You learn something new everyday: what did you learn today?

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when I was young I useta take cold showers. now my old body won't tolerate them anymore.

Well that is understandable as, I don't take cold showers 100% of the time.

i learned my alternator belt was about 1/10000th of a mile of driving away from failing completely.

so, i bought a new one and learned how to replace it. also learned how to replace wiper blades, alternator, AC filter and battery.

holothuroids are so bloody weird. they literally spit their guts out, they get fish living up their butt, they're not even that radial when compared to other echinoderms...

...and now this...

^ That's more than I know how to do, Kip.
With the car, at least.
Happy New Year too, BTW.

Meanwhile, I learned this today:

now if only i knew how to locate the source of the persistent creaking and scraping...it can't just be the springs, no?

thanks.

i have learned that levis and coupons do not mix, at all.

Not to spend $27 on three jugs of kitty litter to try to melt the ice where the city workers didn't lay down any salt before the the most recent snow fall.

How the name of a certain Spanish female player, Laura Arruberena, is really pronounced. Her doubles partner at Hopman Cup, Feliciano Lopez, pronounced it with the proper rolled Spanish "r's." As an American, I couldn't duplicate that.

I've learned that in some ways science fiction writer Jules Verne might have seen glimpses of the future.

you can learn the R trill in the same way that the late Tejano singer Selena did [she grew up speaking English], her father taught her [to dentally trill the R] by placing the tip of her tongue against the hard ridge behind her upper front teeth as though she was going to say "T" but instead, blow through it. simple as that.

germans also roll their "r's." when i learned german, i practiced trying to roll them for an hour in front of a mirror. never got it. thankfully, some germans also use the gutteral french "r." think of "rh."

strangely enough, the best word to practice trilling the Rs is the word Trill- because it puts your tongue tip in the proper position, you start out with T but then blow through it. I was the last person anybody would have thought would learn to trill their Rs but I got peeved when my Mexican/Puerto Rican coworkers could all easily make that sound and I couldn't. so I determined to learn it, it took me a YEAR to learn to make that sound. I read someplace that the ability to trill the Rs is encoded in the DNA and that some people [mainly americans] have had those genes totally deselected.

Folks of Scottish origin also roll their r's.

So to practice doing that just remember: "if it's not Scottish, it's crrrrap!"

https://youtu.be/bzG_J7RCGS0?list=PLaHz ... urllXE79uL

he is very naturally fluent with his trills. "crrrrraaap" is probably the toughest word in which to trill the R due to the distance of the C [tongue elevated and retracted] and trill [tongue tip engaged with upper front teeth] in short order.

i didn't hear much of a trill there, just the regular, standalone flapped /r/.

which, in itself might be a challenge to the anglos.

i've witnessed my sister go from a perfectly capable r roller to being unable to pull it off at all. which makes me all the merrier at my ability.

i learned that mail trucks like to stay near the rightmost lane of the highway.

I have heard that the Russians also roll their "r's."

There aren't many original Jimi Hendrix songs on YouTube.