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This isn't even the first time there's been an FPP on Nicholson doing a four-hour video on an immersive theme park experience and its problems. (Speaking of which, Evermore officially closed a couple of months ago.)
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 7:02 AM on May 19, 2024

Chicagoans primarily eat thin, flat, "tavern-style" pizza, cut into squares.

When I actually lived in Chicago, as a teen in the late 70s/early 80s, I never saw this style, let alone had it. I suspect that it's primarily eaten in taverns by people who are drinking because it's easier to handle when you're drunk. (That's where and why I primarily ate it, anyway.) In conclusion, Chicago pizza is a dish of contrasts.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 7:20 AM on May 17, 2024

Still SMH at the comparison of nicotine and caffeine. I mean, caffeine isn't without its negative effects, and I've started cutting back generally on my intake, but nothing anywhere near the league of "traditionally delivered in a form that includes carcinogens." Smoking is also really fucking obnoxious if you're exposing other people to smoke--in addition to health effects, nonsmokers don't want to smell like an ashtray, generally--and even if vaping reduces the health effects,… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 9:27 AM on May 16, 2024

Very interesting take on the place, not quite what I was expecting.

My experience of Branson was through my then-wife's having an annual get-together with some of her relatives there... but not for any of the dinner-theater or tourist trap franchise stuff. The White River was dammed up for hydroelectric power, which created Lake Taneycomo, name derived from Taney County, MO (and ugh, had no idea about the Dred Scott connection); the lake is stocked with three-quarters… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 8:40 AM on May 16, 2024

and then he told me the origin of the fetish was his MOM (a lesbian who only wore very expensive leather outfits) she'd been the 'girl' on a kids show back in the 60s and it was her role to always get a pie in the face.

Good grief.

Turned 60 last Friday; no pie, but plenty of cake.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 8:10 AM on May 14, 2024

I was going to say that Bishop is a secret agent of sorts because he might have a secret identity, but no--his last name is actually Bishop.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 5:24 AM on May 13, 2024

What this sort of piece says about McSweeney's: they're turning into Buzzfeed.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 9:19 PM on May 12, 2024

Tudyk's dogs look like they're in dog Valhalla.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 8:13 AM on May 12, 2024

.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 8:05 AM on May 12, 2024

The thing that irritates me most about this, by far, has nothing to do with the ad itself (which as someone else noted is just riffing off a very popular YouTube series), and more to do with someone like Matt Zoller Seitz taking time out from his no doubt busy schedule to scold Tim Cook for doing something like this to draw attention to his product... thereby ensuring that Cook's efforts are successful. Good job, Matt. Roger Ebert sure would be proud.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 10:16 PM on May 9, 2024

I would imagine that, if you wanted to hide something that valuable and funky, a sewer would be the perfect place to hide it. Maybe too perfect.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 10:20 AM on May 8, 2024

I'd pretty much given up on music criticism well before Pitchfork even existed, and the high-minded rationalizations ("Progression—whether it was in hip-hop, pop, guitar music, electronic music—was important to us at the time") behind the low-brow gesture is pure college-paper-level crap that you can get away with in your early twenties, if you're lucky, but nothing to be ever proud of. I hadn't heard of the band, but they sound OK.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 7:14 AM on May 6, 2024

They were both rivals for Terry Yamaha's affection.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 10:40 AM on May 6, 2024

Not sure what's funnier, that most of these things aren't exclusive to the 80s or that commenters are having a misery-off. What's worse than Cabbage Patch Kids? Getting actual cabbage for a gift!
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 9:12 AM on May 6, 2024

Old and tired: UFOs are really real, this time, you guys, honest

New hotness: reincarnation is really real, this time, you guys, honest
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 8:37 PM on May 2, 2024

I've had the experience of having a woman come up to me in tears because I was a dead ringer for her dead brother. No claims of reincarnation, just a random (and rather awkward) experience.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 4:48 AM on May 3, 2024

ctrl-f "hyperlexia"
0/0

Some of these stories tend to center around "how could this three-year-old know about [x]." Maybe your kid can already read, or is just picking up stuff off of YouTube? I sure knew a lot more as a very young child than what happened to be on late-sixties TV, thanks to the set of The New Book of Knowledge encyclopedias that my parents bought and that I used to read as if they were comics (which I also read).
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 10:54 AM on May 3, 2024

