Persistent, Niggling Questions

[Nate the Great]

Would it be alright if I just went mad now?

[PointyHairedJedi]

You're implying that you're not mad already? That's a hairy lie if I ever saw one!

[Katy Jane]

I have a question, why is there a letter that is compleatly dependent on another letter? I speak here of Qu.... why can't the letter Q just automaticly mean Qu? So that Queen would be spelled Qeen?

[Nate the Great]

You got me. But there are words that start with Q that don't have a u after it. Qat comes to mind. (Hey, I'm a Scrabbleholic, what can I say?)

[Chancellor Valium]

"Saqqara", "Qadesh", "Qetesh" (important not to qonfuse), "qhytsonthyd" (archaic spelling of "Whistuntide", IIRC).

In short, it is because "Q" is a redundant letter in English, representing a letter described in Egyptology as "k-with-a-dot".

[mudshark]

Originally Posted by Chancellor Valium

... "qhytsonthyd" (archaic spelling of "Whi[ts]untide", IIRC).

Hmm, thot it were hwta sunnandæg, but then, there's no 'Q' in thet'un, so I suppose it wouldn't count.

As mentioned above, Q does occur independently in languages other than English, mostly non-Indo-European ones. The Q-U combination seems to have been imported from Latin via Old French, circa the Norman Invasion in 1066, and has stuck around more out of inertia than anything else.

English is like that -- has lots of relics, artifacts and plain old souvenirs lying around and cluttering things up for no good reason other than that people are used to it being that way and resist changing.

[Chancellor Valium]

Originally Posted by mudshark

Hmm, thot it were hwta sunnandæg, but then, there's no 'Q' in thet'un, so I suppose it wouldn't count.

*eyebrow*

Intriguing.

I read that thing about qhythsonthyd on wiktionary, so it's probably wrong.

Originally Posted by mudshark

As mentioned above, Q does occur independently in languages other than English, mostly non-Indo-European ones. The Q-U combination seems to have been imported from Latin via Old French, circa the Norman Invasion in 1066, and has stuck around more out of inertia than anything else.

English is like that -- has lots of relics, artifacts and plain old souvenirs lying around and cluttering things up for no good reason other than that people are used to it being that way and resist changing.

Like "artic"/"arctic"....

[catalina_marina]

Originally Posted by Nate the Great

Why are men's and women's bicycles still in different structural styles? I doubt that there are that many women who bike in skirts anymore, and a straight bicycle bar really is stronger structurally, so what's up?

As an (Evil) Dutch Woman, I feel I should respond to this.

Women do, actually, still wear skirts sometimes. Even women like me.
More importantly, it's not necessary. Sure, it might be stronger, but it never breaks either way. At least, not until every other inch of the bike has broken down at least thrice. You're getting a new bike LONG before that ever comes close to looking like it's not in top condition.
Also, I happen to think women's bikes are easier to get on, but that might just be me being used to it.
Then there's the point that, if you borrow a bike from someone, and it's slightly too big for you, it's easier to bike on it if it's a women's bike. Less painful, too, if ever you need to stop suddenly.