I agree Todd, that serious stuff gives me a headache.

Pio, we have suckers on our feet and blutack in our pockets. Seems to solve the problem nicely.

I don't know the answer to your logic question. I've heard the answer before somewhere but, like my funny experience, it escapes me.

Todd, Rob has SO many funny experiences from his time working at the Courts (23 years). Someone wrote a poem for his leaving party and it incorporated all the experiences over the years.

Can I relate the best one? I'm going to anyway. I'm sure they've tightened this up at the courts because it sounds terrible but here goes anyway.

When the jury retired after a particularly long and gruelling case the attorneys and the court staff wentto the Crown Room to wait for the verdict. One particular night it was 11.00pm and the jury was still out and looked like they'd be out for quite some time. The bar was opened and the attorneys and the court staff began to drink. One or two drinks was ok but at 3.00am the jury still hadn't come back.

They came back at about 4 in the morning. The attorneys and the court staff had *ahem* a bit to drink.

This is in the days of wigs and gowns here and one barrister put his wig on backwards.

Rob, as usual, asked the jury foreman if the decision was unanimous. He said umianimous, he said umianoumous, he said muni... The judge said in a very stern voice "Mr Registrar, SIT DOWN. Mr Foreman, is the jury all agreed?"

Meanwhile, the barrister with the wig on backwards kept blowing the tail it of it up off his face.

Afterwards, they were all taken into the Judge's chambers and the floor was wiped with them.

A follow up to this. Rob was recently on a book buy at this particular Judge's house, now long retired. Rob said with great trepidation "er, do you remember me?"

The Judge said "of course I do and I'll never forget that night. I came home and told my wife and cried with laughing."

I've got it...

I've got it too. Such a shame that WW didn't use protection.

Oh, wait. What are we talking about?

I meant radiation sickness...

Oh, the logic problem.

Goeth ahead and giveth us thy answer(uth).

Yeah, come on Todd, goeth aheaduth.

Should I really spoil it for others?

Yes

Did you use Google? It's easy to findeth.

No, I didn't even think of google to be honest.

Hey, I will give you one while I goeth to write the answer.

What is the next letter in the series?

O T T F F

S

And the next two?

I posted the question. What the heck happened to it?

Question: If I were to ask a member of the other tribe which road to take, which road would he tell me?

You would then take the other road.

S E

The simple answer is to point to either of the two roads and say:

"If I were to ask you if this road led to the village, what would you say?"

If he says yes, take the road. If he says no, take the other road.

Did you google that one?

No, that is just how I remember it. I may have gotten it off a bit. I did look at google out of curiosity but the top sites were blocked by our proxy server so I gave up.

The problem with modern English is that we are losing the subjunctive tense through usage. Most people don't understand the difference between "if I was going to..." and "if I were going to...". Of course, remember that I am from Arkansas. There it is "if'n I beed gonna...".

Yes, Arkansas. I remember that when I'm posting to you.

I always use "were going to" if I want to sound posh and smart. I think "was" is the correct usage. Were, of course is a plural but sounds kinda good. It's good for icy usage.

When you say "modern English" do you mean American English or English English. Here, the kids are brainwashed by television and music into using American English. If I hear one more under 30 use "skedule" for "shedule" (schedule) I think I'm going to scream.

Also, "gotten" is not used in English English but as Bill Bryson pointed out in "Mother Tongue" we use it in "forgotten". We say "got" not "gotten".

When you say I could care less that means nothing to us. We say "I couldn't care less". Could care less means you DO care. There are so many more I sometimes wonder if we speak the same language.

Well I am no linguist but I did take freshman English four times so am somewhat of an expert.

"were" is subjunctive and indicates an impossibility.

For example, "if I were you" is correct because you cannot possibly be another person. "if I was you" is incorrect.

That is clear-cut. Now what about something not quite so obvious. "If I were smart" or "if I was smart". If you say "were", you are indicating you are actually stupid. If you say "was", you leave the door open.

In the logic problem, if you said "if I was to ask you...", it wouldn't work. You have to say "if I WERE to ask".

Could care less - couldn't care less? I don't know which is correct and I couldn't care less. (or maybe I could - I dunno).