Kee-doodle, that was bad.
posted to MetaFilter by Astro Zombie at 7:47 AM on August 30, 2008

So it's like CouchSurfing plus greed?
posted to MetaFilter by TheOnlyCoolTim at 5:54 PM on August 11, 2008

How, exactly, do we all know this? (NB: honest question)
posted by MarshallPoe at 11:54 AM on August 8

Because at this stage in history, all conflicts are over scarce resources. The ascendance of China and India more than doubles the number of people competing for the resources that 15 years ago were consumed primarily by North Americans, Europeans, and the Japanese.

Oil and energy are not the only resources.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Pastabagel at 9:39 AM on August 8, 2008

Jeff is the brains and motivation behind his break, what started off as a small tee shirt business is now a multi-dimensional design/retail empire that produces flawless creations perfect for today’s consumers.

It's interesting to hear from the exact opposite of the spectrum, people who rather then being unnerved by obsessive loyalty to corporations actually revel, sincerely revel in brand identity and fetishism.

And by 'interesting', I mean 'painful'.
posted to MetaFilter by delmoi at 12:01 AM on August 4, 2008

pigeon, n.

II. Figurative uses.
6. colloq.
a. A naive or gullible person; a fool or simpleton; a person who is easily swindled
posted to MetaFilter by Blazecock Pileon at 12:10 AM on August 4, 2008

This will wend-- oh!
posted to MetaTalk by MegoSteve at 4:32 PM on July 12, 2008

On one hand, he was a person. On the other hand, he was a twisted shill for a corrupt administration.

To snark or not to snark . . . ?
posted to MetaFilter by John of Michigan at 8:13 AM on July 12, 2008

Your shitty chatfilter question was chatfilter. When you reap the whirlwind, it's understood that you don't take the whirlwind personally.

The way to ask your question in a less PLEASE DELETE THIS IMMEDIATELY UPON VIEWING fashion:
What were the causes, proximate and underlying, leading up to the current economic crisis and polticial crisis in the United States. Specifically, is there one or more event in the late 90's or early 2000's that you can point to... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by Pastabagel at 12:58 PM on June 10, 2008

Farishta: If you ever want to see something really funny, find a slightly doughy guy in his thirties--the sort who thought that High Fidelity was a lifestyle guide, not a scathing indictment of emotional immaturity--and start talking about Pulp's "Common People." Mention that you think it's one of the greatest singles of the 90s, and that Cocker's genius lies in how he starts out condemning the strawman of the rich art school girl, but by the end of the song the "you" he's... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Ian A.T. at 10:43 AM on June 9, 2008

Not to be a wet blanket, but I wonder what the carbon footprint is to mail an international postcard.

Wet blankets are good things... they put out the fires fuelled by zealous postcard exchanging. And we all know FIRES CONTRIBUTE TO GLOBAL WARMING.

Unless they aren't wet enough, then they become part of the problem. It also depends on the size of the postcard-exchanging fuelled fires.
posted to MetaFilter by WalterMitty at 10:33 AM on June 8, 2008

Hey, alright! More veggie gardeners!

20’ x 20’ is a pretty huge space to work with as a beginner gardener. You’re going to need to sketch out your planting rows as well as some walkways. I suggest mapping out 4’-wide planting rows and 1.5’- to 2’-wide walking paths. This way you will only have to reach a maximum of 2’ into each planting row to weed. Get some grid paper and plot out your area so that you have maximum coverage for planting.... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by KathyK at 10:08 AM on June 4, 2008 marked best answer

Here are 19 reasons this post sucks and should be deleted with extreme prejudice:

Link 1: YouTube video of Sex and the City opening credits.
Link 2: Entertainment Weekly writeup of filming locations seen in Sex and the City.
Link 3: InStyle article about shoes seen in Sex and the City.
Link 4: Entertainment... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by optovox at 1:05 AM on June 1, 2008

I am sorry to derail this excellent thread, but "wen't"?
posted to MetaFilter by Mister_A at 6:00 AM on June 1, 2008

The recipe using the frozen concentrated green fructose-ade probably depends on the sugar content to get the end result consistency correct.

