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Steven[0461] and I would like to come up from Chicagoland for a Madison meet-up sometime, but we could only make it on a weekend. We would only be occasional attendees at any rate, but perhaps you could also do a weekend meet-up every once in a while, in addition to whatever weekday you settle on. Also, the date in the title doesn't currently match the date in the text.
In response to
Meetup : Chicago Meetup
I might've gone if I had prior notice. :/
Sorry for the late notice. Steven and I usually try to give about a week or so notice, but it didn't work out this time. We figured it's better to have one now even with late notice than to wait until the next time our schedules cleared. Also, we have a Google Group where you can sign up to get e-mail notifications rather than relying on catching it on the site. Hopefully you can make it to the next one!
In response to
A less wrong way to talk about the arts?
I think there are some interesting ideas here, and I agree that analysis of art can (and sometimes should) be done at a high level. But I'm doubtful that The Hangover or even The Hangover 2 is the best example to hang your hat on. I agree with Kevin that the first movie is actually pretty funny. Plus:
Analyzing humor is like dissecting a frog. Few people are interested and the frog dies of it.
Maybe that the quote is not completely true (that is, there are situations when analyzing humor may lead to insight or even more humor), but to some extent, I think White is correct that humor is challenging to analyze without taking the joy/humor out of it. I enjoy laughing, including sometimes stomach-hurting laughter at "lowbrow" comedy, and I prefer to keep laughing at what makes me laugh rather than analyzing it.
In response to
Madison WI Meetup, Sat Apr 2nd 1PM
Steven0461 and I would like to come up from Chicagoland for a Madison meetup sometime (and weekends are better for that), but we will unfortunately be out of town that weekend. Have fun!
I've been looking around for a while, and I haven't found the book that I wish existed -- guides to style for women are more often about "expressing yourself" than systematic "this looks good, this looks bad" manuals. The closest I've found is What Not To Wear. -- there's also a matching book.
Of the fashion magazines, Lucky is the most practical -- the clothes are almost affordable and there are sections that detail how to put together a pretty outfit.
Still trying to figure out clothes, though. "Flattering" is hard to pin down. More advice would be welcome.
It's not a fashion magazine, but I find a lot of the fashion advice in Real Simple to be quite helpful, and some (although not all) of the featured clothes are affordable. The website looks like it has some good resources too.
Sure. Anyone know any good sources on that?
I enjoy (and learn from) What Not to Wear, although it's probably not the most efficient way to learn about clothes, make-up, hair styles, etc. It's often pretty amusing though. Also good is the original BBC version. There appear to be some resources on both of those websites, and a number of related books, but I haven't used/read any of them.
ETA: One of the things the show taught me is that, especially if you're not that experienced with fashion, you often have to try on a lot of clothes to find something flattering. Unfortunately that can be both frustrating and time-consuming; but to some extent knowing some of the "rules" that the show teaches about what's flattering (and the different rules for different body types) can at least help that process go a little more smoothly.
In response to
Suicide note of an LW user
Do we have any way to confirm if he successfully killed himself and is beyond help, rather than changing his mind at the last minute or making some technical error that left him alive? Does anyone know him in person?
The post appears to have been removed. I hope that means that he changed his mind, but have no information either way.
Edited to add:
In response to
College Selection Advice
It's often good advice, other things being equal, to go to the best school you get into. Of course, other things are rarely, if ever, equal. (Where best means most prestigious.)
The Harvard name, particularly internationally, is probably without peer among U.S. institutions. On the other hand, I think it's at least possible that for certain fields, including engineering, that an MIT degree, for example, would be viewed just as positively among those who are most likely to matter in terms of career advancement, etc. But people in engineering could speak better to that than I.
It's also my impression, based on conversations with friends who are alumni of the school, that one of the primary criticisms leveled against Harvard is its lack of focus on the undergraduate school as opposed to the grad and professional schools. One good friend of mine, while very happy to have the Harvard name on his resume, was somewhat disappointed in the academic experience at Harvard because of that. Of the schools I'm most familiar with on your list, Swarthmore, for example, would be the very opposite of Harvard in terms of its attention to the undergrad experience.
I do interviews for my undergrad college, and always advise people, once they've narrowed down their list using whatever criteria they've determined are most important to them, that they won't go wrong by going with their gut in choosing among the remaining contenders. Maybe that doesn't sound like rationalist advice, but again, this is after you've already applied your rational analysis and narrowed your list down to just a handful of schools. (Of course, your analysis may leave you with only one school on your list anyway, in which case, no need to resort to the gut.) At that point, I recommend going with your gut, particularly if your gut feeling is informed by visits during admitted student events, which I highly recommend if you can swing it, and which, while not giving you perfect insight into the school, give you a different way to evaluate than just comparing schools on paper. Talking to current students and alumni is also useful.
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I felt skeeved as well. I didn't mind the polyamory plugs, and in general I like autobiographical bits, as they bring more of a human element into posts.
What bothered me was that the discussion about romance felt very cold, somehow. Talking about "suboptimal" relationships, saying that you "scored" your first one-night stand, and such. It sounded like you weren't interested in other people as, well, people.
The interesting thing is that I don't really endorse these emotional reactions to your writing. In general, I'm completely fine with PUA stuff as long as it stays ethical, which I think your post did. Nor do I feel, on an intellectual level, that there's anything wrong with considering a relationship "suboptimal" - many relationships are that. Yet the post managed to push buttons on an emotional level anyway. For that reason, I'd very strongly prefer to not see this post on the front page, as I suspect it would give a lot of people an unreasonably negative image of this community.
I agree with you on the skeeviness of the terminology of "scoring" a one night stand; interestingly, version 1 of the post instead states that Luke "had [his] first one-night stand." Although I haven't compared the versions carefully, it therefore seems like version 1 may make more of an attempt to avoid that sort of language.