Really. I just remember thinking "Jeez, this sucks."

Yeah, but that's all you ever remember thinking about anything.

And I was, like y'know, alive then.

A note for anyone who might be confused by this: "Alive" is the word that jonmc uses to mean "shitfaced drunk".
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 2:43 PM on October 6, 2008

Just shows you how far ahead of his time Sir Mix-a-Lot was.

Brother, you ain't kiddin'.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 4:45 PM on October 6, 2008

It's really kind of amazing how strongly the death of Biggie has stayed with some people. Two years ago my then-girlfriend and I were attending a party at the Petersen Automotive Museum. When the ex told her mother that we were going there, she received the following warning:

"Be careful; that's were they did Big."

I thought that she had to for sure be joking. The likelihood that Biggie's assassins were still hanging... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 11:21 AM on October 6, 2008

It took half an hour before this kid was stopped. That's half an hour where this seven-year-old evaded his parents, and in the meantime he was scaling fences, evading alarm systems and bringing wave after wave of silent death.

I'm sure that I'll be outraged eventually, but at the moment my emotional abilities are being completely dominated by the fear that Australia is raising an army of tiny ninjas.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 10:46 AM on October 3, 2008

Yeah, you kind of have to wonder how it would have ended if he could have gotten to the croc.

Based on everything else in the article, I'd wager that it would have ended with the kid snapping the crocodile's spine and calmly moving to his next target, his hands silent engines of death.

Later, he and Devin Funck could team up and use their collective reptile-slaughtering skills to rid us of the menace of Godzilla once and for... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 10:50 AM on October 3, 2008

And I'm completely oblivious for a long moment, thinking, "Dang, I never knew this about Timbaland! Coleridge means a lot to me too!"

I made a similar mistake a few years ago. The Ol' Dirty Bastard died two days after Yasser Arafat, but I was still taken by surprise when my brain connected the newspaper headline Rapper ODB Dead with the smaller article Arab World in Mourning.

I... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 1:13 PM on October 1, 2008

Was she arrested for a Mooooving Violation?

Here all week, folks.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 3:23 PM on September 30, 2008

Remember to listen to a seven year old because you just have more words and life experience, not necessarily more wisdom.

Me: So, got any wisdom for me?

Seven Year Old: I fed my dog a gold crayon, and now he makes gold poop from his butt!

Me: As I journey through life, I'll try my best to keep that in mind. Thank you.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 2:29 PM on September 26, 2008

Although my love of reading is strong, I think its disingenuous to disregard the role of TV in this magical age.

I was thinking the same thing about music videos. Growing up, my parents didn't allow television in the house, but one of my friends had MTV and it strongly shaped the person that I eventually became.

The most important video in shaping me was without any doubt Mix-a-Lot's Baby Got Back, which more... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 2:22 PM on September 25, 2008

I know that this thread is going to be nothing but people crying "where's _____!?", but...

No Richard III?

Also, talk to me about Voldemort again twenty years from now. As a villain, I'd guess that his staying power will be about equal to that of Skeletor.

On Preview, CPB steals my thunder, making him the #1 villain on my list.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 3:27 PM on September 23, 2008

Well, that's it. Everything is ruined forever.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 1:38 PM on September 23, 2008

Everything you need to know about Biblical teaching is readily available at Back of the Bible.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 5:03 PM on September 18, 2008

I've met Jessamyn. She was nice. I imagine that Mathowie and Cortex are also good people.

Plexi, why would you do this to them?

Despite the fact that I agree with a lot of what was written in the editorial, it's still an op-ed that isn't doesn't really add much to the debate. Which is to say, I think that this post could have benefited from some serious supporting links and perhaps some alternate views.

As it stands, it's... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 11:37 AM on September 16, 2008

I couldn't bring myself to listen. Now the Wesley Willis is dead, the dream that the perfect Super Mario Bros. song might someday be written is over.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 4:26 PM on September 11, 2008

As the age range gets older, it looks like the number of single women gets significantly higher. There are a lot of single grannies out there, from the looks of things.

This is good news for Skwisgaar Skwigelf.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 12:52 PM on September 10, 2008

Have you had straight sex? Gay sex? Had a kid? Started watching Gossip Girl? Been to Burning Man? Gotten a tattoo? Smoked weed? Joined a gym? Bough a pair of Crocs?

