Activity from Tell Me No Lies
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Waterproofing 150 windows
I have 60 year old iron-frame windows in my house. Either in the original construction or in the years since gaps have appeared. They range from 1/32 to 1/4 inch. When the rain blows from a particular direction they leak like sieves.
Tracking virus mutations
Microbiologists: Given the host's role in virus reproduction could we theoretically track (with some statistical accuracy) individuals that a particular virus variant has passed through? For example, if 20 infected people visited the old folks' home, could we pick out the one that passed the virus to the residents?
What does it feel like to become bilingual as an adult?
If I’m going to continue on my current path it’s important for me to become fluent in Spanish. Despite that I’m having trouble getting started and I’ve realized one of the big reasons is that I don’t have any image in my mind of what it would feel like to speak two languages. I’ve talked to people who grew up bilingual, but what if you came into it later in life?
Dog likes being petted but doesn’t show it
My dog, who is otherwise expressive and affectionate, lays like a lump on a log while being petted. She occasionally rolls over to offer her belly or bears into a head scritch and she always reacts when I stop petting, but for the most part there is zero movement. Is this normal? Is there anything I can do to get her to let me know what she likes and doesn’t?
Starving vs. risking the virus
I live in an area where 50% of the population is living hand to mouth, and that's not just a figure of speech. Should I have my head contractor cancel the landscaping work his team is doing in my yard so I'm not responsible for contagion?
How sure are we of pre-mechanized army sizes?
The sizes given for armies in the pre-mechanized era frequently set off my B.S. detector. For example, Napoleon’s 685,000 soldiers marching on Moscow would have required 1000 tons of food daily and would have left a swath of 365 tons of excrement per day in their wake.
Hikes and/or natural beauty within 100 miles of Houston
I have some free time in Houston coming up and I’d like to spend it making day trips to the great outdoors. Closer to Houston is better but anywhere out to a 100 mile radius would be fine. Any suggestions?
Mosquito repellent plants
I’m doing what I can for mosquito abatement in my backyard, but I’d like to line my covered patio with a last line of defense. I’m wondering if there is some plant that either repels mosquitos or at least covers up the chemical signatures they follow. Has anyone had any success with this?
Puppies pooping when it’s pouring
My puppy is doing well with house training so far but there’s a problem when it’s pouring rain outside. Namely, she refuses to go out there at all. Unfortunately this means sometimes she holds it too long and goes potty inside the house.
Help me get footage of mosquitos
I need to get video of mosquitos in flight. I'm particularly interested in ones around 250 cm (8 ft) from the camera so I was going to set the focus there, but even if they're blurred I need to record all of them within the field of vision. I know between little and nothing about cameras or video in general.
What types of dog is this
I'm trying to figure out what breed (if any) my puppy is closest to. Her mother is a street dog (picture included) and her father is unknown.
What happened to the Lord Of The Rings merchandise in New Zealand?
So we managed to find our way to New Zealand, but time was running tight at Hobbiton and we didn’t have time to pick up LotR gifts/etc. Unfortunately we missed the WETA workshops as well. Bizarrely we have not been able to find a single bit of merchandise in cities large and small throughout the rest of the country. Is this a licensing thing? Has the tourist industry just moved on? We’ve got Queenstown, Dunedin, and Christchurch left to go; is there any hope for us?
Will my puppy remember me in a month?
I have a 10 week old puppy. She was weaned and I took her home at 7 weeks. We've had a good (if exhausting) 3 weeks and . . . I'm about to leave for a month. She'll be going back to live with her mother and two of her siblings while I'm gone and I'm wondering what to expect when I return. We've had fairly good bonding time, but at her age will she even remember it?
Identify a (possibly imaginary) tree
This tree appears in the Japanese Anime "Akira". I'm trying to figure out what species it is/might be.
Emergency prescription drug refill when you have no prescription
When I lived in the U.S. I always had photos of my original prescription slips available when I travelled out of the country in case my meds and I got separated. Now living in Mexico I take a different set of drugs that are also prescription the U.S. (and I’m sure many other places), but they are all OTC here. I have no prescriptions. How do people deal with this situation when traveling?
Graphs of the number of posts and comments, the...
Metafilter Usage 2010-2019 Graphs of the number of posts and comments, the number of unique posters and commenters, and users joining and leaving the site from January 1, 2010 through Jun 15, 2019. I may add some more later if I come up with any other interesting metrics.
What to reserve in New Zealand
A friend and I are off to New Zealand in September. We generally make up trips as we go, but there are some items (like Hobbiton) that require a little more planning in the form of long term reservations. What restaurants/lodges/experiences should we be booking three months out?
Mural suggestions
I have a seventeen foot diameter dome with a six foot hole down the middle (picture 1, picture 2) that I would like to have a mural inside of. Ideas welcome.
