Darn, the one in my neighborhood isn't on the list.
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 2:44 PM on July 18, 2008

The number of posts in this thread demonstrates just how much anti-fat energy there is in society.

Can you imagine if all that energy, that contempt, that disgust, could be directed at the actual reasons for the recent increase in fatness? At McDonalds, and Cargill, and the farm bill structure? If it was as socially unacceptable to walk into a Jack in the Box, skinny or fat or neither, as it currently is to weigh 500 lbs?
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 3:22 PM on July 14, 2008

Could it be people who drive Humvees, own 20,000 square foot mini-mansions in the suburbs, and own boats, and four wheelers are simply filled with shame? Just like morbidly obese people?

Whenever I see someone drinking a Coke I think of them as sitting rather comically in the driver's seat of a little tiny Hummer.

Then again, I'm an asshole that way.
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 3:34 PM on July 14, 2008

Now availability of cheap food is the problem?

Yes. And yes, of course I'm serious. When the cheapest calories are also the least healthy, there is a problem.

There is nothning wrong with eating a burger. There is nothing wrong with Jack in the box

There are a great many reasons to disagree vehemently with you on both of those points, and I do, but the one that's most relevant... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 3:38 PM on July 14, 2008

[Advertising] may make them THINK they are hungry, but being easily led by advertising is a human failing of the consumer, not of the advertiser.

On the individual level, you have a point, and if you want to walk around pointing your finger at individual people and saying "BAD fat man" in a stern voice, far be it from me to stop you.

At the level of large groups of people, whether advertising makes people hungry or... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 3:48 PM on July 14, 2008

Not necessarily. But I would definitely disagree with the extrapolation that people being fat is the fault of Well-marketed, cheap, unhealthy food and its availability, as they are completely different things.

Then I think we're just talking past each other without any real disagreement. We both agree that the availability and acceptability of cheap, lousy food can lead to fatness on a societal scale. When you're thinking of "fault",... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 4:05 PM on July 14, 2008

It is a tiny proportion of shelving space in your average food mart/supermarket that is actually left for real food, rather than processed shit.

My understanding is that this has a lot to do with the need for big growers to dump massive amounts of subsidized commodity crops (mainly corn & soy) into the economy. You can get people to eat a lot more calories (and therefore more actual tonnage of crops) if you reduce the bulk down to something that... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 4:23 PM on July 14, 2008

After all, obesity is most prevalent among the poorest Americans, who almost by definition consume less than the skinny elite.

OK, who gave this joker a forum? Slate? "Almost by definition" != "actually", if you're talking about raw calorie consumption. Nutrition is a different matter.
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 4:02 PM on July 10, 2008

Yep, memepool.
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 9:11 AM on July 10, 2008

Damn that story for being so interesting that I had to read the whole thing, because the writing was atrocious:

And, though terribly injured, the two men had each other -- Farmer with his strength, Johnston with his exacting will. Half of each man made nearly a whole to get them down the mountain.

Oh, come on.
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 9:48 AM on July 9, 2008

I think it's awesome that you and I both chose the same format for our condemnation, D_W. Condemn, quote, react.

"Lovely, isn't it?" Johnston says, curving around mountains that once were open and inviting before turning dark and hungry.

Retch.
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 9:54 AM on July 9, 2008

Poisonous snakes and fish shimmering in the creeks.

Poisonous Snakes in the creek... Tough fucking country...

It's worse than that -- poisonous shimmering fish in the creeks!
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 10:09 AM on July 9, 2008

Adding that the photo of the Wapiti Shelter (#6 in the photo gallery link) is the photographic equivalent of the prose style.

Wow. I'm so glad you pointed those out, I had missed them. They're all pretty over the top. I've never seen trail signs look so menacing. Or a guy on a phone. Or a house.
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 10:45 AM on July 9, 2008

I poked through the comments on the WaPo article, to see if they were raking this writer over the coals as much as we are. There's some of that, but a lot of the posts are about how crazy you'd have to be to go hiking without a gun. The implication seems to be that everyone who heads up into the mountains, or perhaps even out their front door, should be armed at all times.

I'm not sure how that would have helped in either of the incidents described... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 11:17 AM on July 9, 2008

Many people already go into the mountains armed for protection

I'm sure you'll tell me that I'm being naive, but I very seriously doubt that that's true in my neck of the woods. I'm quite sure it is true in Utah, where I used to live. There are a lot of reasons I don't still live there, and the gun culture is one of them. I knew some seriously messed-up people with concealed-weapon permits in that place.
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 12:50 PM on July 9, 2008

Well it would be foolish to deny that there's /anybody/ in the mountains with guns around here, and in sheer numbers I suppose it probably is /many/ people. But it would take some convincing for me to believe that more than 5% or so of hikers/backpackers are packing heat. And it would be very depressing.
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 1:18 PM on July 9, 2008

Obviously, it's a personal choice, and if you don't like guns, by all means, don't carry one... but very depressing? I don't get that.

