When I buy a house I have no idea what the real estate agents' commission is (or are) and I don't care. I've never used an actual buyer's agent, and if I did commission someone to help me buy a house I would not pay them a percentage of what my buying price was - what sense would that make? I have sensed on at least one occasion that the real estate agent agreed to lower her fee in order to make the deal happen, but that's between the seller and the agent, it's completely invisible to me (I... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 10:17 AM on July 11, 2008

I'm familiar with "brioche" as an ice-cream-filled sweet roll in Salerno. I guess that usage is specific to the Amalfi coast, but I know the type of roll you mean - it seems to me I've been served them at my in-laws in Salerno because they know Americans like to eat something for breakfast. It seems to me the taste is identical to a Panettone actually, which you can buy all over the place (at least at Christmas time). Anyway, I think what you want is the type of thing that never... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 11:42 AM on July 9, 2008

Yes, the amount of calories you burn is a function of the weight moved over a distance. It doesn't really make any difference how quickly you move that weight. There are actually some minor differences that have to do with things like momentum and wind resistance, but for all practical purposes, if you are a human being trying to measure how many calories you burn when you exercise, it doesn't make any difference if you run a mile or walk a mile.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 1:51 PM on July 1, 2008

It's entirely possible that the senior guy (on vacation) understands the product's requirement better than anyone else. He/She may even understand the product requirements better than the customer. Since you say there's no formal project management at the company I wonder how you know there is significant unimplemented functionality. If this person is returning in less than two weeks it's not clear to me what your sense of urgency is. When he/she gets back I would just ask him why some... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 10:23 AM on July 1, 2008

My sister-in-law and her house renovations were featured on a couple of shows. I'm pretty sure her architect arranged the whole thing. The house is in Winchester, MA.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 9:57 AM on June 13, 2008

If it's not a done deal it's not a done deal.

Even if it were, there's nothing wrong with taking two weeks off to think about a career move. People do this all the time.

Whatever you do, DO NOT give notice until you have a written offer from the other company.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 1:58 PM on June 11, 2008

Whatever you do, do not try to understand or appreciate baseball listening to Joe Morgan. Although I've never read it, Ted Williams' book is considered a classic. I am impressed by the reader reviews of it on Amazon: it sounds like a good way to learn to appreciate baseball.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 9:17 AM on June 9, 2008

The last time I took the Math SAT, in 1969, I wanted to lower my score from my first test because I was getting a D+ in Calculus, so I did the entire test in my head, without doing any calculations on paper (this was before calculators existed; for all I know, you can use a calculator now when you take the SAT). So anyway, I managed to lower my score from something like 754 to 714. I'm not sure why I'm telling you this, except that it's something that I remember all these years later.... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 2:23 PM on June 6, 2008

I've only spent a day wandering around Bergen with my Norwegian friend/host from Oslo who insisted we spend the day there even though I desperately wanted to take the day train right back to Oslo to again experience the really fantastic train ride through the mountains. The scenery between Oslo and Bergen is easily the most spectacular, breath-taking, awe-inspiring thing I've ever seen anywhere in the world, and I'm usually pretty blase about such things. If you get a chance, take the train at... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 11:30 AM on June 4, 2008

As for food, expect to eat all kinds of fish, especially pickled. I don't even like fish but I developed a taste for things like pickled herring, mackerel, and anchovies for breakfast. In particular try to find FiskePudding which is essentially fish jello. Absolutely delicious.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 11:33 AM on June 4, 2008

I don't currently work for a commercial software development company so I can't give you a literal answer. I remember studying some software companies as a class assignment in business school many years ago and realizing that some very profitable companies like Lotus (at the time) and I think Microsoft were not capitalizing their software development. I don't know if that's still the case. Basically the reason you would capitalize software development would be to make your current assets and... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 11:23 AM on June 4, 2008

yes, funny thing, our pediatrician said Benadryl when we took our son to Italy when he was that age.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 10:41 AM on June 3, 2008

Do you have a significant equity stake in the company? That's all that matters: everything else is just bullshit. If you have equity, then the only metric that matters is profit (and ultimately, the exit strategy). You want to make money. The other stuff, the metrics, the performance reviews, the titles, and the at-a-boys are just for wage slaves.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 8:15 PM on June 1, 2008

Beppe Severignini writes about the Amercian phenomenon of spelling bees in his book Ciao America. It would be nearly impossible to have a spelling bee in German although currently in Germany Bastian Sick's column on grammar has become something of a craze, with even a computer game that tests people on their knowledge of German grammar, but still spelling, in German is pretty regular. Likewise certainly for Italian: it's just spelled too regularly to be an interesting thing to quiz people on.... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 5:57 PM on May 31, 2008

What fogster said. Photos are mandatory. Negative comments about bidders, past auctions, warnings, hassles, all that stuff is a real turn-off. Text in all caps. The only thing I think fogster does not mention is that I only buy from people who will accept Paypal.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 7:38 AM on May 31, 2008