In order: Yes. Yes. Maybe. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. You're a pervert to even suggest such a thing.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 10:52 AM on September 9, 2008

Umbrella today? Yes. Umbrellas every day, my good man!

What we really need is a website that can tell me what sort of umbrella to carry. For example, my henchmen and I have planned to lift a rare poison-beaked hummingbird from the Gotham City Zoo. It's a certainty that that meddling winged rodent, the Batman, is likely to attempt to interfere. What umbrella to best handle him?

Should I use the old standby, the knockout-gas... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 2:20 PM on September 8, 2008

I was really hoping the the final page would reveal that the ants hadn't actually gotten any larger, but that everything else on Earth had gotten smaller for some reason.

Because I am M. Night Fucking Shyamalan.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 3:42 PM on September 5, 2008

And there were a lot of Entitled Founding Americans who also risked and even lost their lives to break laws against free speech to help us get it that way.

Those same Founding Americans had some interesting ideas about what to do when some clown from across the ocean wanted to tell them how to live. If James Powderly wants to impose his worldview on people living on another continent, he should take that into consideration.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 4:33 PM on September 3, 2008

Cats with wings, you say?

When pigs fly!
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 4:48 PM on August 28, 2008

Cap'n Crunch
As a Kid: Crunchy Sugar!
As an Adult: A bowlful of razors!
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 10:22 AM on August 26, 2008

Does humanity have a responsibility to save an orphaned baby whale, or is our duty to let nature take its course?

Whales worldwide would get a grim chuckle indeed at the notion of a human suggestion of humanity "letting nature take its course", since we've utterly failed to allow nature to take its course with whales for so long that many species are now facing likely extinction. Well, they would if whales had any capacity for gallows humor, anyway.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 3:46 PM on August 20, 2008

As the article pointed out, if this were a baby shark near the shore looking for its mama, the public would have a remarkably different reaction to it.

My reaction would, yes, be quite different. I'd be a bit surprised, since baby sharks aren't normally raised by their mothers. Watching a baby shark attempt to suckle on anything would almost certainly be a story worth following, since every fish about which I've ever read has lacked mammaries.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 4:24 PM on August 20, 2008

Any parody of Lovecraft's writing that doesn't end the final line of each entry in italics doesn't hold water with me. For it was in this style that he wrote!
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 9:01 AM on August 20, 2008

I used to live down the street from the Doggie Diner by the San Francisco Zoo. It really was a cultural landmark for that portion of the city. It didn't matter where someone in San Francisco lived, as long as I began my directions by saying "start at the Doggie Diner" they'd be able to find my house without any difficulty. Everyone knew that place.

It was almost enough to make living down the street from the zoo worth it. Almost. God damned... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 4:12 PM on August 18, 2008

I can understand choosing not to own a car, definitely. And I can understand choosing not to own a cell phone. Went down that road myself for a long while. But I can't really understand choosing not to own either one.

I don't own a car or a cell phone. I have chosen not to own them, not in order to make a statement, but because I don't really have the need for either of them, and I would rather spend my money on other things.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 11:57 AM on August 18, 2008

Classy guy. Got dressed up in a tuxedo and everything.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 11:45 AM on August 15, 2008

How long until PETA links this story to bus beheadings?
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 11:38 AM on August 7, 2008

Sailors fighting in the dance hall
Oh man, look at those cavemen go
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 2:56 PM on August 1, 2008

I live in a relatively low-income neighborhood of Los Angeles (K-Town, y'heard!), and I'm a little bit confused about what the problem is. Good, cheap food is available in abundance around my apartment.

Not enough fruits and vegetables? There's a cart on every fucking corner where some friendly gentleman who speaks precisely enough English to get your order right and wish you a nice day will cut you up an enormous bag of fresh fruit for a couple of... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 11:50 AM on July 31, 2008

You can always cash a check at the bank that issued it though, without having an account, right?

Usually. Although if it's a payroll check most banks will charge you a fee for cashing it. When I was without a bank a few years back I know that Bank of America was charging five dollars per paycheck that they cashed. That's still significantly less expensive than cashing with a check cashing service, but it's still a bit of a bite. Of course, if there are... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 12:45 PM on July 31, 2008

Speaking of things that rhyme, did anyone else see the name of the site and immediately think the following?

(Ooh, Write Rhymes!) Vision dreams of passion
(Blowin' through my mind) And all the while I think of you
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 8:40 AM on July 29, 2008

Do you find it insulting when white characters only date other whites?