I find it a depressing idea because, if all these people up in the mountains are carrying guns, it implies that they buy into the same picture of the wilderness that you described: "drug running, poaching, theft, and similar crimes... not to mention the wild animals, off-leash dogs, drunks, and other occasional... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 3:27 PM on July 9, 2008

(And since I'm a vegetarian, I pack in more food and would get less use out of shooting stuff to eat)

Well, you could always shoot the tips off of fiddlehead ferns. It gives them a nice smoky flavor.
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 3:56 PM on July 9, 2008

I think it's just about comfort level with firearms. I am uncomfortable with firearms, so a situation in which I would feel obliged to carry one is, for me, a very unpleasant situation that I would avoid. If I were more comfortable with firearms in general, I might think nothing of bringing one into the woods.

That is to say, I am /also/ not the kind of person who would carry a gun to the grocery store, or to a crappy neighborhood, in case something bad happened... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 4:54 PM on July 9, 2008

I'd just like to point out how vaguelly nasty the phrase "slyt kittens" sounds.
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 5:13 PM on July 7, 2008

There are plenty of terrible directors out there. Michael Bay deserves the hate, not because he's so terrible, but because studios are entrusting him with properties that he proceeds to crap all over.

I quite liked Armageddon as a popcorn movie, despite the fact that it was mindless, because it wasn't defecating on a part of my childhood.
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 4:06 PM on July 7, 2008

I disagree, let them do it. No better way to illustrate what a con-job religion is.

Right now this is a very minor story. I've been following it for months, but that's because I'm a church-state geek. No one outside the community of these master manipulators and the people who hate them gives a rat's ass at this point.

But if one or more these guys actually get their tax-exempt status taken from them, or even has to pay... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 11:15 AM on July 7, 2008

This reminds me of the caricatures of Emmanuel Goldstein and the Two Minutes Hate in 1984. Except in the end I guess he wasn't real....
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 8:58 AM on July 3, 2008

Wow, what a bunch of killjoys. OK, in addition to all the concerns leveled already, presumably parts wear out periodically, and they have to be replaced, and the replacement parts have to be machined, and the machining (not to mention materials extraction) probably takes way more energy per year than the coaster could "generate" in a thousand years.

Fine, well and good, it's no free energy lunch. But it's still cool! And it's not as big... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 10:46 AM on July 2, 2008

Wait, so a postal worker died due to a bite on the hand from a medium-sized dog? Was the postal worker as geriatric as the dog was by that point?
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 9:36 AM on July 2, 2008

I like some of what this guy has to say -- he's been on NPR a lot lately -- but I really hate that the metaphor du jour for something that's really important seems to be "war". Can't it just be really really important action against climate change?
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 7:12 AM on July 2, 2008

This kind of reaction is silly and overblown, but I do remember being surprised, during the movie, how straightforward Pixar was about the politics. The captain of the ship even throws out a "stay the course" line at one point, which (though I agree with the viewpoint) felt kind of tacked-on.

I was also wondering, during the movie, if the sedentary over-consuming schlubs that the movie was aimed at would realize that it was aimed at them and get offended. I... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 11:52 AM on July 1, 2008

You live in Seattle? See it at the Bay on Friday night?

Because that's what the guy behind me said to his wife/GF/whatever.

For a minute there I thought I was your mystery commenter, dw, but then I remembered that we saw Wall-E at the Metro instead of the Bay.

Then again, I imagine geeks everywhere were making that kind of comment after Presto. After being primed by... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 2:59 PM on July 1, 2008

Huh? I'm on the nutty left and The Incredibles is one of my favorite films; currently my favorite animated film. Why would anyone on the nutty left have a problem with The Incredibles? Brad Bird rocks.

I love The Incredibles, but I don't think it fits too well with my worldview. Not so much the Ayn Rand stuff, but the celebration of the nuclear family and traditional gender roles, the fact that they made a nasty villain out of a misfit geeky kid,... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 3:29 PM on July 1, 2008

Since I seem to have provoked a strong reaction, I'll explain in particular what I don't like about what happens to Violet's character. True, at the beginning she's limited by her shyness and less confident, and at the end she's able to approach the guy she likes and even take charge when he stumbles. That's great.

But also, at the beginning she's different-looking and -acting, while at the end she's dressing in nice soft purples and doing the same thing with her... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 4:30 PM on July 1, 2008

gurple - so basically she's not a goth?

Yeah, pretty much.
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 4:36 PM on July 1, 2008

At the end at the track meet, it's not that she's trying to look like the other girls. She still could care less looking like the other girls. She just doesn't have to hide anymore. That's not conforming. That's growth!

