Is it just me or did Sydney sound like he could have come from North Dakota?

Yes! Definitely that region, or northern Minnesota. He sounded very American.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 6:28 PM on October 20, 2007

Um, this links to NOTHING.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 4:06 PM on October 8, 2007

Some of my best friends are black nerds.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 1:14 PM on July 30, 2007

Wow. The Beatles wore tight pants. I'd like to see a closeup of that.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 9:14 PM on May 9, 2007

Portland meetup, anyone?
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 7:05 PM on May 4, 2007

So ... is there any way to know which over-the-counter products contain ingredients made overseas?
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 5:56 PM on May 1, 2007

.
.
.

I know it's solipsism to seek connections between this tragedy and my real life, but I can't help it. My mom's neighbor can't get a hold of her son, a master's student in engineering. My brother can't reach some of his friends. They're probably fine. My mom says phone lines are down because of the high winds. But the uncertainties, the temporary absences .... I don't know.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 11:31 AM on April 16, 2007

Livejournal of a current VT student.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 12:17 PM on April 16, 2007

Another livejournal. It sounds like students on campus are pretty frustrated with the way this was handled.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 12:33 PM on April 16, 2007

As someone who has personally met both Sarah Aswell and Fred Beukema (and who logged on this morning hoping to post this link, grrrr), I can vouch for the fact that that they both exist and are not the same person.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 7:19 AM on March 13, 2007

Yeah, I still don't know how this guy tracked people down. I know Sarah and Fred both wrote for the Grinnell College newspaper, another guy I knew who received one of these letters was profiled in the paper. Maybe that's how the Duclod man got people's names?
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 8:05 AM on March 13, 2007

hydroponic: Grinnell has only about 1,500 students, and I think it was closer to 1,300-1,400 when Fred wrote his article. It's pretty easy to know what's going on on campus.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 12:22 PM on March 13, 2007

So the "Grinnellian sense of humor" involves making gay people feel threatened?

Quite the opposite in my experience.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 6:25 AM on March 16, 2007

Languagehat: I'm not sure why you're being so combative. Grinnell is one of the most gay-friendly, nurturing campuses in the country.

There are a number of current or former Grinnellians who have posted here. None of us have posted, "Chuckle, chuckle, it's a gay joke, screw the folks who don't get it." The tone has been more of bewilderment and puzzlement, and a little bit of uneasiness. Grinnell had marches and candle light vigils a couple of times when I was... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 7:45 AM on March 17, 2007

I've been taking zinc for colds, after reading about some scientific studies that suggested its effective. But a quick google shows that there are some doubts about its effectiveness and safety. Meh.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 10:51 AM on January 16, 2007

Discussion at the Sax on the Web forums.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 5:43 PM on January 13, 2007

*sigh* ... The Wayback Machine doesn't have my first web site.

Actually, I think that's a good thing.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 12:41 AM on January 6, 2007

I love how all these people poop on the toilet seat or poke their crap with a stick. I pay so little attention to my shit that I have no idea if it can do tricks or not. If it can, I'm not gonna post its tricks on the internets.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 7:49 PM on December 16, 2006

The local paper did a great job covering the demolition -- from the time it was announced through to the end. The paper -- The Daily News (which at one point one a Pulitzer Prize and this year swept a Washington state journalism contest) -- also explained the politics, science and cultural myths behind the cooling tower and Trojan power plant, and provided public space for people to talk about the event.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 7:36 PM on May 22, 2006

The cooling tower never contained any radioactive materials. While the plant was operating, from 1976 to its shutdown in 1993, nuclear fission reactions took place in a dome-topped containment building next to the cooling tower. Heat from the fission turned water into steam, and this steam turned turbines to generate power.

The nonradioactive steam was then channeled into the hollow cooling tower, where it would circulate until it cooled back into water.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 7:39 PM on May 22, 2006

Say it ain't so, Homer!

As the Lower Columbia region readies for the May 21 implosion of the Trojan Nuclear Plant's cooling tower, a long held-belief about its brush with television fame may crumble along with it.

Many -- in the region and throughout the Internet -- have long claimed that Trojan was the inspiration for the nuclear power plant where Homer Simpson munches donuts and naps while he's supposed to be monitoring control panels.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 7:41 PM on May 22, 2006

This is my favorite ancient sex law -- don't have a source, but I'll never forget it from college:

In at least one early Protestant colony in the Eastern pre-U.S. bestiality with goats was outlawed with the following punishment: death to the person and death to the goat. Poor goat!
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 9:29 PM on April 15, 2006

This page has been around for a long time. I found it many years ago, before I had learned much about how men work, and I found it incredibly informative at the time.