So... this is a documentary about a documentary? Is it documentaries all the way down?
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 6:14 AM on May 3, 2024

I had three or four Palm devices (depending on whether or not you really count the watch, which was underwhelming even when it worked); the first one was a Palm III and the last one was a Treo, which I traded in for an iPhone 3 because it stopped syncing which made it sort of useless. Palm took the handheld market away from Apple--making its PDA pocket-sized, which Newton never came close to being--and eventually Apple took it back. But I was on Team P for a solid decade there.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 8:21 PM on May 1, 2024

njohnson23, that scratches the same itch as the scene in Real Genius in which Mitch finds Lazlo Hollyfeld's secret hideout (after having previously seen Lazlo walk into his closet and disappearing). I'm reading Geoff Manaugh's book right now, and it's likewise compelling; there was a case in Memphis some time ago where there was some kind of cash storage facility (not a bank per se, maybe some place where armored car companies stored it?) that shared a wall with a place that… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 9:14 AM on May 1, 2024

When I think of Marillion, and this album specifically, I think of "Childhood's End?", because a friend of mine got into the album as a sort of replacement for Peter Gabriel-era Genesis and played this song repeatedly. Such a great bass groove.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 6:21 AM on May 1, 2024

That's funny that Jerry thinks that comedy is dead or dying, because I've been enjoying comedy a lot more lately, tuning in (a bit late in some cases, but better late than never) to some really excellent comedy by the likes of Taylor Tomlinson, Iliza Shlesinger, Fern Brady, Hannah Gadsby of course... what do they have in common? Wait, it'll come to me, I'm sure.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 10:22 AM on April 30, 2024

I'm going to start with a link back to a comment that I made in the 2011 thread, which I think still holds up and connects well with this thread. In particular, the part of the above-the-fold quote in the FPP that says "his reputation for contentiousness was equally potent, often overshadowing the art itself" seems to me to be pretty disingenuous, because I think that that was 100% intentional on Ellison's part; to a large, maybe overwhelming degree, Ellison never seemed to trust the… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 7:26 AM on April 29, 2024

I'd suggest "crazydaysandnights" and "cdan" tags.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 3:22 PM on April 28, 2024

On review of TFA: indeed, Christ, what an asshole. Apparently, his reaction to #MeToo putting a lot of stuff out in the open was to double down and just make shit up.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 3:32 PM on April 28, 2024

"giblets"

could be true
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 8:31 PM on April 27, 2024

I tend to think that the (usually) teenage hormones have a lot to do with forming strong emotional bonds with music that you encounter at that age, or at least that was the case for me--I'd peg my peak years as being from about 13-23. I can still find new music and musicians that catch my attention (as with this recent FPP), but it's less frequent--like, an artist will really grab me maybe every two or three years now (I'm nearly 60).
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 9:50 AM on April 26, 2024

aww yiss shake that moneymaker
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 7:29 PM on April 24, 2024

Sorry, chavenet--I assumed that that's what I'd heard on the radio, but it doesn't seem to connect to it. Here's a short live set that I found elsewhere on NPR from 2022 that seems pretty good on sampling.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 8:45 AM on April 24, 2024

The thing that has always stopped me cold with EA is its name. Every form of philanthropy strives to be effective, by definition; they can vary wildly according to the honesty of the particular altruist in terms of what they want to accomplish (i.e. contribute to the infrastructure of institutions of higher learning, but also putting their names on those buildings to put them in the mouths of future generations), how well and thoroughly they examine the institutions by which… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 10:47 AM on April 20, 2024

Unfortunately, I didn't go to Vegas when the one thing that should have gotten me there (the Star Trek Experience) was there, but I haven't completely ruled it out, and the Sphere sure sounds like it's something to see.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 10:21 AM on April 20, 2024

Have they formally given up the whole "don't be evil" thing?
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 5:20 AM on April 19, 2024

.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 6:05 PM on April 18, 2024

I found the article itself to be a bit on the thin side. The adage “You can never be too rich or too thin” is more than sixty years old; you have to go back more than a century to find rich gluttons like Diamond Jim Brady. How long has haute cuisine been associated with overengineered food in tiny portions?

