There's a well-known one for the statute of frauds:

MY LEGS: Marriage, Year, Lease (or Land), Executor, Goods, Surety
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 2:51 PM on July 16, 2008

Main thing is, if you're sure you want it, buy it NOW and figure out storage while it's in the mail. Seriously — this isn't the dotcom boom anymore, but I think you'll still find a lot of well-heeled Douglas Adams fans out there.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 6:32 AM on July 16, 2008

Softlord: Thanks, but I should have been clearer: I don't want to link individual words or phrases automatically, I want to automatically include a couple of links to books at the end of each post. Definitely still an advertisement, but something closer to a "Possibly related posts" section than Snap or Kontera links.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 5:44 AM on July 16, 2008

Not really what you're looking for, but my favorite acoustic that I've ever owned was a twelve-string strung with only six strings.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 7:30 AM on July 15, 2008

There's no tense as such, but what about "will be yet" and then the action's infinitive form?

e.g., "Even following the investigation, his resignation will be yet to come."

The fact that that sentence is so awkward indicates that we speakers of English, lacking a compact verb tense to capture that meaning, would work around it completely in a way that's appropriate in the context (here, something like "He will surely... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 3:54 PM on July 9, 2008

From an acoustic standpoint:

Leo Kottke
John Fahey (deceased)
Robbie Basho.

From the younger generation, with a similar sound:

Sir Richard Bishop
James Blackshaw
Jim O'Rourke.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 8:56 AM on June 27, 2008

For the song that embodies Jofus' "un-remarkable" comment (but is utterly charming nonetheless), reference "The Biz vs. the Nuge" off the Beastie Boys' Check Your Head.

For the real thing, though, I've never heard a name for it — it's not quite scatting.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 5:09 AM on June 26, 2008

Hmm. That’s definitely on the right track, but it's not shot from a distance, and I'm sure my dad wouldn't have seen an Italian pressing before the advent of the Internet. Just to clarify, he's thinking of an image from an LP he owned himself, and he's lived in the US all his life. Good to have the info on the photo from that site, though.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 7:24 AM on June 24, 2008

Thanks! I'll show him this thread, but I think that must be it.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 9:54 AM on June 24, 2008

Agree with the above. Just check out a few groups that interest you, and get active in one or two — between academics and staying sane, you'll have plenty to do without a full plate of extracurriculars.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 6:23 AM on June 24, 2008

While in the UP, be sure to try a pasty, a delicious Cornish fried pie with potatoes, onions, and beef. The smaller the town where you find the bakery, the better; see here for more.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 1:17 AM on June 24, 2008

(Great idea for a road trip, by the way!)
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 1:20 AM on June 24, 2008

Just another datapoint: I'm almost certain it's from in re, which means "in the matter of" or "concerning."

You occasionally see legal proceedings where there aren't two parties, like A v. B, but instead only one. When an attorney is brought before a court for a disbarment hearing, for instance, I believe it's captioned In re C.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 1:28 PM on June 9, 2008

Of course, I'm amenable to general suggestions about what's good in Wiki design as well, though my first focus is on the front page.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 8:43 AM on June 2, 2008

Thinking more clearly the next morning, it occurred to me that the Mediawiki project itself would almost surely have a page for people to post their own installations, and many of those might have custom designs. Sure nuff.

Of course, unlike Wikimedia's stuff, most of these designs are copyright, so future browsers of this question, take heed.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 3:34 AM on June 3, 2008 marked best answer

Yeah, if the prices have gone up then your landlord will almost certainly raise the rent himself the next time he leases the place. You just have the benefit of a lower, contracted price right now.

Check your lease — almost all of them will say what to do if you need to sublet.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 7:35 AM on May 24, 2008

Could also have been Young Marble Giants or the Pretenders, based on the time and sex of the singer. I think my best guess, though, is Cocteau Twins.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 12:00 PM on May 22, 2008

Upcoming.org? It's user driven, so it will have a lot of smaller-scale stuff.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 11:56 AM on May 22, 2008

Yeah, it's definitely "Breaker," and it's probably not stock — it's common CB lingo and easy enough to produce with a radio microphone. When I think of it, though, the little dispatcher in my head is saying "Breaker four-one-nine, we got a . . ."
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 11:54 AM on May 22, 2008

Aphex Twin videos: Rubber Johnny (this really does make some people uncomfortable, though of course it's all SFX), Come to Daddy, Windowlicker (the first bit is funny, but the crazy starts about four minutes in), Donkey Rhubarb

Though if your audience is hipsters, a few might have already seen these.... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 8:04 AM on May 17, 2008

Does your reference to iCal imply that you're using a Mac? If so, this article on triggering Applescripts with Mail.app might give you a flash of inspiration. iCal is very scriptable...

