Goodness! I was actually going to finish my dual-posted message addressing all of VaeliusNoctu's comments, except that I was doing it in sections with the "edit" button but before I could submit a final post my internet service died, courtesy of a nasty winter storm. I didn't have Internet for several days, and got back online just now.
@Ain Soph Aur: Thanks for jumping in while I was offline.
Side note: For those that know German for real, how close (awful) was my grammer? Was I even partially understandable?
As for posting in English with a translator, I personally don't mind if it is double-posted (or whatever you want to call it) in two languages at once, in fact in my case it makes it easier because I can compare both versions and grab pieces from both to get the whole message better - but Mattn should make the final decision on forum posting guidelines.