By the way, the answer to the problem was: yes, it would be grounds for a public insult case (not surprising in Taiwan). 
Whoa, I just now noticed this link. Again, brilliant find!
Hi all, random question. What’s the nuanced difference between these 3 sentences?
我需要15分鐘洗澡
我花15分鐘洗澡
洗澡花我15分鐘
I need 15 minutes to shower.
I spent 15 minutes showering.
Same meaning different sentence order.
This one sounds a bit weird
Would be a little better with a 了.
This is such textbook Chinese. No one talks like this. Only Chinese textbooks.
Why not 我洗澡需要15分鐘 or 我洗澡會花15分鐘？
The same structure is more commonly utilized like 光洗澡就花了我15分鐘
Why bother learning this kind of stuff? I’ve never heard it used in real life. There is no reason to waste time learning structures that are not used commonly by most people. “我洗澡花了15分鐘” is probably the most normal if you’re only talking about how long it took for you to shower. “…需要15分鐘” is good for the amount of time you need to be able to shower or if you’re telling someone how much time you’ll need in a moment to before you’ll be done showering. Everything else is just dumb shit that people don’t say in real life.
Cool thanks for everyone’s input.
I was wondering if there was a subtle difference between 我花 and 花我 as I saw the latter in a textbook. Good to know that I can basically ignore it.
The 光__就___ structure is very common.
光洗澡就花了我15分鐘 has the meaning of “Just taking a shower alone took me 15 minutes” which cannot be conveyed with 我洗澡花了15分鐘 or 我洗澡需要15分鐘. You also cannot put 光 in front of those constructions to get the “just doing that alone took me a long time” meaning unless you use the 光_____就花了___ sentence structure.
Some other sample sentences from news articles after a quick google search
三天下來光餐費就花了930元
光倒車入庫就花了20多分鐘
光是調查就花了6千萬
光車位就花了3700萬元
There’s also a Chinese Stack Exchange thread on what’s the difference between 光寫這份提綱就花了我一個月的時間 and 寫這份提綱花了我一個月的時間.
I guess you could say that the first is slightly more active and the second slightly more passive.
Yep. Maybe not super colloquial, but very common.