(One idea: arrange all your alerts to come n days before the due date. Then tell Mail to run a script to create an event n days from today. I don't have Mint set up to email me about reminders, so I don't know their format, but you might be able to pass the subject line to iCal if it... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 10:09 PM on May 16, 2008 marked best answer

You might also like to submit the letter to Chillingeffects.org, a user-driven, user-focused clearinghouse for these C&D letters, founded by the Berkman Center at Harvard Law School. Even if you choose not to add your letter to the database, it's a good source of information.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 9:43 PM on May 16, 2008 marked best answer

I can put in a recommendation for Wainwright Bank — they're like the anti-BoA, I suppose (they really stress the social responsibility angle), and they've been fine for me since I opened account. I have to say, though, if you don't mind having no branches around, try a high-yield money market account with Capital One, which you can open online. They eat your ATM fees, so it's like having free ATMs *everywhere* (even abroad, I believe — I know they eat your foreign currency fee on credit card... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 9:37 PM on May 16, 2008

In almost any situation I would advise you to think rationally and avoid knee jerk reactions, but here I would just leave well alone. The stakes are too high. Don't move in if you can reasonably find a home elsewhere.

Exactly. Whether it's safe or not, if it's going to keep you up at night, then that's reason enough to keep looking elsewhere.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 8:37 AM on May 13, 2008

It's really late, so I can't stay up to type much, and I apologize if this sounds brusque, but read and understand this link. If it were as easy as posting on a message board asking about safe, undervalued stocks, everybody would be doing it, in the same way that if there were a simple, safe way to get a free hundred bucks in the mail, everybody would do that. Word spreads.

Alternatively, think about it like this: buying low and selling high with low risk is... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 12:28 AM on May 13, 2008

No. Of course not. You could die.

And sun-dried tomatoes are awful anyway.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 12:16 AM on May 13, 2008

This is what GTD is best at — reducing the scary piles of stuff surrounding you (virtually and physically) and turning them into simple, actionable items on a to-do list. I would heartily second everything chrisamiller suggests.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 1:09 PM on May 11, 2008

Holy crap, that sounds awesome. I don't think that feature existed when I demo'd OOO a few years ago... Anyway, I came in here to suggest Typinator, but that still requires you to add abbreviations manually. As it stands, I'll watch this thread to see if anyone has an idea.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 8:43 PM on May 9, 2008

A little searching turned up this unresolved Ask.Mefi from 2005. Also of interest may be this Wikipedia article and this one.

My take is, first, it's definitely not as easy as clicking a checkbox in Pages or in MS Word, and I fear that without a solution built into the program, a piece of software running globally wouldn't know what list of words to draw from. As the first article I linked mentioned, if you feed a text-completion program the whole English dictionary,... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 8:59 PM on May 9, 2008

Whoops — that first Wikipedia link should point here. Okay, somebody else talk.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 9:37 PM on May 9, 2008

In case this goes much further than your friends calling the landlord's bluff, make sure they get a local lawyer. Almost all landlord-tenant law exists at the state and local level, and while most states' codes are similar enough to one another, Louisiana is different. General info they might find online, in other words, might not apply to them.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 10:13 PM on May 8, 2008

Yep. You'll love any of Philip Glass' or Erik Satie's piano works. For Glass, his non-piano works have a different sound (you'll know it when I hear it); so take Jaltcoh's advice and start with Metamorphoses. For Satie, I especially like his Gymnopédies (the first of which I think showed up in Rushmore?)

Oh! And don't miss Arvo Pärt's "Für Alina" — very halting, very beautiful.... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 1:14 PM on May 8, 2008

(No, wait, that other Wes Anderson movie, The Royal Tenenbaums. Dag.)
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 1:16 PM on May 8, 2008

As far as books, the number one is Getting to Maybe. Right behind that is Law School Confidential. If he reads those over the summer, he'll know what to expect, and that's the biggest way to take that initial stress off.

I'd make sure he has a good backup plan for his laptop — something like Mozy, perhaps? My hard drive died on my last week, my own 1L exams are this week... without a backup, I would have been in serious trouble.