Yes. It doesn't reflect on my experiences, and it contributes to a culture where dating outside of your race is considered somehow remarkable (in either a positive or negative light, both of which cause problems).

I've noticed that the what little I've watched of BBC television appears to have a much higher rate of interracial couples that you see on... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 10:46 AM on July 23, 2008

Oh My God, The Baby!
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 10:25 AM on July 23, 2008

The thing about needing coffee to get through the day is that most people didn't need it to get through the day before they started drinking it. In much the same way that Vonnegut mentions that the only stress that cigarettes relieve is the stress that's caused by not having a cigarette, most people who need coffee to stay awake and alert only need it because they've trained their bodies to depend upon it.

This is not to say that I wouldn't drink caffeine if I could.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 10:32 AM on July 22, 2008

They named the friggin' thing TYSON and they thought that they could contain it behind a quarter-inch of glass?

FAIL.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 11:06 AM on July 21, 2008

Last Year I Killed a Man in Reno, just to watch him die.

I hear the train a comin', it's rolling 'round the bend...
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 8:43 AM on July 21, 2008

1.) As much as I enjoyed the remake of Dawn of the Dead, I have to ask: Has Zack Snyder ever directed anything that didn't already have a massive built-in audience before he picked it up? Watchmen, like Dawn of the Dead and 300, has a huge following. When is Snyder going to do a project that doesn't already have a massive media presence?

2.) People can tell me how faithful to the comic it is once... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 4:08 PM on July 17, 2008

They're also nearly cold blooded, impervious to pain, and feed their young on their own feces from the time they're a month old until they can eat the giant tubers that make up most of their diet.

Don't any of it. Up until around twenty years ago, people believed the exact same thing about the Irish.

As we've since come to learn, they were only about half-right.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 11:28 AM on July 17, 2008

Don't any of it.

Gah!

"Don't believe any of it."
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 11:28 AM on July 17, 2008

Or for generations of shared symbiotes.

Part of me wants to really put Rule 34 to the test and do a Google search for "2 Molerats, 1 Symbiote".

The rest of me has considered the potential damage to my already-fragile psyche and opted not to pursue this avenue of research.

Not all knowledge is worth having.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 11:53 AM on July 17, 2008

Exactly what billysumday says, when the culture is used as a cover for secretively monstrous behavior.

All culture is a cover for secretively monstrous behavior. Particularly the nuclear family.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 8:05 AM on July 16, 2008

not letting kids go past the eighth grade, encouraging teen marriage, encouraging young teenagers to go absolutely nuts with drinking and drugs on the (usually successful) theory that they'll get so burnt out and disgusted with that false idea of "english life" that they'll come running back to you

As a former teenager, I hereby declare this parenting style to be awesome.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 10:28 AM on July 16, 2008

That's because their heat is being siphoned off to fuel billysumday's hate.

His hate has been the only thing keeping us from being burned into ash for some time now. The global warming phenomenon that everyone's been discussing in recent years is the direct result of that one time where he decided to smoke a bowl and maybe not be so hateful a couple of years back.

Hopefully, this article will get his hate levels back where they should be.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 4:15 PM on July 16, 2008

He's never be able to bake the perfect chocolate chip cookie until he realizes that the secret ingredient is love.

His cold, robotic heart can't ever understand that.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 7:56 AM on July 16, 2008

Butterstick recommends Crisco: Eponytreason!

My family has a similar technique for baking cakes, but in our case the Wu Tang Secret is mayonaisse.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 8:18 AM on July 16, 2008

But what should I do if I find a stranger in the Alps?
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 3:48 PM on July 15, 2008

As much as I want to sneer at these people, I'm going to take a moment to step back, look at myself, and admit that I want nothing more in life than to be able to drive around the country in the Oscar Meyer Wienermobile.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 2:19 PM on July 11, 2008

There are other countries who are as well armed if not better than the US, who have considerably less firearm related violence. What is it that makes them different, and what can we in the US do to better emulate them?

Distribution of wealth and infrastructure. Dollars to donuts, if you find a country that has comparable levels of gun ownership but lower rates of gun violence, it has a more even distribution of wealth and a better managed... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 10:51 AM on June 26, 2008

Most murders are not premeditated.

All murders are premeditated. Malice aforethought is a part of the definition of murder. The premeditation might not be very long, but it's definitely there.
posted to MetaFilter by Parasite Unseen at 10:55 AM on June 26, 2008