I think the great thing about these movies is that we even bothered to read so much into the minutiae like this. I don't think any one interpretation is necessarily "correct", and I doubt everyone involved in the film, or... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 6:04 PM on July 1, 2008

"Football" as a verb always sounds vaguely dirty, to me.
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 1:14 PM on June 30, 2008

The "narrative" link bugs me. This labyrinth could be solved pretty easily by pulling yourself up on top and walking along the walls. Even if the walls /were/ "twice the height of a man" it seems like you could just ask somebody for a boost. If there's some narrative device to prevent that, it doesn't come through in the artwork, which makes the artwork seem pretty silly....
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 9:27 AM on June 30, 2008

I saw this "End of Suburbia" movie in my video store and almost rented it. Then I decided that the warm glow of smugness and self-congratulation might still not be worth my hour spent watching it if it isn't objectively a decently made/researched movie.

Anybody seen this movie? Is it any good?
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 1:02 PM on June 25, 2008

How much gas do city dwellers burn doing endless loops around their neighborhoods looking for a spot, I wonder?

I hear you. I burn a lot of calories looping around the neighborhood looking for a spot to eat.

Oh, you said "gas". Never mind.
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 2:01 PM on June 25, 2008

Oh, man, I loved that show. Thanks!
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 3:37 PM on June 23, 2008

Oh, man, for a minute I thought Steve Jackson and Steve Jackson were the same person.

Given that the UK guy works at Lionhead now, that would be way too much awesome for one person. Even with the "Fighting Fantasy" silliness.
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 12:50 PM on June 23, 2008

Penny Arcade seems to be handling this very appropriately -- not making a stink, but pointing it out.

Of course, they've had their own IP issues recently (scroll down to Gabe's "An Apology" post).
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 10:21 AM on June 20, 2008

So much Penny Arcade hate here! Why? I wouldn't say they're my favorite thing ever, and they tend to run jokes into the ground, but they generally give me a chuckle three times a week, which is more than I can say for most webcomics.

Are they really so popular in some circles that people try to shove Penny Arcade down their friends' throats? That would be annoying, I guess.
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 10:28 AM on June 20, 2008

So alien was his experience to me, so unguessable his values, so mysterious his very language, that I couldn’t succeed in engaging him in a few minutes of small talk before he got down to work.

This guy, and lunit, apparently attended a parallel universe Ivy League rather than the one I attended. Hello across the quantum divide, my parallel friends! If parallel me has a beard, tell him he has to shave it off, because I called it first!... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 10:43 AM on June 18, 2008

Wasn't that the author's point?

Seemed to me it was half his point. The other half was crap like My education taught me to believe that people who didn’t go to an Ivy League or equivalent school weren’t worth talking to, regardless of their class.

I don't think these two things (opportunity and misanthropy) are coupled as tightly as he seems to think they are.

Meh. Some people,... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 10:56 AM on June 18, 2008

I know that they all have CS programs but I don't know anyone who graduated from one of them.

I did (Yale's). I can't speak for it now, but back in the late 90s it was a pretty small undergrad program (<5>reasons people went to Yale -- Lit, History, etc.

I probably could have gotten a better CS education a lot of other places (I decided on my major pretty late), but I'm glad to have had access to those other departments.
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 1:25 PM on June 18, 2008

Wow, my earlier comment got mangled. Forgot to escape my <. Let me try again:

I know that they all have CS programs but I don't know anyone who graduated from one of them.

I did (Yale's). I can't speak for it now, but back in the late 90s it was a pretty small undergrad program (less than 50 per year). There were some professors there doing interesting research, and one or two profs who could teach pretty well, but it... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 1:28 PM on June 18, 2008

On Science Friday last week, Shyamalan tried to slip one by Joe Palca, asserting that Einstein had become conventionally religious later in life. I sometimes spend the Palca episodes wishing Ira Flatow were back, but to his credit, Joe was taking none of M. Night's shit (program link).
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 9:15 AM on June 18, 2008

If you're Ted Hagee, you probably wouldn't consider that a safe call.

I fear a world that contains a reproductive combination of Ted Haggard and John Hagee.
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 1:44 PM on June 17, 2008

Whoah. This is put out by an outfit whose name is INRI, followed by the letter most like a cross? I guess those guys have been in some particularly excruciatingtraffic jams.
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 1:32 PM on June 17, 2008

As skeptical as I am of a beer writer who claims to have a "favourite beer style", this is unbelievably awesome. Thanks for the post!
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 9:38 AM on June 17, 2008

This is what's great about beer: so many different types to like that are so different from each other, and so many regional variations. No palate is right or wrong except the palate that refuses to try everything.
My beer snobbery was forged on the west coast, but that doesn't mean I can't enjoy the hell out of a Harpoon or a Saranac when I'm in the area.

I was about to make a jackass comment about what it would take to get me to drink a pitcher of High... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 12:52 PM on June 17, 2008

So, this work represents the majesty and grandeur of large-scale energy consumption to no useful purpose? I like it!
posted to MetaFilter by gurple at 1:20 PM on June 16, 2008