One week might be just enough time to take advantage of a JapanRail pass (for one week) which is one of the world's great travel bargains, and something you can only buy outside of the country. You might consider riding the trains all over Japan for one week - the more modern trains are really fantastic. Japan is very safe and a blast to visit. It doesn't have to be ridiculously expensive, although it can be. I guarantee you will have a great time. :-)
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 7:31 AM on May 31, 2008

I took my wife to Mother Anna's on our first date almost exactly 25 years ago. We are still married.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 9:12 AM on May 30, 2008

The Economist Big Mac Index has attempted to measure and compare the purchase power of local currencies over the years. I think however you are expecting too much analysis from a television news report, about anything.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 9:09 AM on May 30, 2008

Wandering the alleyways of Venice is one of life's greatest pleasures. I recommend you read The Comfort of Strangers now, and see the movie version as well.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 12:45 PM on May 29, 2008

I haven't read any of the responses, but here's the deal:

1. If it ain't broke don't fix it.

2. If it's broke, change it.

You can't upgrade to a future release that doesn't exist, but you can downgrade to a previous version to see if that fixes your problem.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 7:27 AM on May 26, 2008

Your tastes sound very similar to mine. I love the Sopranos, and miss it, but the other series that I am really crazy about is Mad Men. Really great. Another fun series, excellent acting (Eddie Izzard and Minnie Driver), is The Riches.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 7:21 AM on May 26, 2008

You can get more specific answers on the Massachusetts forum on TripAdvisor.com.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 6:30 PM on May 25, 2008

Don't tell them what you currently make. Tell them you want to be paid what the job deserves. If they make you an offer less than what it would take to make you move, say "gee, I'm making more than that in my current job, I really couldn't do it for less than X."
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 3:50 PM on May 22, 2008

You don't need to buy a UK DVD Player to do this - you can now get fairly inexpensive multi-region DVD players that will play "other" region DVDs on an NTSC TV set. I do this all the time with German DVDs now. I got mine off of amazon - mine was a toshiba, something like this. I've had mine for well over a year now - works great.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 1:16 PM on May 13, 2008 marked best answer

I've never been to Lisbon but Madrid is one of my least-favorite places in the world. I agree with KevCed about Barcelona: great place.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 10:20 AM on May 9, 2008

My wife's birthday is the 18th too. She would kill me if I gave her a computer as a birthday gift. I think this is pretty much a personal choice - something you need to figure out.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 8:16 AM on May 8, 2008

I have a Macbook Amateur edition running OS/X 10.4.11 (don't know what animal that would be). I haven't seen this problem. I would take the DVD itself to a MacStore and ask one of the geniuses there if they can play it. I suspect it's a problem with your hardware.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 8:44 AM on May 7, 2008

We live in Winchester and have been thinking about cashing out of our home and downsizing, so we have been studying the local real estate market for a few months now. You absolutely cannot presume that homes in "desirable" neighborhoods are overpriced and will drop in price. It seems to us that houses in places like Woburn are overpriced and not moving, but houses in Winchester seem to be selling within weeks if not on the day they go on the market. A house two doors down from us... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 8:37 AM on May 7, 2008

I don't understand why this would come up in a job interview at all. You can always just say you were laid off. As an aside however, if you live in the United States, there are laws to protect whistle blowers from being fired for whistle-blowing. It's one of the very few ways you could successfully sue for unlawful dismissal (I know this from doing jury duty in Massachusetts). If I understand your story correctly, it sounds as though the people who fired you were somewhat solicitous after the... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 9:48 AM on May 6, 2008

It's your wedding. You are the bride. You can pretty much say whatever you want to anyone and be as nasty as you want. Everyone will just ascribe this to "Bride's nerves." Chances are you will explode at someone over something else trivial anyway, so don't worry about it. Just yell at your Mother, something like "Mom, Dad is walking me down the aisle and not you and THAT'S FINAL!" This sort of tirade is part of any traditional wedding.... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 3:26 PM on May 5, 2008

What everyone else is saying: you're saving too much for retirement, spending too much on travel, and food, and house cleaning and maintenance. Oh, and you can't afford to live in a house that expensive. On the other hand, your taxes seem low to me. :-)
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 10:44 AM on May 5, 2008

I actually missed the $3400 line item for "children" - I assumed 2 kids were in your budget. That seems like way too much. Looking back at it, 22 years ago my "numbers" were probably pretty similar to yours (adjusted for inflation). I actually did similar excel spread sheets in Windows 2.0 in which things like the price of Hewlett Packard (wife's employer) and Apollo Computer (mine) stocks were inputs.

