Well, I can't come. I'm from Ipswich (two-head-city) and therefore would be overly conspicious. But I liked how at the last one people gave me a shout-out, that was really nice.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 5:38 AM on October 6, 2008

Are there any old introverts I can share a corner with? That might sway me into turning up.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 7:03 PM on October 12, 2008

Well, then, it's a tentative yes from me :)
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 8:08 PM on October 12, 2008

And then leaving to watch Spicks & Specks.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 4:53 AM on October 8, 2008

Being a scaredy cat, someone said, oh, sometime in the 90s, something like "Fear is a beacon to the truth", which I thought was profound (hey, i was younger, then), and so my online name was Beacon to the truth, which was meant to indicate that I was afeared, but apparently seemed to mean I was pompous (which wasn't the look I was going for) so I changed it to Beacon but people called me bacon, and I wanted to incorporate my 3D name, so I... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 10:14 PM on August 26, 2008

When I signed up for a MeFi account, all the names I wanted were already taken. Finally I buttonmashed a random set of keys, because I was only signing up to post a comment or two and wasn't really planning to stay around long.

This was in 2001.
posted by ook at 9:30 PM on August 26 [+] [!]

Dude, i totally thought it was a reference to Pratchett's librarian. I'm ultra-disappointed.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 10:19 PM on August 26, 2008

mine's obvious.
posted by quonsar at 8:44 PM on August 26 [+] [!]


Yeah, felt I might be lacking in some understanding so I thought I'd google quonsar (it's probably some astronomical term, right? amirite?) and this is all I came up with for a definition.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 10:21 PM on August 26, 2008

And you know what sucks? When you came up with the answer first, and some copycat gets the favourite or best answer mark.

I figured the multiple answers were because they were the only questions those people actually had answers for, the other questions being too difficult for them.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 3:02 AM on July 1, 2008

I'm way down here and nobody's reading anything anymore, but here's why A is actually better than B. I considered the scrolling issue first and thought I would prefer that, but comparing the tags within the alphabetic categories, it's easier if they are vertical, the eye will be able to scan through the first three/four letters of a word. Horizontally, as in B, each of the tag words needs to be read in order to get to the next.

A. (because lists are vertical, and... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 8:43 PM on June 17, 2008

I came here too late but I had a decent solution to the problem AND I am also a student, an old one (40) and even long distance I hate most of my fellow students because they are so damn boring and predicable and egotistical. I wish just one would get plastered (they're legally allowed to do so, because they're 18 and in the comfort of their own home) and spam the entire board with drunken ramblings. Boy, that sure would improve some of my classes.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 4:54 PM on May 27, 2008

So, your ideal model is for your classes to resemble MetaTalk?!??

It'd be an improvement. Currently they resemble a desolate wasteland, with the occasional ramblings of naive egomaniacal ungrammatical morons. No wonder the lecturers avoid them (deliberate ambiguity).
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 7:30 PM on May 27, 2008

I'd like to point out that the APA manual allows the use of an ellipses followed by a period, whereas the Australian Style Manual does not. If you're going to start your pedant site, you're going to have to decide whose rules you're using. Good luck with that. Oh, and here's a partner for you.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 3:04 PM on May 22, 2008

Should an FPP/link stay if only those in Australia/China/Vietnam/France can access it? Should an FPP/link stay if it's not in English?
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 12:25 AM on May 6, 2008

I get mixed messages from metatalk about over-editorialising on the green, and noob-actions (like signing your name using @username, etc). I figured less is more, but if it helps, I am very grateful for everyone who reads, understands my questions, and takes the time to answer it/them thoughfully. I really do appreciate it, but I thought you knew that already.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 12:10 AM on May 3, 2008

Eh, I keep a word doc on my desktop for this. Sometimes it gives the questions time to nicely age and I word them better. Sometimes they just crawl away and die. But I don't think it'd be good to have a question go up and not be around to hit refresh constantly to see whether you've started something so big that it has to go to Metatalk. Man, you wouldn't want to miss that.

dersins, we're a community. I'm sure we can get a roster going to help you out with that. Or,... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 3:42 AM on March 17, 2008

Community consensus? Hardly. I think maybe two people out of 30 suggest that OP should/will/must find his wife/Jabba sexually attractive.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 7:20 AM on March 16, 2008

