Hi, Michael!  Awhile ago you wrote in a message to Ardith Hinton:   
      
    AH>  I am troubled by the idea that while other people's lawn   
    AH>  parties are planned well in advance the maintenance is   
    AH>  too... yet hotels must be prepared to accept guests at   
    AH>  any time.  In an environment where a lot of other things   
    AH>  seem contrived their guests might settle for fake grass   
    AH>  which needn't be mowed, fertilized, &/or watered....  :-)   
      
    MD>  A well thought-out consideration.   
      
      
             Thankyou....  :-)   
      
      
      
    MD>  Automatic translation is still not so good, and though   
    MD>  Google Translate works better than Bing, there is much   
    MD>  space for improvement.   
      
      
             AFAIC translation is as much an art as a science, and while computers   
    may be more efficient than humans are at calculating the value of pi to   
   umpteen decimal points humans may do better with connotations & multiple   
   meanings.  ;-)   
      
      
      
    MD>  For justice, it should be noted that earlier the   
    MD>  automatic translation was much worse. So obviously   
    MD>  there is some progress.   
      
      
             So I gather... and I know spelling checkers have improved a lot since   
    the days when Fidonetters made jokes like:   
      
                       I halve a spelling chequer;   
                       It came with my pea sea.   
      
   Search engines, for that matter, are becoming more efficient too as they follow   
    the procedure of allowing us to choose from a list what works best for us.    
   :-)   
      
      
      
    MD>  I can translate the phrase I wrote in Russian this way:   
    MD>  "An overgrown beach comes right up to a paved road   
    MD>  (asphalt sea)".   
      
      
             I'm not sure about "overgrown beach"... but the rest is fine with me.   
    The problem is that whereas a neglected garden might be described as   
   overgrown, because e.g. nobody has done any weeding or pruning recently &   
   Mother Nature is taking control, little or no plant life could survive for very   
    long on what I'd refer to as a beach.  Here on the Pacific Coast a beach   
   consists mainly of sand &/or smooth stones which may be underwater half the   
   time & get pounded by waves on a regular basis.  I may be thinking a bit too   
   much, of course... [wry grin].   
      
      
      
      
   --- timEd/386 1.10.y2k+   
    * Origin: Wits' End, Vancouver CANADA (1:153/716)