Also, I am on Ozempic, and while I don't find my insurance to be exceptionally generous, it's quite affordable (about $25 for a four-week supply) and is really doing… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 7:12 AM on April 17, 2024

What If... H.P. Lovecraft wrote the Homer Price stories?
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 7:06 PM on April 16, 2024

I always start with STAIN and BORED, and occasionally will go on to GUPPY if the first two don't cough up enough hits. Had no idea that BUMFS was a thing.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 5:41 AM on April 15, 2024

I don't get lost, I practice "stunt navigation." It even has its own theme song to the tune of "I Shot the Sheriff", although I only really do the chorus.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 12:07 PM on April 14, 2024

I'm also uncomfortably reminded of Jeffrey Dahmer and how he got away with murder for as long as he did thanks to the local PD's neglect.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 9:29 AM on April 11, 2024

...and I just got to the part of TFA where that comparison is made. Great minds, &c.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 9:37 AM on April 11, 2024

My condolences to his surviving partner, John Boson.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 10:11 AM on April 10, 2024

I'm about 2/3rds of the way through and had to tear myself away to go to work. Kind of furious at the podcaster/vlogger character who used the main character as grist for the true crime industrial complex. There was a "Heavenly Creatures"-type crime in central Illinois some years back, with the young teen girls tried as adults for the murder of one of the teens' mom (she got 20 years, the other one got about 11), and I was thinking about them as I was reading this.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 6:47 AM on April 10, 2024

So Halloween Jack... Did you figure out where this story takes place yet?

Ha, yeah, I saw the one where there are I-74 signs pointing to Champaign-Urbana and Indianapolis and I was like, soooo... Danville?
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 7:53 AM on April 10, 2024

Signs and portents, folks.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 9:11 PM on April 8, 2024

It suddenly occurs to me that this story and "The Nine Billion Names of God", by Arthur C. Clarke, have exactly opposite premises.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 9:03 AM on April 8, 2024

Well, looks like Carbondale, Illinois is going to be clear after all; still, the coolness of being down there in 2017 was--sorry--somewhat eclipsed by the much-longer-than-usual drive back. 94% will be an interesting experience and I still have my glasses from the previous one.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 7:27 AM on April 8, 2024

JoeZydeco, in 2017 I was coming from a family reunion in Indiana, and since the weather was good I decided to camp in a state campground not far from Marion, which was also in the path. My thinking was that the roads would be less crowded driving back; they may have been, but it was still a crawl.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 7:39 AM on April 8, 2024

I learned about menstruation from reading Carrie, which is not a great way to do that, but that's what you get from a fairly repressive upbringing. It's still one of his more unique books, with its epistolary structure, which was probably not only influenced by Dracula, which also influenced King's next book, 'Salem's Lot, but also by the fact that he originally intended it as a short story for the porn magazine… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 3:07 PM on April 5, 2024

I think about Carrie’s last thoughts running through her head, or Cujo’s confusion, or when Gage dies, or Harold’s curdled loneliness, and I still catch my breath a little, even all these years later.

King's deep and sincere sympathy for outsiders of all types extends to some (or at least some pity) for some of the characters who end up as villains.
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 5:26 PM on April 5, 2024

But in the gently self-aggrandising philosophing of Microserf’s characters, we can also see the dawn of a more extreme worldview. What if I’m an outsider because I’m better than everyone else?

The same is true about Harry Potter and literally every other chosen-one trope.

Before you had HP, there were the X-Men--also pupils under training for their special powers at an isolated, expansive mansion, and also with other people… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 3:17 PM on April 5, 2024

I remember the 2017 eclipse quite well; I camped out at a nice nearby campground the night before, got to a park, the sky was clear, got the full experience. I also remember the drive back, which took at least twice as long as it should have.

And the same place does not look super-promising WRT the weather, even though it's still in the area of totality. I missed out on a transportation option that might have worked, which would have been to get on a train going to and… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 6:36 PM on April 4, 2024