?

I have some rather careless friends whose cigarettes have left a number of small holes in my car's rear upholstery. However, today, one of my friends accidentally caused a rather nasty hole-- a clean hole about 7-8mm in diameter right through the cloth on the seat, exposing the material inside the seat.

Are there some products I could use to make the hole less obvious, or appear to be mended completely? How much do you suppose it would cost to get the seats patched by a professional?

This might seem a little esoteric, but does anyone have any knowledge, or even any conjectures as to the origins of the Persian (specifically Farsi) word خورشید (khorshid)?

I found this word a little puzzling, given that it doesn't seem to be an Indo-European (or Turkic or Semitic, for that matter) word. I know that Persian also uses a cognate to the Hindi word आफ़ताब (aaftaab, which I assume originally came from Persian), and that Офтоб (aftab) is more common in Tajik, but even in other Indo-Iranian languages such as Kurdish (which has a cognate to aftab), and the Indo-Aryan languages of South Asia, خورشید isn't reflected.

Where did this word come from?

I was wondering if there are any conventions for offering verbal or textual description of how a sign is made in ASL, or any sign language for that matter. Is there a standard terminology employed when telling someone how a sign should be formed? For example, do different motions or hand shapes have specific names?

I know absolutely nothing about ASL, I'm just curious about how different signs are described verbally.

I am currently in the process of transferring universities (I am applying to multiple universities). Once I transfer, I plan on pursuing a BA in Persian language & literature, if I choose to attend a school that offers such a degree. At the other schools to which I'm applying, I am applying to complete a BA in Near Eastern Studies. I don't know of any US schools which have graduate programs in specifically Persian lang & lit-- many seem to offer Master's Degrees, and PhDs in Near Eastern Studies, however.

My question is, if I were to get a BA in Persian, would I be able to apply to a graduate program in Near Eastern Studies, in order to receive a Master's or PhD? Does my bachelor's degree need to be in the same discipline as the higher degree, or would I be able to pursue another degree in a closely related discipline?

Thank you for your help.

Specifically, I want to cite Army Regulation 670-1, which changed regulations regarding the "wear and appearance of army uniforms and insignia." It was published in Washington DC by the Department of the Army on February 3, 2005-- this is about all I know about the publication.

I have a PDF of the document, and I have no idea how to cite it in MLA.

For one of my courses, I need to write a paper on Sikhs in America, how their cultural and religious practices are misunderstood, and how they are stereotyped, in contrast to how they are perceived in Britain, and India.

I am lucky enough to have a Gurdwara in the town where I live, so I thought it would be a good idea to go and interview some of the members of the congregation. I'm sure they'd be happy to help dispel any misconceptions about their religion, but before I telephone the Gurdwara, I felt it would be best to learn a little about what is deemed polite. I do not wish to offend them in some way, but I am primarily concerned as coming across as overly clinical in my research, or as insincere.

Any help, or tips about how I can conduct my research with a sensible amount of sensitivity would be appreciated. Thank you in advance!

I am rather curious about how the justice system of the European Union works, and I was wondering: if a citizen of one EU state (for example, the Czech Republic) commits a crime in another member state (example, Spain) and is convicted by a court in that country, would he be automatically repatriated to the Czech Republic to serve out the prison sentence assigned to him by the court, or would he serve his sentence in a Spanish prison?

Would the same regulations apply to the citizens of Schengen Area countries that are not part of the European Union, such as Switzerland, and Norway? Would a Swiss citizen be repatriated, or would be serve his sentence in Spain? Would a Czech citizen in Norway be sent back to the Czech Republic? In all these cases, the criminal is convicted, and sentenced to jail time in the country in which the offense was committed.

This may or may not seem like a rudimentary question, but I do not know where to begin to look for useful information. Any help would be appreciated. Thank you in advance.

What I'd like to do is find the amount of pixels in a selected area on GIMP (GNU Imagine Manipulation Program). When using the rectangular select tool, it shows the height and width in pixels, so it's easy enough to calculate the area then, but no information is given when I use a tool like select by color to select a non-rectangular area.

I'm dealing with small, irregularly shaped areas of a large image, so counting pixels, dividing the areas up into boxes, or any mechanical process such as that would likely take me all night. Is there any way in which I can get the program to display the area of an irregularly shaped selection?

Oeste is the Portuguese word for "west." Now, the Latin word is "occidens," but I feel that the Portuguese word, as well as the equivalent term used in many other modern Italic languages is much more Germanic. I'm wondering if perhaps "oeste" can be traced back to the Germanic groups which dominated the Iberian peninsula, as well as much of Europe, in the period following the fall of Rome, in which the Romance languages began to grow distinct from Latin Vulgate. I read on a Spanish website that "oeste" derives directly from the English "west," but I find this hard to believe, considering how it's also reflected in other Romance languages. It seems more likely to me that each Romance language inherited the word from an earlier West, or East Germanic language.

