Fascinating! As a native speaker, I got 89/100 ("you know 72,000 words"), but perfect on the core and intermediate levels. There were a few that I knew I'd heard before, but couldn't quite place, and then there were some words that I just got lucky with my experiences, like having recently reread Gulliver's Travels and being asked about "brobdingnagian," which literally comes from that book.

I'm curious what other native speakers get, and how difficult even the lower levels are for those learning English.

I mean, fuck Boeing and the death still seems suspicious. But to claim that there was no police investigation is just lying. Suspect a cover-up or frame or whatever if you want, but seems like there was a pretty thorough investigation: https://www.wdbj7.com/2024/05/18/police-release-investigation-report-boeing-whistleblower-death/

What is the charge? Eating a succulent meal?

Just because I can’t name the head of Antifa (or any other prominent member of Antifa) off the top of my head doesn’t mean they aren’t a highly coordinated terrorist organization.

Fantastic satire

Newton's blessings on everyone!

I upvoted because I could not disagree more.

But! No judgement from me. Everything's not for everyone. I can reread the LOTR trilogy for the 12th time or delve into the Silmarillion (basically the history of the LOTR world) and love every second. Whereas I tried to make it through the first Twilight book after watching the movie and had to put it down and take a shower. But if you like Twilight more, read that, because that's what you like! Your thoughts still have value!

Headline could be misleading, but it basically means that (according to one independent analysis) China's emissions have just stopped growing this year. They are still the world's largest contributor by far. This hilariously optimistic chart from the same site shows them relative to the US and almost all of Europe:

Still, not gonna knock what is good news, or at least "better than the alternative" news

Ridiculous. The metric system is all the same. How many millimommies in a decamommy? I dunno, but it's 10 or 100 or 1000 or something like that. Everything is a factor of ten, and the unit conversions are even a factor of 10! You can look that up in a table, and a 6-year-old can properly measure things. Booooring!

Now look at the Imperial/English/Standard/US/Florida system: how many hogshead in a cubic furlong? Nobody knows offhand, so you have to get creative. Is it a US standard colonial, also called a tobacco hogshead? Or is it the British hogshead? It may depend on the contents, like whether it's brandy or sugar or fish (the species matters!). You can convert to firkins if you wish, but that's optional. As for furlongs, it used to depend on the horse, but sadly they standardized it to 40 rods, because German feet were longer than English feet, probably due to the toes. Fortunately, some states in the US still disagree on definitions, so the length may depend on the state. Once you figure that out, you can easily calculate that using a English wine hogshead and an international furlong leads to about 34,136,818.7 hogshead in a cubic furlong. Explain to me how that's not better than your silly metric system!

Prison pocket of holding

If there was a god, I'd imagine them designing the universe and giggling like an idiot when they made math.

Engineering: We only care if it works, even if it breaks math/physics/chemistry/biology.

I had a copy of Fahrenheit 451 as a kid that suddenly had a different book in it for about ten pages or so. I'm like 5 chapters in, and all of the characters change. Same font, same size text, so I was very confused when the next page was talking about some woman cuddling on a couch with a man, and him feeling her shoulders. I figured it out finally by the page numbers being off.

It was part of a romance novel, which probably wasn't explicit, but seemed spicy to a 10-year-old. I'd think it was a fever dream if my mom didn't bring it up every so often ("I wrote to the publisher and gave them an earful!"). Anyway, the publisher apologized and sent us a new copy plus some coupons. I wish we'd kept the book, though.

Mr. and Mrs. McGill,

Thank you for your time. While the vicious poisoning of your son was a horrific tragedy, I am sure that with the evidence we discussed, justice will be served and the perpetrators will be made to financially compensate your shattered family. If you need to contact me or any of the other lawyers at our firm regarding this important matter, you can reach me at [email protected].

I mean, I do wish she was president right now because the world would be a better place. But that statement is also probably true of approximately 8 billion other people.

Mawp. Mawp. Mawp.

I had an old school friend I visited in Chicago, and her apartment had a locked door in her bedroom against the back wall, and her landlord had just said "it's not used, just ignore it." It didn't even have a doorknob, so she had just ignored it for like 3 years. The building had been there for like 100 years.

Naturally, after some alcohol, I convinced her I could lockpick it, and we pushed her bed to the side and I spent about ten drunken minutes picking the deadbolt. We finally got it open, and discovered it was a straight-up small elevator! None of the lights or buttons worked, and we were worried about it falling, so we got out of there.

To this day, I'm not sure if it was an old building elevator for residents and her room had been a hallway, or if it was some kind of (very small) service elevator, or something for the ADA (handicapped requirements). But it was absolutely fascinating.

Yeah, but can it play Doom?

This is so real. Some kid in 5th grade discovered marquee and told me about it, and it was my favorite thing for a good year or two

I had a neighbor growing up who was opposed to legalizing same-sex marriage in our state. Why? Oh, it was because he was legitimately convinced that it would ruin his gay son's marriage, which had occurred in Massachusetts and was currently recognized by our state. He thought his son would have to get remarried again in our state, and that was unfair and discriminatory to his beloved son. "Why should he have to get married again just because he's gay?!?"