I am an Australian. I’m in Queensland and I saw that in the local news this morning and went meh. The post was pretty minimal and I agree it should have been deleted. I think you would get a much broader picture if you include the Elder who became incredibly ill at a Queensland University bus-stop, and lay ignored in her own vomit because the Australian students assumed she was drunk. You might talk about the girl from Cape York who was gang-raped more than once, but who’s attackers... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 5:21 AM on March 13, 2008

uh, all the threads I come back to show something like this: 2 comments (1 new) + and if I click on the (1 new) bit, it takes me to the first comment I haven't read. The only time this doesn't work for me is when everybody is being really prolific, AND my son has used our entire month's download limit so we're reduced to dial-up speed.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 1:40 AM on February 20, 2008

disillusioned, peacay has it. We're on broadband but after some ridiculous figure (40 Gb peak, 80 gb offpeak, I think, don't quote me, I'm not sysadmin in this house), access to the intertubes is reduced as a punishment as a punishment to people who parent teenagers. Funny thing was, I remember reading (back when the web was still in black and white), that Australia had one of the quickest uptakes of new technologies - something to do with feeling isolated and wanting to connect (in the old... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 2:03 PM on February 20, 2008

You'd have to have the same sort of quality control you have for the blue. You'd have to ask, is this the best of the web, this photo of Aunty Edna's cat licking it's butt? With stories, photos and art, this should increase the moderator work three-fold which should then open up a moderator position on the antipodean side of the world. Let's write job applications in the form of haikus now.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 3:35 AM on February 13, 2008

Yeah, I was struck by the guy who drew the conclusion that boobs he couldn't help staring at belonged to women he didn't know he was in love with. My god, there's been a lot of unrequited love following me around, and I didn't even know!!
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 3:43 PM on January 23, 2008

I'm interested in the comparison of the crying thread to the boobwatching thread. I've both cried and stared in the past, and I've always found it easier to move my eyes away from something than to stop tears coming out. But, admitting the crying is more likely to be a feminine problem, and assuming that staring (for whatever reason) is more likely to be a masculine problem, are you saying that it is physically impossible to avert one's eyes? Sheesh, dudes, you probably shouldn't be allowed to... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 6:24 PM on January 23, 2008

Look, blaming all this on someone's age makes it bad for other old people. Can't you just blame it on Bruce? It'd be like saying, see, proof men shouldn't be allowed to use the internet.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 1:42 PM on January 6, 2008

Like The Deej, I too had a serious remark removed from AskMefi and you don't see me complaining about it. What? Oh, someone wanted to know what to do the day before they ran their first marathon and I thought making their will would be a good idea. Deleted! And not one word to me. However, I just checked and the OP did survive.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 8:38 PM on December 15, 2007

i mean, any sheila who stands between a bloke and his right to knock back a few cold schooners with his mates just isn't worth keeping.

I'm under the impression that any use of the word sheila to indicate a woman is a key to irony, sarcasm or other non-serious communication. Just as if I called you squire, or milady. It's archaic.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 6:44 PM on December 4, 2007

I only go to MeFi if AskMe is terribly slow. I was traumatized by all the flameouts about poor FPPs when I joined and can't bring myself to attempt one. I go to Metatalk for the flameouts too. They're fun because no-one knows who I am and that means they can't pick on me.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 11:57 PM on November 26, 2007

no, that's my role.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 11:54 PM on November 26, 2007

Weeknights are terrible for me because I have to take the train all the way from Ipswich and back again, and walk about 2k in the dark, but don't let that influence you, I'm really really shy and can't decide whether or not to come.

PS Thanks Jacalata for pm-ing me.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 2:52 AM on October 20, 2007

Thanks for the shout-out. Geez, you're a good looking bunch.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 1:27 PM on November 26, 2007

"I'd hit it." Oh, and any reference to Australia being a land of convicts. Uh, yeah, sigh, that's hilarious, haven't heard that before, ever. Oh and have you actually read the Five Languages of Love recommended regularly on the green? It helps a lot if you're Christian.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 11:28 PM on November 25, 2007

I reckon you should have to pay up again to get undisabled. I run a forum and the shenanigans when people want to flounce out are just tiring after a while. And then they want to come back, and then flounce again. Enough already. If you don't like it, don't come back. If you do like it, don't be a drama queen.

That said, I'd like a time-out button where I can ban myself from viewing Metafilter for a specified time so I can actually get something done. Not a public... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 2:33 PM on November 23, 2007

Thanks!
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 2:12 PM on November 17, 2007

Great, another way I can feel isolated and ignored from and by all the cool mefites. I'm keeping my mathowie email, though, so my box will NEVER be empty.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 3:58 PM on October 19, 2007

I think someone proposed once that the Wiki or the FAQ should include something along the lines of "The answer to every 'Name my _____' thread is 'Frank'."