Doesn't your grocery store carry lime juice? Like the RealLemon but it's RealLime? Mine always has it. I think.

Alternately, you *could* get out your home vacuum pump and bell jar, and reduce it that way. Since reducing the pressure lowers the boiling point you could boil off all the water at room... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by gjc at 3:13 PM on May 31, 2008 marked best answer

Robert Heinlein: "A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects."
posted to Ask Metafilter by Cool Papa Bell at 8:17 PM on May 30, 2008

Finally, Tolstoy as it was intended.
posted to MetaFilter by mazola at 10:01 PM on May 28, 2008

Prior to the emergence of socialism, matters of politics, the division of property and statecraft were conducted via needlepoint. Generous intercontinental traders gave people from Africa free lifts to job opportunities in the places that are now tourist destinations, such as the Caribbean; theological differences were resolved by gymnastic and circus feats such as seeing who could stretch their arms out longest on a rack or hold their whole body in the flames for the greatest period of time;... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Abiezer at 6:18 AM on May 27, 2008

I would suggest learning about the different types of wine rather than too much about the specific brand the restaurant sells. Once you know the different types of wine and what it best pairs with, you can match that with the various brands -- so even if the brand changes, you still know your fundamentals.

Here's a really good site that gives a quick basic overview of the different types of red wine. Try to understand that and then see if you can match the specific... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by Lleyam at 9:17 AM on May 22, 2008 marked best answer

I don't even understand what they're trying to sell me.
posted to MetaFilter by knowles at 3:00 AM on May 21, 2008

A fish, my pants contain.
posted to MetaTalk by cortex at 12:38 PM on May 20, 2008

After talking to my brother the next day, he told me she was upset about having to sleep in the twin beds, and that it was incredibly rude and disrespectful for my girlfriend and I not to offer to take the twin beds, because we weren't married and everyone else was.

Marriage obliges the state to recognize a relationship. Common decency requires family to recognize a relationship even among the unmarried. Your brother's wife is a brat.
posted to Ask Metafilter by Inspector.Gadget at 7:36 AM on May 20, 2008

My favorite cooking blogs:
The Amateur Gourmet
101 Cookbooks
Delicious Days
Chocolate and Zucchini
One Hot Stove
The Kitchn
Kalyn's Kitchen
None of these is especially for beginners but I found them a great source of inspiration when I started cooking regularly.
For recipes, you can't do better than epicurious.com. You'll also find great tutorials and food discussions at forums.egullet.... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by peacheater at 6:49 PM on May 19, 2008

My character goes down dark roads. For the sake of the book, I thought I'd travel those roads with him. He begins to work out obsessively. I began to work out obsessively. He joins a boxing club. I joined a boxing club. He takes steroids. I took steroids.

It's not that I harbor fantasies of transcending my doughiness and Charles-Atlasing myself into a totally badass hardbody fighter! It's for my writing! It's to help with my... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Greg Nog at 6:35 AM on May 19, 2008

Nineteen sixty called. It wants it's arrogant, bigoted psychologists back.
posted to MetaFilter by Caduceus at 10:59 AM on May 17, 2008

Can I suggest bokashi compsing? Far greener than what you're doing and you get cool compost for your plants. Not to mention the satisfaction of doing your little bit for the planet.
posted to Ask Metafilter by dmt at 5:09 AM on May 15, 2008

Awesome, but I think "Nobody died today" would be pretty big news.
posted to MetaFilter by ErWenn at 9:42 PM on May 14, 2008

I make somewhere between a quarter to half my income as a stage "mentalist" whose act somewhat resembles Derren Brown's--though not to his "magic handshake" level--so let me post a clarification, a bunch of caveats, and as much information as I can without making my colleagues mad at me.

(Paging The Deej! Hope me fellow magician!)

First, there are three very different forms of hypnosis being talked about... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Ian A.T. at 3:32 AM on May 12, 2008

Try this regularly updated list from Pitchfork.

You can take artists you like and plug them into Pandora or last.fm. This is the most efficient way to quickly expose yourself to a lot of good music you haven't heard of. Supposedly, last.fm lets you listen to a given album free, three times, but I've never tried it.