Doing business in Uganda
A friend of mine will be on the ground in Uganda near Fort Portal. He'll be there as a business representative for a small company. He has reason to trust the company he'll be meeting with and the U.S. State Department advisory for Uganda is remarkably mild, so perhaps there's nothing to worry about. I certainly wouldn't blink at being a tourist there, but a businessman seems more like a target somehow. Is it worth hiring a bodyguard?
Serious weather stripping
I need to install weather stripping on 24 or so window sets like this. Difficulty: It’s regularly a pretty humid 105F around here, something I reflect on as I scrape the half melted rubber remains of the last person’s attempt off.
Siamese Jets
What's bigger than an American football field and flies? The Stratolaunch. April 13 saw its first flight, a two and half hour shakedown over the Mojave. Previously.
Ideas for a comprehensive bathroom mirror arrangement
I’m laying out a new bathroom but I’ve never seen a mirror arrangement I’ve really liked. I need three things: 1) a way to quickly glance and see how I’m looking in general, 2) A set up for shaving that allows me to easily see every bit of my face, including the bottom of my jaw, and 3) a set up that someone could do their makeup with. I’ve never worn makeup so 3 is particularly difficult for me to cover.
Quote: "Travelling suggestions from strangers are postcards from god"
I have obviously misremembered the quote "Travelling suggestions from strangers are postcards from god." I’m hoping someone with better Google-fu than I can help me track down the original. Anyone?
Western Europe. Hotel. View Of River. Cheap.
I'll have some down time in Western Europe next month and I'm looking for somewhere I can pull up an armchair and watch the boats float by. Say, somewhere within ten hours train travel from Paris. Cheap (less than €100/night) is good too. Suggestions?
Ergonomic drafting/lab chair
I'm looking for an ergonomic chair to use at my 3' tall electronics workbench. If there was an Aeron model that tall there wouldn't be a question, but no such luck.
Cheapest possible speaker for public presentation
My organization does once a week presentations in an open courtyard. For sound we have a little 8" all-in-one amp/MP3 player/cuisinart that sits up front. We're looking for recommendations for a speaker to attach to its Speakon OUT port.
Driving one way from the U.S. to Mexico
I've got a) a carload of stuff that I need to get from San Antonio, Texas to Merida, Yucatan and b) a yen to drive down the gulf coast of Mexico. The complication is that I don't have a car and I don't want to buy one. If this was in a single country I'd just do a one way rental. I'm looking for suggestions.
A compendium of Psychic Energy?
There are a lot of different models for "Psychic Energy". Auras, Ki, the mood of an audience or just someone being a downer all get that description. I’m looking for a book or other resource that breaks out the various forms and talks some about how they fit (or don’t) with the context they arise in.
Skeptical, non-skeptical, anthropological... I’ll take whatever I can find. Thanks.
Why am I suddenly a hot job prospect?
Over the years I’d gotten used to a steady drumbeat (say one every two weeks) of recruiters mailing or calling to say they’d found my resume, blah, blah, blah. Ten months ago I disabled all (I think) of my job site accounts, and contacts slowed to a trickle. Two weeks ago, it all went nuts.
Show me the natural beauty of Mexico
I find myself without a home in Mexico for three weeks so I thought I’d go poke around. I like natural beauty, generally on a grand scale. Difficulty: I can not leave Mexico, and I’d prefer to stay out of the western areas for safety reasons.
Good carpentry wood in the Yucatan?
I have the opportunity to have custom furniture made for a house in the Yucatan. I am personally a fan of big solid pieces of glass and wood. What wood to use is the question.
Man plans Yiddish poster; God laughs at formatting
I've been tasked with making a poster with the phrase "דער מענטש טראַכט און גאָט לאַכט" on it. It would hopefully be about three equal sized lines of text, but I have no idea at all where to put line breaks. Could some Yiddish and/or Hebrew speakers help me out?
Is this Russian saying Russian?
I'm trying to find out if any actual Russian has heard the supposedly Russian saying "The church is near, but the road is icy/slippery. The tavern is far, but I will walk carefully."
What kind of ship is this?
This was spotted near Naval Base San Diego, and identifying it has been driving us nuts. The profile does not correspond to anything we can find. Help us, AskMe!
"Chinese" proverb source and translation?
I've been tasked with finding the source of "Tension is who you think you should be. Relaxation is who you are."
So far I've seen it tagged as a Chinese proverb, but I thought I'd ask if anyone from China had ever heard the phrase.
If it is Chinese in origin, does the following capture its essence? (I'm entirely ignorant of Chinese languages, I'm just passing on something I found.)
松懈中的你，是真正的你；你之所以感到压力，是因为你期待改变自己
Why do so many Spanish vocabulary lists omit gender?
Lately I’ve been poking around the Internet for speciality Spanish vocabulary lists. I’ve been able to find what I need but in the process I’ve come across any number of lists that do not include genders for the nouns.