Remember, those of you who say that all this stuff is common knowledge: for the female half of the population this is not common knowledge at all (except the "men sure masterbate a lot" part). Jackniworld 's enlightening, informative and entertaining.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 11:26 PM on November 26, 2005

Wow, awesome. Thanks for the link to the flash games blog, too.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 1:12 PM on November 26, 2005

Well, I'm a heterosexual woman and I think it looks hot.

I like Annie Proulx's stories. I like Ang Lee's directing. I like hot naked men, especially when there's a compelling story. It sounds like this movie has what I want. My heterosexual boyfriend says he's willing to see it with me, but he's not really all that enthusiastic so I may find a woman friend to watch it with.

Ang Lee has already proven his ability to do smart movies with gay main... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 3:09 PM on November 20, 2005

I just want to be able to say "I was here," some day. I've missed so many blue events, ever since I became a convert to the green. But today I leave my mark.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 7:27 PM on November 18, 2005

As a woman whose had experience with a limited range of penises, and who is promising herself to one penis forever soon, I totally love this sight.

It's so nice to see normal looking dicks. I am surprised by how many of the fellows on these pages seem to shave down there.

Also, I am now much more motivated to make sure my sweetheart avoids gaining weight. It never occured to me to think about how penis size is affected by obeisity before.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 8:15 PM on October 24, 2005

I met a guy who makes $7.15 an hour working part time in a town 20 miles from where he lives. He ran out of gas on the way home from work, and walked the final 6 miles. Do you "what's the problem US of A" people hate him?

It seems to me that the folks who can afford Hummers aren't actually hurting all that much. They already have a lot of cash, plus they generally have at least one other, more fuel-effient, car to drive until the price of gas goes down.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 10:00 PM on September 7, 2005

On the other hand, I know a guy who was fucked up for a while on meth. He saw his friends wasting their lives, and he decided to get off the stuff. After dropping out of high school in his teens, he worked to get to college in his mid-20s and has now earned the first of what I expect will be many degrees. It's possible his short-term memory was fried by the drug, or maybe he never had much short-term memory in the first place. But he's doing better than a lot of folks who never touch drugs.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 11:56 PM on January 26, 2005

These are beautiful images, and a nice break from all the unverifiable / pseudo-news / conspiracy theory front page posts populating Metafilter right now.

I just had dinner at a Persian restaurant, where there was framed calligraphy on the walls, next to elaborate woven rugs, some of them with human and animal figures on them.

The world is awash with cultural contradictions.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 12:30 AM on December 7, 2004

Usually if you are applying for a job that tests its hires, they inform you the minute you get an interview. But they don't test you until they offer you the job.

Unless you are really heavy (some drugs are stored in fat) or a really heavy user, you should be able to stop using and go on an intense water regimine in order to pass the pee test by the time the interview process is over.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 10:49 AM on November 9, 2004

If you're crafting your X-mas presents this year, you're getting started around three months too late, though.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 9:51 PM on November 4, 2004

Do any other not-obese people go around hearing all the bad news and wonder when the other shoe is going to drop? I'm not fat, but it's not because I'm particularly fit or because I eat all that well. It's like, any minute now I could balloon up and become part of the epidemic. Until them, I go around feeling lucky and grateful.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 11:28 PM on October 24, 2004

They haven't posted it online yet, but a local Portland tv network just reported that people have been going around registering Republicans to vote and refusing to even give the registration forms to non-Republicans.

The secretary of state (Bill Bradbury) came on the screen, saying that Oregon law prohibits people involved in registering voters from refusing to register people based on party.

Of course Bradbury, a strident Democrat, has made a... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 11:30 PM on October 12, 2004

As Romanesko put it in his link, Hannity apparently has found a jet he likes--to Utah Valley State College.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 8:33 PM on October 9, 2004

Excuse me for being probably obnoxious, but this was so I am sharing this with everyone I know.

I work near Mount St. Helens, and I got to fly up in a Cesna and look into the volcano's crater after the eruption.