As for keeping up with new releases from specific bands you already like, there's iLike. They have a Facebook app, which is what I... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by Jaltcoh at 5:57 AM on May 2, 2008

This has been discussed a lot on MeFi - check your eyeglasses tag, and the glasses tag.

One oft chosen option is an online discount optician, like Zenni Optical, where glasses start at $8.00. They do sunglasses also!
posted to Ask Metafilter by DarlingBri at 9:00 PM on May 1, 2008

I have sad story.

A few years ago I interviewed a young guy for a job with us... we needed a Jr. Designer for some graphical production and design help. He was a nice kid who was three years out of school. It was weird that he only had one job on his resume — some internet business I never heard of— and his salary history was pretty high. But he had no real work samples. Only old student stuff. When my wife asked him for more portfolio material he turns beet red.... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by tkchrist at 1:17 PM on May 1, 2008

I went on a joyride once when I was 14 or 15 years old. I snuck out my window at 10 o'clock, met my friend on the road beside my house in his Mom's car. We probably made it 200 yards before he missed a turn, ran over a dogwood tree and plowed the car up to the axles in a muddy field.

I walked home, climbed back in my window, and went to bed.
posted to MetaFilter by vronsky at 11:09 AM on May 1, 2008

Hi Metafilter,

I just got out of a year long relationship (God, imagine that! A year! I suppose being too committed is one of my quirks!) because of how awesome I am, and I'd like to go bang a lot of chicks without having to do anything arduous like talk to them overly much or get to know them. I'm told I'm attractive, chicks dig me. Is that a good thing? I dress like a gangster, but with that signature flair that says "I know whether or not what I'm wearing is... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by shmegegge at 3:06 PM on December 18, 2007

Can I have some of my favorites show up with a different smell?
posted to MetaTalk by yhbc at 8:17 AM on April 29, 2008

Well here's the thing, unless you're wedding is in Williamsburg and someone like Girl Talk is in the audience, they'll most likely want to hear that fucking Umbrella song and maybe that new Madonna single. Not that there are incredible DJs who can read an audience and play a mix of new, obscure and pop with complete aplomb (like Mark Ronson), I really doubt you'll be able to find them.

I say this as someone who just got done with doing something similar. I had a friend... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by geoff. at 2:42 PM on April 27, 2008

Yeah, well I return to apologize to semmi for blowing my cool at his/her comment; I have a quick temper on this issue in particular because of my line of work (thank gawd we aren't discussing country music, or things might get really intense).

After a lifetime in music, I no longer believe musical value can be discerned from sound alone; the question for me is what music does for people, and in that respect, I start from the a priori position that all musics are equal... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by fourcheesemac at 3:45 AM on April 22, 2008

I've been outside. It's overrrated.

Traditionally Outside receives extremely high ratings by those who like to see others play it, and these people are in many cases comfortably ensconced Inside themselves. Outside was released many years ago, it was in fact the first massively multiplayer game, and yet it has always managed to avoid the double-edged Retro tag. In its favor, continual user updates have kept Outside current; there are always new things... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by aeschenkarnos at 4:19 PM on March 30, 2008

Take an orange and about a dozen whole cloves. Poke the pointy end of each clove into the orange, in an attractive pattern, if you like, until all that shows is the head of each clove. You'll end up with an orange studded with cloves.

Tie it with string and hang it in a corner (if you leave it on a plate, the orange will flatten and rot), and the cloves will slowly leech the juice from the orange and evaporate a lovely clove-orange scent into the air. It will last a few weeks.
posted to Ask Metafilter by breezeway at 6:46 AM on March 26, 2008

I have the opposite problem. I constantly have questions that aren't easily answered by Google, Wikipedia, or my friends in their various professions, but I don't ask them because I don't want to break some arbitrary ratio I've imagined between "questions" and "answers".

A quarter of my questions have been the hated "Does anyone remember this thing from this time?"

