The Widmann Blog » it http://blog.widmann.org.uk Thomas Widmann's blog about politics, linguistics, programming, food, kids and life in general Fri, 18 May 2012 22:02:59 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.2 Multilingual blogging http://blog.widmann.org.uk/2010/09/26/2770/ http://blog.widmann.org.uk/2010/09/26/2770/#comments Sun, 26 Sep 2010 07:16:41 +0000 thomas http://blog.widmann.org.uk/?p=2770

Who is warned not to drink the water?
Originally uploaded by Hanan Cohen

Som en del af la Journée européenne des langues, today is the Day of Multilingual Blogging.

Para la mayoría de los bloggers no es difícil, потому что они пишут только на одном языке обычно, och alla läsare förstår genast att det inte er vanligt, kiam ili skribas en nekutima lingvo.

Men hvis jeg havde blogget på spansk eller tysk, hätten alle wohl gedacht che sia completamente normale.

だから, co jsem mohl dělat? მე მქონდა იდეა: !איך קען שרייַבן איין פּאָסטינג אין פילע שפראכן

Problem solved!

]]> http://blog.widmann.org.uk/2010/09/26/2770/feed/ 3 Exit polls http://blog.widmann.org.uk/2009/06/08/1316/ http://blog.widmann.org.uk/2009/06/08/1316/#comments Mon, 08 Jun 2009 22:34:43 +0000 thomas http://blog.widmann.org.uk/2009/06/08/1316/

M29 Exit Poll
Originally uploaded by rodo.dentro

Det ser ud til, at Tronfølgeafstemningen ville have fejlet, hvis de danske medier ikke havde offentliggjort exit polls i løbet af dagen.

Jeg er helt enig med Socialdemokraternes Lene Hansen på dette punkt: Det burde forbydes!

Generelt vil folk skynde sig ud at stemme, hvis det ser ud til, at resultatet er snævert, men at deres foretrukne parti/udfald er ved at tabe. Tilsvarende vil de blive hjemme, hvis det ikke ser ud til, at deres stemme er nødvendig for at opnå det af dem ønskede resultat.

Det betyder, at der åbnes op for valgsvindel. Hvis jeg fx ønskede at hjælpe Det radikale Venstre, kunne jeg have offentliggjort en exit poll, der sagde, at partiet var 0.1% fra et mandat, og at det mandat ellers ville gå til Dansk Folkeparti.

Om omvendt, hvis jeg ville hjælpe DF.

Den enkleste måde at forhindre dette på er simpelthen at forbyde offentliggørelse af prognoser og exit polls på valgdagen.

]]> http://blog.widmann.org.uk/2009/06/08/1316/feed/ 0 La madonna che conduce la macchina http://blog.widmann.org.uk/2006/08/07/92/ http://blog.widmann.org.uk/2006/08/07/92/#comments Mon, 07 Aug 2006 19:37:00 +0000 thomas http://blog.widmann.org.uk/?p=92 There’s a church in Bibbiena in which one of the madonnas has had her baby Jesus stolen. Unfortunately, the way she’s holding her hands makes it look as if she’s driving a car, not holding a baby, so I renamed her mentally to la madonna che conduce la macchina. :-)

It just a shame I had forgotten my camera that day – this posting would have looked so much better with an illustration…

Interestingly, the next day we went to the museum in Arezzo to look at their Etruscan stuff, and they had a whole collection of tiny statuettes all looking exactly like the madonna. I wonder whether they were also holding kids originally, or did the Etruscans have cars in the 6th century BC? ;-)

]]> http://blog.widmann.org.uk/2006/08/07/92/feed/ 2 Wormsoapy cock poetry http://blog.widmann.org.uk/2006/08/04/86/ http://blog.widmann.org.uk/2006/08/04/86/#comments Fri, 04 Aug 2006 07:27:00 +0000 thomas http://blog.widmann.org.uk/?p=86 I bought a passaverdura in Italy. In Italian, it reasonably enough tells me to “lavare bene prima dell’uso” – which in English has become “before first use, wash in wormsoapy water”.

That reminds me of a friend of my dad, Ötz, who wanted to buy a gasket for his tap. In German, a gasket is called a Dichtung, and Hahn means both tap and cock, so he reportedly asked for una poesia di gallo d’acqua!

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