card anyway to provide a second display, then it would make sense to get a card that can provide two outputs and then just disable the built-in one.
Another possibility (which is not necessarily as cheap as a low-end video card) - there are USB to VGA adapters that will act as a video card, and let you send video to a monitor through a USB port if, for some strange reason, adding a video card is not an option. You can chain them with no problem - at one point, for the hell of trying it out, I had 3 of them hooked up to a system that already had 2 "regular" displays, for a total of 5 monitors. But I will point out that the key here is to use a USB 3 port - when testing the configuration I mentioned, I could have 5 different HD videos playing full-screen, independently from each other, and not a stutter. Full-screen HD video over USB 2 did NOT work as smoothly. Even just moving a single window over a USB2 port showed the image getting clipped as it was being dragged.
And TBH that was years ago when HDMI still wasn't all that common as a PC connector. I can't imagine there wouldn't be equivalent USB to HDMI adapters nowadays.
[Edit]
..and sure enough, they exist, and they're even cheaper (CAD$25) than what I had paid for the USB to VGA adapters I experimented with.
|
|
|
|
|
dandy72 wrote: Going as far back as Windows has had the ability, people have generally been recommending against mixing video chipsets from different manufacturers together, so that would mean disabling the onboard video and using instead a video card that supports two independent output ports. In reality--and I can only speak for myself--I've personally never experienced any display problem that I could attribute to mixing video cards from different manufacturers together.
If you go back far enough (win95? NT4????) you actually had to use different brands because something in the driver model choked on 2 instances of the same GPU.  
I ran into NVidia vs ATI driver problems with XP (vista?) years ago; I was running 3 monitors in an era when GPUs only had 2 outputs and upgraded my main card from NVidia to ATI and ended up having to buy a second cheap ATI card because I could never get my main card and low end NVidia ones to play nicely. On more modern systems I never have had an issue with Intel and AMD/NVidia/USB; I've never tried mixing AMD and NVidia though. (My current systems are Intel and since cards started offering more outputs haven't needed to double up just for that.)
Did you ever see history portrayed as an old man with a wise brow and pulseless heart, weighing all things in the balance of reason?
Is not rather the genius of history like an eternal, imploring maiden, full of fire, with a burning heart and flaming soul, humanly warm and humanly beautiful?
--Zachris Topelius
Training a telescope on one’s own belly button will only reveal lint. You like that? You go right on staring at it. I prefer looking at galaxies.
-- Sarah Hoyt
|
|
|
|
|
No doubt problems existed, they were being reported for a reason. I just was saying I was fortunate enough not to have run across them in any of my own little experiments.
|
|
|
|
|
What OS?
Without waxing too descriptive then, get a PCIe video card but know that purchasing one will require some homework on your part, mainly brushing up on knowing what types of connections to IT you will be supporting once you decide you're going to spend x amount of dollars for your reason.
Why "what OS?" ... because the blue screen of death has evolved recently.
And with that warning, hang on to your old DB 15-pin monitor for a while or at least until you do everything in your power to resist the nostalgia of sticking with an old operating system just because your hardware seems to run optimally on it.
I'll end this here.
But remember the onboard VGA connection CAN BE USURPED by your BIOS.
modified 4-Feb-21 16:44pm.
|
|
|
|
|
General 
News 
Suggestion 
Question 
Bug 
Answer 
Joke 
Praise 
Rant 
Admin 
Submit an article or tip