One thing: I would worry about having two... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 12:19 PM on May 5, 2008

The disappearance of the middle class is a world-wide phenomenon, see this German-language video: "The Last Member of the Middle Class".
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 9:06 AM on May 5, 2008

There really isn't even a gift tax, actually. If someone gives you more than $12,000 you only need to report that the IRS so that eventually it is used in computing the size of the giver's estate when they die. If your great aunt's estate is not terribly big and thus not subject to the so-called "death tax" anyway this really is something you need never worry about. I'm too lazy to look up the details right now but this is the sort of tax thing that people make much too big a deal... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 5:50 PM on May 4, 2008

The wiki article on opposites is interesting: "Typically, they (opposites) differ in only one dimension of meaning, but are similar in most other respects..." For a long time I never really understood what people meant when they said they were lonely, because I always wondered "as opposed to what?" To me the "opposites" of lonely would include "self-sufficient", "content", and "well-adjusted.... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 1:07 PM on May 2, 2008

"Goene dich ein Kaffee" can be translated "treat yourself to a coffee."
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 7:49 AM on May 3, 2008

The Millionaire Next Door is excellent but The Only Investment Guide You'll Ever Need really is the only investment guide you will ever need.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 1:21 PM on April 30, 2008

The answer depends entirely on your insurance policy, which is (probably) subject to local (state?) regulations. Why don't you call your insurance company and ask them?
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 9:35 AM on April 30, 2008

As far as I know this was a myth perpetrated in the late 60s to scare people off the use of acid. As I recall, as early as the early 70s people generally acknowledged that there was as much or greater risk from drinking coffee. In any case, I haven't heard anyone even suggest this in nearly 40 years, and it's not something I ever worried about. Like many other parents I did acid in my youth and my now 20-year-old son has no apparent genetic defects.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 7:41 AM on April 30, 2008

If you're going to run Linux I would just go with DELL.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 10:54 AM on April 29, 2008

You seem to have some preference for good old-fashioned Debian - if I were you I would ask this question in a Debian forum.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 11:47 AM on April 29, 2008

I am a new Mac user since buying a macbook last August. I do like it, although I'm not really sure why. The lack of a "right-mouse button" is the biggest pain-in-the-ass. I use mostly Linux at work but still have Windows XP machines at home. One of the things I like about the Macbook is that it doesn't come pre-installed with all kinds of free trial programs, which seems to be part of the business model now for low-cost Windows laptops. The one application I have not been able to... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 11:05 AM on April 29, 2008

There's a thread about romantic restaurants in Munich on toytowngermany.com, a site for English-speaking people in Germany.

I know Munich fairly well but I'm kind of drawing a blank on a place for a "romantic dinner" - there are places I know that could have little tucked away nooks but I would probably have to call ahead and try to reserve something specifically tucked away.

I don't know enough about you to suggest how you should spend... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 8:21 AM on April 29, 2008

Given your itinerary, you might consider Sedona, Arizona. I'm hoping that's where McCain will be giving his concession speech (although I'm not very hopeful).

Otherwise it doesn't really matter. Most people just watch the returns on television.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 2:02 PM on April 28, 2008

I've tried everything over the years, and I've been very surprised by the benefits I get from wearing a very light, fingerless "wrist glove" that just applies some slight pressure to my wrist. This link may show of picture of the glove I use; not sure of what what brand I have, but it's the basic idea. I buy mine at local pharmacies. I have no idea why this would help, but it does.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 12:05 PM on April 28, 2008

There's something very funny (for me) about your post considering how many slides I have that I shot when I was a teenager 40 years ago - you make it sound like you just discovered some prehistoric cave art. :-)

I have not used an slide scanning services, but you can get awfully nice technology to do this yourself nowadays. As far as I know, nothing still beats a Nikon CoolScan V with infrared technology (to do dust removal). I personally own an older Minolta scanner... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 10:23 AM on April 28, 2008

You should stay near Las Ramblas. We stayed at the Duques de Bergera and liked it a lot.

There's a really good hop-on hop-off tourist bus in Barcelona that makes all the tourist sites really easy to get to, but for just walking around you really want to be near Las Ramblas.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 9:16 AM on April 28, 2008

Most balance transfers or cash advances charge a one-time 3% fee usually with a max of $75. There are occasionally offers to transfer balances with no fees, but most of the time they will start charging you interest immediately. I get a lot of these offers all the time - I think once I got an offer for a zero fee balance transfer with a one-year 0% interest which I did take advantage of, because what the hell, it's free money, but it was very unusual (it was used as an incentive to get me to... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 7:19 AM on April 28, 2008

56 next month. No idea what you are talking about.
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 9:41 AM on April 26, 2008

When a friend's cat goes to the Happy Hunting Ground, my mother (an old cat lover) usually gives a contribution to the Cornell Feline Center in its memory. Please follow that link!
posted to Ask Metafilter by thomas144 at 9:37 AM on April 26, 2008