A few comparisons:

Portuguese (Ibero-Romance): oeste

Spanish (Ibero-Romance): oeste

Catalan (Ibero-Romance): oest

French (Gallo-Romance): ouest

Italian (Italo-Dalmatian): ovest

Romanian (Eastern Romance): vest

(note that the voiced labial-velar approximant cannot be denoted by a single letter in any of these Romance languages)

German (West Germanic): westen

Old High German (West Germanic): westar

Dutch (West Germanic): west

Norwegian (North Germanic): vest

Swedish (North Germanic): vaster

I think it's safe to assume that the Proto-Germanic was something like *westan.

I don't know the Proto-Indo-European, but I think that neither "occidens," nor "westar" are from the PIE root for west, considering that no other branch of the Indo-European family (to the best of my knowledge) commonly uses a native word resembling either.

It should also be noted that both Spanish and Portuguese contain direct derivatives of "occidens" as well as this more Germanic word. (occidente, and ocidental, respectively)

This may seem like an odd inquiry, but I have a few questions about imprisonment and trial in Switzerland. Any links to information that may be useful to me, in English, or in French, would be greatly helpful as well.

Firstly, can a criminal be detained while awaiting trial? If so, for how long, and would he be placed in prison with other already convicted criminals?

Secondly, how much time typically elapses before an offender faces trial for a possible crime?

Lastly, what are some regulations surrounding when one is eligible for parole?

I'd like to know the most accurate equivalency of the English word "farewell" that there is in Irish. I.e. what would one say when taking leave of an Irish-speaking person with whom he is very close, but may never see again.

I would also be interested in any way of saying goodbye in Old Irish. Please state your sources if giving Old Irish.

I own MW2 for the Xbox 360. I've downloaded both the update and new map pack, but I'm currently unable to be put into a match of any game type on Xbox Live.

Were I to search for suitable games of Team Deathmatch, the search would consistently return 0/50 good games found. If the game type was Search and Destroy, Domination, or any other game mode, the same thing would occur.

I understand that the update caused some problems for other players' Xbox Live accounts, but I can't find anything on the web about anyone else experiencing this particular problem. This has also been occurring for nearly 24 hours now-- ever since the update was downloaded. The internet claims that all of the glitches caused by the update that any website specifically addresses have been fixed. 24 hours is an unusually long time to be left experiencing this kind of problem, no?

Can anyone suggest any possible causes or solutions for this?

I recently downloaded a very lengthy (over 500 pages in print) text on the Tajik language. However, the file extension is .djvu, which I have never seen before.

What type of program can open these files?

So, for a while I'd been bothered by the meaning of the word "shodam" in Persian, and today I remembered where I'd heard it and what it meant. It was in the title of a Persian film that is translated to English as "The Day I Became a Woman." I decided to search the film, as I assumed the Persian title was "Ruz ke zan shodam" (روز که زن شدم) but I soon discovered that the title was actually "Ruzi ke zan shodam" (روزی که زن شدم).

I know that the enclitic marker -i is added to the end of Persian words when they are being modified by other words. For example, "boroni abr" would be "rain cloud" (most of my vocabulary is Tajik, I apologize if these words are not used in Farsi) and "duxtari xushruy" would be "beautiful girls."

Why is it ruzi rather than ruz here? Is it because ruz is being modified by the adjectival clause (ke zan shodam) or is it an entirely different grammatical structure?

As an avid player of solitaire, I'm quite curious. I once read that every possible set up for a standard game of solitaire can be won with the right combination of moves. Now, I recall playing about three games in the course of my life where I'm almost certain that not a SINGLE move could be made, and I've played a handful more where only a few moves seemed possible.

Can anyone shed some light on this?

I understand that it is set out in the Quran that no Muslim should consume alcohol. I'm a bit curious as to the reasons given for this order, and I do not know where to look on the internet or in a book to find out more about the reasoning behind it.

I'm currently working on a short story in which the main character is Muslim and I would like to better understand why he is abject to the consumption of alcohol.

I've recently begun to study the Tajik language, and have had a good deal of trouble finding learning materials. I've decoded a few hundred words of the Tajik lexicon myself, but my knowledge of grammar is a bit wanting as I have only found the slightest bits of information on it.

Would anyone be able to direct me to any online resources that could aid me in my studies? Anything written in Russian would also be appreciated.

I cannot make heads or tails of the Tamil script-- would anyone be able to transliterate (write in the Latin alphabet or IPA) some basic Tamil words for me?

1. மகன் 2. நெருப்பு 3. நீர் 4. பல் 5. கண் 6. குதிரை 7. முகில் 8. கோதுமை 9. இறைச்சி 10. ஆண் 11. இதயம் 12. நாக்கு 13. தாய் 14. தந்தை 15. கடவுள் 16. சூரியன் 17. நிலா 18. மொழி 19. வானம்

I would also appreciate it if anyone could write the words for "small", "good", "head", "foot" and "hand" for me in both Tamil script and Latin (or IPA). In addition, any links to websites that could help me learn to read Tamil would be welcome.

Would I be able to grow papaver somniferum (Opium poppies) or papaver nudicaule (Iceland poppies) indoors in a flower pot or a flower box? Or would it be possible to grow them outdoors at this time of year? If they can be grown indoors, would I be able to transplant them into my garden at some point?