Oh, i thought the answer was "Christ, what an asshole."
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 5:51 PM on October 9, 2007

My husband's mohawk turned out great thanks.

With the encouragement of Mefites, I quit my job, began studying full-time and was offered part-time work (and contract jobs) that suit me really well. I'm still trying too hard and getting perfect grades.... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 6:36 PM on October 4, 2007

yeah me too. I would like to live next door to grumblebee and talk about life issues over the fence once in a while. I'm pretty sure I would be happier for the experience.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 3:12 PM on July 29, 2007

Luckily he can graduate from shoplifting to house breaking.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 1:51 AM on May 10, 2007

Clearly, this is a result of the abstinence only education currently being provided.

/eponysterical
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 12:30 AM on April 12, 2007

Um, I don't think it's highly unlikely, and I don't think it's unreasonable to worry about it. For example:

The National Resource Council estimates the percent of the U.S. population which has been sexually abused to range from a low of 20-24 percent to a high of 54-62 percent of the population; the higher estimate includes sexualized exposure without touching, such as masturbating in front of the child.1 The largest retrospective study on the prevalence of... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 8:49 PM on April 9, 2007

Okay, you don't like those numbers? How about Wikipedia?

Goldman (2000) notes that "the absolute number of children being sexually abused each year has been almost impossible to ascertain" and that "there does not seem to be agreement on the rate of children being sexually abused". A meta-analytic study by Rind, Tromovitch, and Bauserman (1998) found that reported prevalence of abuse for males ranged from 3% to 37%, and for females from 8%... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 9:40 PM on April 9, 2007

b33j, you are missing the point... No-one here is denying that this is prevalent...
posted by IshmaelGraves at 10:28 PM on April 9

So between 1/4 to 1/2 of children will experience sexual abuse.
This is such unmitigated horseshit.
posted by Civil_Disobedient at 9:18 PM on April 9

Maybe I missed the point of the call out - though I don't see how the original MeFi poster was ruling out relatives by the use of the... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 10:56 PM on April 9, 2007

Ishmael,

I don't actually have a problem with your point of view. I was trying to explain to you why I was quoting figures and it had to with someone saying that my early quote was horseshit. Here and in the thread I have certainly not said that stranger danger is the problem. I regret that I wasn't as clear as I should have been. My apologies.

My issues and has been throughout this topic has been people who think sexual abuse (whoever the... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 11:24 PM on April 9, 2007

Icebreaker gave me the same result as Rhomboid.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 4:41 AM on February 7, 2007

i am an angel.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 12:03 AM on January 18, 2007

I'd like to see best answers go. As noted above, quite often it's used in unexpected ways. It's not reliable as data for anything.

Simplify!

And, we could also make favourites go away too - people could just use their browser system to mark favourites and it'd stop being a quasi-popularity system.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 3:10 PM on January 10, 2007

Ooh, and think about this, we're all equal but some are more equal than others. If someone favourites my post, and they have been more favourited than favouriting, surely that makes that favouriting more favourable. So, you need a weighted coefficient in there too.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 5:07 PM on January 10, 2007

If this were just about genital mutilation, then a discussion of circumcision or indeed even of the earlier contraceptive practice of the South Australia aborigine with the whistestop (or perhaps this link is bettter).

But this is not just about genital mutilation. It's about a recent time when a group of people in one of the most advanced nations on earth were unfamiliar with their biology. It's about an unethical behaviour of medical practitioners, where the patients... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 6:37 AM on January 9, 2007

Not male, not 24-35.

When I was distance studying statistics (all by myself), I ran across outliers after Poisson distributions and thought initially that it was another French math term and embarassed myself publicly by pronouncing it "oot-lee-ers" - this is not hyper-bowl.

just had a feeling that this communal thing we enjoy isn't as all-encompassing as we really think: can we only be communal if we are all... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 3:15 PM on January 4, 2007

Having anonymously asked a relationship question at ask me, I was surprised at how hurt I felt at the way my relationship was (mis)interpreted. I wanted to defend myself. I wanted to moderate the responses (especially the really stupid ones). And yet, I also learnt a lot, some of which didn't sink in for days.

So yeah, what Stynxno said.
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 5:36 PM on December 14, 2006

This one?
posted to MetaTalk by b33j at 9:41 AM on December 2, 2006