Does he know... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 9:58 AM on May 8, 2008

Oh yeah, in case I wasn't clear: I never registered it before, it just worked. I checked all my email accounts for a receipt, just in case I'd forgotten registering it, and nothin'. That's why I'm confused — I can't figure out why it would have worked unregistered before, and stopped now.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 8:26 AM on May 8, 2008

Yeah, I think when someone uses the word "indie," without more, to refer to a culture, they're trying to lash together millions of people based on fairly divergent tastes they have or had in the at some point in the last thirty years. I'm no anthropologist, but that doesn't sound like a culture to me.
Much less a "movement," which would seem to imply some goal...
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 6:02 PM on May 3, 2008

Or, if you'd rather work overseas, Geek Corps!
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 5:57 PM on May 3, 2008

The Boston area's got plenty of cheap eats if you're willing to hunt around a bit. My favorite place (that hasn’t been mentioned yet) is Boca Grande. They're great for cheap (~$5) Mexican food — closer to the taqueria standard than the Qdoba/Chipotle standard, but that's a plus in my book. They’ve got a few locations, including one between Harvard and Porter Squares on the Red Line. No beer, though...
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 12:38 PM on March 27, 2008

Raikkohamilonso's right on. The price difference is build quality + quality of components/circuit + packaging and marketing. I would add that we could probably recommend something if you'll say what kind of delay sound you're looking for.

One fairly concrete difference between Danelectros and more expensive pedals is the issue of true bypass — basically, does the signal completely skirt the effects circuit when the effect is disengaged? True bypass is sought after in... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 10:59 PM on March 17, 2008

Not the same thing, but maybe it'll help jog your memory: the Panopticon
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 7:31 PM on December 11, 2007

Thanks for the suggestions, all! I think I'm going to set up a recurring iGTD event on an (arbitrarily arrived at) three-week schedule to try all of these solutions from top to bottom until I find something that works well for me.

(Gotta nth the apprehension about the 'poo free method, though. If I miss a day's hairwashing, I am not fit for public. I might try this plan out last.)
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 6:31 PM on December 11, 2007

Voting for "yep."
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 9:54 AM on December 6, 2007

I believe many "name" bands have contracts with gig promotors and touring agents. If you found a directory of these, you could probably see who represents whom.

On the other hand, it'd be a lot more fun to pick a band first, and then see if they're available. If you want suggestions from the hive-mind, though, we're going to need a lot more contextual information than you've provided. For starters, what's the nonprofit's issue area, geographic area, who are the invitees, ...
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 3:28 PM on December 5, 2007

Might be barking up the wrong tree, but how about this software? You'd have to install it on the XP machine, but I assume that's not a problem. It's shareware ($20 after 30 days).

Never used it, just found it on Google.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 5:27 PM on December 4, 2007

There's a few interesting chapters in the first half of Can't Stop, Won't Stop that deal with the main personalities in the Bronx gang scene of the mid-seventies, through interviews and other primary sources. It's a really good read; it handles more of what went on on a day-to-day basis than some dry sociological overview.... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 11:02 AM on December 4, 2007

If you're shooting for a big firm, ask yourself (realistically) whether you plan on being there for any length of time greater than three or four years. Reason being, until you've got some time under your belt, you're just a fungible JD that happens to have a human attached. Litigation associates won't set spend a day in court; transactional associates won't make a single deal. My understanding is the real difference between the two won't be very noticeable during that time.... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 7:32 PM on December 2, 2007

I'm getting bad vibes for the reasons mentioned above — I would get out now, myself.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 3:14 PM on December 2, 2007

To tack on to alexplainlater's recommendation for thesaurus.reference.com, if you're using Firefox, it's really easy to create a bookmark to http://thesaurus.reference.com/browse/ and give it a keyword like "t", so that you can type "t whatever" in your address bar and get the search results for "whatever."

If you use IE, check out Searchy for the same.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 11:43 PM on December 1, 2007

n-thing the suggestion not to withhold rent. It sounds like you'll be fine with a polite-but-assertive talk with your landlord, but withholding rent is a sure way to get evicted, and the law will will not be on your side.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 11:40 PM on December 1, 2007

Oh, and stuff written in Icelandic or Faroese always looks nice, I think.
posted to Ask Metafilter by electric_counterpoint at 11:01 PM on November 30, 2007