It was awesome and exciting.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 10:45 PM on October 1, 2004

I'd wager the guards with real guns would probably scatter your brains

When was the last time you saw guards in a bank? Around here, homeless people rob banks by telling the tellers to empty their cash drawers, "or else." A woman with a mysterious buldge in her pocket and a baseball cap that obscured her face robbed more than half a dozen banks by standing in line, asking for money and leaving.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 10:13 AM on September 12, 2004

While researching liquified natural gas, I recently learned that in the right circumstances an LNG explosion could create a four-mile blast radius. That leads me to think possibly 2.5 mile mushroom cloud could be from any of a number of things--including a really big non-nuclear bomb or an industrial accident.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 12:37 AM on September 12, 2004

Has anyone else here read Greg Palast's book, "The Best Democracy Money Can Buy"? The back cover proclaims it a great work of journalism, but most of Palast's "investigations" amount to tracking down obscure documents and drawing untenable conclusions from them. By arguing that unconnected dots are hard and fast evidence, he does his cause more harm than good. I don't take anything he says seriously.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 8:08 AM on September 7, 2004

I think you can still by Coke syrup at grocery stores and Wal-Marts, too. My mom has always had a bottle of the stuff in a medicine cabinet. It works.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 8:48 PM on August 31, 2004

The village of Holcomb stands on the high wheat plains of western Kansas, a lonesome area that other Kansans call "out there." Some seventy miles east of the Colorado border, the countryside, with its hard blue skies and desert-clear air, has an atmosphere that is rather more Far Western than Middle West. The local accent is barbed with a prarie twang, a ranch-hand nasalness, and the men, many of them, wear narrow frontier trousers, Stetsons, and high-heeled boots with... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 5:35 PM on August 29, 2004

I moved a lot and went to a different school each year from fifth through eighth grade. I think every year in there I was assigned to read "Where the Red Fern Grows." I may have enjoyed it the first time, I don't know. But I do know that when it was assigned for the fourth time in four years I got permission to move up to the advanced reading class so I wouldn't have to deal with it any more.

When I was that age, I was really into reading young-person... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 5:19 PM on August 29, 2004

One of the things that I appreciate about Islam is that it allows divorce, recognizing that just because a marriage fails it doesn't mean you are a sinner. The last page of the article touches on some creative uses of the doctrine by young people who don't want to have sex outside marriage.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 4:59 PM on August 29, 2004

I feel like I'm surrounded by Lincoln all of a sudden. Did everybody else watch C-SPAN in-depth with the Lincoln biographer, too?
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 5:33 PM on June 7, 2004

Sure, there are some real problems with being a hillbilly, based on the few I've gotten to know. Many are poor. Many are badly educated. But they're just as smart and interested as most other people. And culturally they inhabit an interesting and shrinking place in society.

The Christian stuff I see on this site is about how believers should live their own lives, not how they should impose their beliefs on others. I don't have a problem with that.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 1:17 PM on May 16, 2004

I don't think it's just meat. I remember a med school student telling me that toast can cause cancer--the act of toasting bread produces carcinogens, though I'm not sure how potent they are.

Life causes death.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 2:54 PM on May 16, 2004

Aaak! Everyone thinks I'm in my 30s! (I'm 26). At least I still get carded at the liquor store.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 5:09 PM on May 8, 2004

Couldn't this easily be used against all the various legal ways of joining two people (joint ownership of property, two-person adoption, power of attorney, etc)

I don't know about adoption or power of attorney, but Virginia already bans same sex ownership of certain types of property. Only married couples are allowed to buy homes together. The Washington Post did a story about a year ago about two elderly sisters unable to take out a mortgage together... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 11:13 PM on April 26, 2004

Only married couples are allowed to buy homes together.

Clarification: I believe it's the mortgage laws, not the ownersihp laws, that require people to be married. So rich gay people, siblings, or friends could probably pay cash and buy together. But if you need a mortgage that's another story.
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 11:14 PM on April 26, 2004

Yay Beth! I'm the daughter of a lactation consultant and La Leche League Leader. This may have contributed to my desire to never have children, but if I ever do I'd definitely breast feed.

Here's another nursing tidbit: When babies feed at their mother's breasts, some of the child's saliva is absorbed by the woman. On some probably not-yet-explained by science level the mother's body interprets information for the baby's saliva and adapts to the child's needs, providing... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by croutonsupafreak at 10:24 AM on March 26, 2004