I click on the profile of a user who has supplied... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by JeremiahBritt at 1:28 PM on March 17, 2008

Following up on what rhizome said, the sorts of questions you're asking here are similar to those that concerned Derrida in a lot of his writings (see Of Grammatology and Writing and Difference). I'm more familiar with Foucault, who touches on this sort of things from a structuralist point of view in The Order of Things and from a post-structuralist point of view in The Archeology of Knowledge.

This idea of the endlessness of definition (how one word leads to another... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by wheat at 10:37 AM on March 13, 2008 marked best answer

the OP does have a specific question

I'm going to vent here rather than in the thread. (Then I'm going to work, so won't be responding)

This person has some goofy haldbaked theories and keeps coming into Ask to ask for other scholars who have written on them, using his/her own goofy made-up terminology and goofy half-baked ideas. The infinity of definition? This is BS that gives philosophy a bad name. Grrrrr. There are tons of... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by LobsterMitten at 10:04 AM on March 13, 2008

SWEET FANCY CHRISTMAS JUST ASK HIM TO BONE YOU ALREADY.

But maybe not in those exact words.
posted to Ask Metafilter by schroedinger at 11:31 PM on March 12, 2008

I'm the kind of guy who loves to read great books, tinker endlessly on my computer, create works of art when I'm in the right mood, and reeeeeally enjoys my own space & reclusion. Got married to an incredibly ambitious, gorgeous and intellectual woman over 2 years ago. We now have a 3-month old son. He was planned.
Now, despite my natural inclination to go all "Walden Pond" with my life, creating things electronically or with the written word, silently reading or... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by Detuned Radio at 10:42 PM on March 11, 2008

City Centre Apartments was a great deal for me the last time I was there, and they're very helpful - you can get in touch via email and make arrangements in advance. They rent rather nice apartments and rooms by the day; the price varies depending on exactly what size room in which apartment, but it's much cheaper than a hotel, no matter what. Talk to them in advance and they can probably coordinate roommates for you.

Their biggest block of apartments is RIGHT... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by Wolfdog at 7:29 AM on August 20, 2005

I was totally enjoying the absence of this post and then blam along comes this post. I'm going to have to go on to enjoying the absence of this post now.
posted to MetaFilter by rusty at 12:10 PM on March 10, 2008

I forgot what I was gonna type.
Oh yeah... I say bong hit all the time.
I forgot why I said that. Wait.. I'm on MetaFilter? Hey everyone!!
posted to MetaFilter by not_on_display at 8:01 PM on March 6, 2008

Normally I have to have two windows open in order to masturbate. Problem solved. Thanks Loq!
posted to MetaFilter by kosem at 2:50 PM on February 29, 2008

Cool post, thanks hadjiboy.

I understand that there will always be poverty, but seriously, send over a few thousand shovels, a few tens of thousands of feet of pipe, and some blueprints, and let them at least have some dignity. Christ.

Pasta, you're brilliant as ever.

I moved to South Africa last year to do some pro-bono work with one of the biggest NGOs doing relief and development work in the third... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by allkindsoftime at 1:40 AM on February 29, 2008

loiseau: "I'm just imagining someone giving me a cowbell and expecting me to play it and having to say, "Are you for real?"

Precisely Kenny Buttrey's reaction when recording Bob Dylan's Lay, Lady, Lay--that is, until he tried it. The following all quoted from Down The Highway: The Life of Bob Dylan, by Howard Sounes:

"The distinctive sound of "Lay, Lady, Lay" was created partly by chance after... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by roombythelake at 11:02 PM on February 26, 2008

Should I eat the...

black bean soup?
deviled eggs?
wheat bread, yellow mustard, fat free mayo, precooked breaded chicken patty, american cheese sandwich?
beef past the sell-by date?
raw chicken and onions?
6-7 day old cooked chicken?
raw pancetta?
rotten-egg-smelling pork?
squirrel-knawed cookies?
blue cheese in fridge for a month?
tuna sandwich?... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by Locative at 1:21 AM on February 26, 2008

If you favorite this comment I'll send you a mushy MeFi mail love note, possibly with integral equations in them.
posted to MetaFilter by onalark at 8:53 PM on February 24, 2008