As someone learning the language, I’m curious why that might be. I know I can make a good guess at the gender based on the ending of a word, but those are just heuristics— isn’t knowing the actual gender fairly important?
Received Pronounciation or General American accent for LA Spanish?
I want to integrate some accent work into my Spanish language education. Unfortunately I live in the Yucatán and I’d rather not end up with that as my default.
Is there a neutral(ish) accent that is recognized across Latin America? Something that newsreaders and sportscasters use for international programming? Or if not for all of Latin America, at least for Mexico?
Everyone gets a nombre but me?
I’m trying to understand some Google Translate weirdness. For English->Spanish entering "my name is ____" translates to "mi nombre es ____" for every name I can think of. Except Tim. "my name is Tim" translates to "me llamo Tim".
As much as I like to feel special this is weirding me out a bit. Can anyone suggest an explanation?
Is it worth sending resumes in late December?
I'm starting up a job search but from prior experience on both sides of the process I'm thinking I might put things on hold from Dec 15 through January 5. I suspect a lot of people will be out and that my resume might get lost in the backlog when they return.
I'm hoping someone here will have enough experience to weigh in either direction.
Was Charlie ever redeemed?
The character Charlie (aka Scottish sniper with PTSD) in Wonder Woman fails to take a shot at a critical moment in battle due to his own issues. This is a relatively common trope which is traditionally followed up by the character getting a hero moment later on, usually by performing a similar action under impossible circumstances. Charlie is seen fighting later, but he never gets his moment.
Jake and Elwood get beaten for no reason.
I once saw a censored version of the Blues Brothers which was particularly notable for the scene where Sister Mary goes after them both for swearing. In the overdub they're just saying "Shoot!" "Gosh!" "Darn!" so it looks like she's just beating them with a yardstick for no reason.
Other people have seen this version so I know it wasn't a fever dream, but the best I've found so far are bleeped versions. All I'm really looking for is the nun scene. Can anyone help?
Did the Trojan Rabbit have a name?
Very very obscure Monty Python and the Holy Grail question: How was the Trojan Rabbit referred to on the set? Was it called "The Trojan Rabbit"? Something else?
Hamburger is short for...
Burt Reynolds reveals the strangely apropos meaning of "hamburger" from the set of Smokey And The Bandit:
And Jackie drank on set, sometimes before 11 AM. He’d look over his shoulder and say “Mal! Hamburger!” And that meant glass of bourbon. Whenever he said “Mal! Hamburger!” that meant go get me a tall glass of bourbon.
My oak spheres unsanded themselves.
I'm creating some oak spheres as part of a larger project. Last week I got done cutting them and sanded them down to a nice 220 in anticipation of staining them when I have the whole project ready.
This morning I went out and touched them and they're basically rough wood again. I'm assuming this is moisture related, but I'd like to hear about people's experience here. Presumably I just need to sand them down again?
Honey, why is the cat talking?
Entertaining Data Sets
I'm looking for a whimsical large data set. Something bizarrely specific, or just an area you'd never guess there was that much to measure. For example, the amount of materials used by the Teddy Bear industry or the shifting volume of animal feces at major zoos. I've been searching through the many big data set sites to no avail.
The ideal set would contain around a million nodes and, if relational, a few hundred thousand connections. A factor of ten either way would be reasonable though.
Student food == Animator food
Ongoing workshop decluttering
I tend to accumulate surplus hardware (brackets, hinges, etc) in the workshop. Lately I've been thinking of timing things out: if some random part been idle for X months then dispose of it. I'm wondering if anyone has used a scheme like this and what the pros and cons might be. Logistically I was just going to date-stamp things on the day they get added to the random collection of parts, and make a periodic pass to weed out unused items.
Boutique crafting duct tape
I've got a nephew who enjoys building duct tape wallets and the like. Generally we just buy him tape off the rack down at the hardware store (they have a surprisingly large selection of color and patterns) but I'm curious if there is .... I don't know, artisanal tape out there somewhere. Something to get as a special treat.
Narrow down a laser pointer to .01 inches
I'd like to have a very small beam from my laser pointer. It doesn't have to be particularly bright so what I've done so far is to prick a thin piece of paper with the tip of a pin and fasten it over the end. I'd prefer something a little more robust so I've been trying to think of something that would already have a .01 inch hole in it that I could buy and trim to fit. Any ideas?
"Got up too quickly" for different cultures
Yesterday I stood up too quickly, got a bit lightheaded and had to sit down again. My Mexican hosts were concerned and I tried to explain.
At this point that I realized that "got up too quickly" is really not that descriptive and in fact borders on idiom. So now I'm curious what the Mexican Spanish idiom would be for that particular event (technically orthostatic hypotension). And while I'm at it I'm kind of curious about other cultures as well.
Please help me sate my cultural curiosity.