This sums up my experience travelling and living abroad.
To your point on vocab choice: if I use vocab not present/with different meaning in American English I would get blank stares so I often switch to the American term e.g. mobile phone vs cell phone.
To your other point about local slang: I recently learned South Africans call traffic lights "robots", which I thought was fantastic.
I had a similar experiences to you on both accords:
1. It wasn't until a class aged 14 where I heard the word 'chasm' spoken aloud and realised I had it wrong all those years.
2. It took me a some time to realise a word which sounded like 'rederick' was actually rhetoric.
A few months back I opened a link to a new article using an in-app browser (no ad-blockers). I kid you not, upon initial load the entireiy of the screen was ads or "annoyances". The one thing missing was the entire reason I clicked on the link.
What tricks and tips do you find help you with that? I've yet to find a silver bullet. I found forcing myself not to sit on a task for hours on end and physically moving when fatigue sets in (something incredibly difficult to notice when one is fatigued).
This looks like a neat idea! A couple of questions if you don't mind:
1. Does the pass apply to the Firefox version too?
2. When you say "It works with Kindle books..." what do you mean? On desktop only? (My) Kindle doesn't have colour.
I'm curious to hear what you think about the Therac-25 situation because the line between a code change and fatalities isn't as clear cut as with Challenger, but definitely still there.
How do you distinguish between those who have and those who haven't received the original? I'm going to hazard a guess that "Staying hydrated" is sufficient obscure that they ask you about it.