Translation and Revision of Wordplay and Puns

I love word games. I really do.  I'm not very good at them, but they're fun.

That said, however, they're a huge pain to translate if gameplay has anything to do with vocabulary, wordplay or puns. Even Scrabble requires some tweaks from language to language - the game is carefully balanced in English based on our letter frequency.  If you translate it into French, suddenly you need to include more U tiles and the letter H needs its value increased.

Puns don't translate well at all, with very few exceptions. Occasionally, you'll find a word that has multiple meanings in multiple languages, but these words are very rare.  Similarly, games requiring wordplay are a huge pain to translate.

I'm told that the Spanish-language editions of Sir Terry Pratchett's Discworld books are exceptional. I'd love to read them sometime. Or, more accurately, have my wife read them to me, as I don't read Spanish.

Right now, I'm working on the translation of a game that uses wordplay. And has very strict requirements for this wordplay - the total number of available letters is limited, and there are limitations on the available words, too.

I've spent the better part of a month fighting with this one. And it just gets more and more frustrating as I work my way through it. Because it requires jokes and onomatopoeia and changing languages really screws with them.

It's the second-most frustrating gaming project I have ever worked on.

The first? Also based on wordplay, but it also required puns.

It took a team of four of us multiple evenings communicating via Skype to get it done.

And then the publisher decided not to print it after all.

Not. Fun.

Shopping for Clothes

I know I previously discussed my general dislike of shopping - let me get a bit more specific:

I dislike shopping for clothes.

I am not a small man.  I'm not grossly overweight, but I could stand to lose a few pounds.

What trips me up is my size and a handful of other issues.

I have size 11½ feet, but I need EEEE width. Very few shoe manufacturers bother making shoes that wide, and I'm very appreciative to brands that do.  I also need natural fibers or cloth uppers on the shoes - fake leather doesn't breath enough and my feet swell up dramatically. Enough so that I can't walk.  My parents used to tell the shoe clerk that I was allergic to the fake stuff just to save time and hassle.

Lots of teenagers wear size XL T-shirts. Usually, it's because they fill them. I wore size XL because my shoulders wouldn't fit anything else - the rest of me could fit into a size L just fine.  These days, I wear size XXL mostly for my shoulders (but the rest of me benefits from the added space these days).

Either way, it make shopping awkward - my frame (other than my shoulders) isn't "Big and Tall."  My shoulders won't fit anything less.

All in all, it makes shopping for clothing a frustrating activity from start to finish.

Keeping Track of the Calendar

What? Two posts this week?

Yep.  Because I had some trouble keeping track of which day of the week was Wednesday and which was Friday and so my post for today went up on Wednesday.

Because I have to keep track of too many calendars.  Each blog I write for has its own schedule. And I have to squeeze the writing into my spare corners (which are becoming rarer and rarer as time goes by).

Not only that, but many evenings have specific weekly events. So I need to know what day of the week it is.

Eventually, I'll quit my job and live the unemployed and free life where I don't have to know if it's Monday or Thursday. And I can write all day and maybe update my blogs more than once per week ...

But that's not today. Today, I need to be able to feed myself and take care of my cats.

And I need to learn to keep better track of my calendar.

The Sound of Fireworks

I love a good light show. I really do. But I absolutely despise the sound of fireworks.

I like hissing and sizzling and crackling - but it's the bangs and the booms and the pops I can't stand.  Especially when it's 11 pm and I have to work the next morning. But even when it's noon, I still flinch every time a firecracker goes off.

But setting firecrackers off past midnight is just rude. Especially if you live in a city where they're illegal outside of certain hours or an apartment complex with a no-fireworks policy in place.  There's a reason I chose to live here.

The Decline of the Hat as an Indicator of Adulthood

I have a hat that I wear. Constantly. It's a Greek Fisherman's cap. And, because it's not black, it's very distinctively mine.

Yes, I do have a black one.  I also have a blue one, a brown one, and the grey one that gets the most use.

To me, we have really lost something over the last few decades as hats have declined.

If you can find it, take a look at street scenes or candid photos from the 1950's and earlier. You'll find that most adults - men and women alike - wore hats of some sort while outside. Children (especially boys) wore caps. It's as if, once you hit eighteen, you set aside the cap and got a grownup hat. Very few caps (such as mine) qualify as grownup hats.

If you looked at people on the street, you saw fedoras and porkpies and bowlers and cowboy hats and  homburgs and ...

Wikipedia has an excellent list.

To a small child, roles are still tied up in hats - if you wear a fireman's helmet, it doesn't matter what else you're wearing: You're a Fireman.  If you are wearing a hard hat, you're a construction worker (or a builder).

Somewhere along the way, however, we've misplaced the grown-up hats. People my age wear baseball caps. Constantly. It's like they're holding on to their childhood.

When did this all change? And why?

I'm not the only person who feels like this, by the way.

Poking around the internet, it appears as though the rise of the automobile is responsible for the decline of the hat - we're walking less, and are thus spending less time outside. With less time spent outside, protection from the elements becomes less important.

There is a line of thought that the new pedestrian-friendly community development concepts may bring hats back from the dead - I sure hope so.

Because I dislike the current state of things.

Firm Mattresses

At home, we have a pillow-top mattress. A nice, soft, cushioning pillow top mattress.

Most hotels have a moderately soft mattress.

But, when visiting family, we're often stuck with what said family has.

My mother-in-law has a concrete slab cleverly disguised as a mattress.

Based on my experiences in Minnesota, it runs in the family.

Which is really really not good for my back.

Fifteen years ago, I slept just fine on nearly any surface you'd care to name. Hardwood floors? Check. Car seats? Check. Nails? Check. Grass and dirt? Check. Hammock? Check.

As I've aged, however (and I'm really not that old - I'm only 35), my back has grown more and more intolerant of more and more sleeping surfaces. Sleeping anywhere that isn't home leads to back pain.

That? Is something I dislike.