When working in a textiles warehouse I would make it fun by imagining someone I'd met walking down a familiar street while showing off the shirt/hat/etc. I just sorted/tagged/profiled in a ridiculous fashion show montage, then turning to me with a smile and a wink or thumbs-up and saying, "Thanks, man!" or similar after I finished X items depending on the day's quota. The person would then step into a crowd behind me cheering me on, who I would imagine turning around and "hi-five"-ing one at a time after arbitrary milestones to celebrate my progress.
To come up with this idea I asked myself who would be disappointed if no one in the world were willing to do any job resembling mine anymore and what would they be losing, then optimized the generated examples for salience and awesomeness.
Took the entire survey and all extra credit questions in one go; minus ACT, SAT2400 and Respectable(tm) IQ scores since I don't have them, and </=140 character LW description because I was starting to get tired after the 40 min. IQ test.
So much fun! I'm very curious to see the results.
Meetup report! We had a total of 4 Attendees plus a well behaved infant. Much lower than usual, but not unexpected due to scheduling issues.
Meta-meetup discussion: Nominated planner for next meetup. It has been suggested that in the future, if an organizer/presenter cannot make it to their meetup, that it not be postponed unless at least 3-7 days notice can be given (since not everyone checks their email, facebook and/or the Less Wrong posting daily).
Presentation: Skipped in favor of scouting the area as a location for future meetups. While I'm currently re-working the whole thing (found some critical flaws), it should be ready again by the meetup after next if there is... (read more)
New location! Dinner at The Wine Loft near Dayton, Ohio. Reservation is under Dugan. After dinner activities may include:
Presentation and discussion of preliminary material for a "Rational Mattress Buying" article (inspired by Rational Toothpaste: A Case Study).
Exploring and appraising The Greene as a location to hold future meetups.
Splitting off into small groups for rejection therapy in unfamiliar surroundings.
An example of "having the child occupied by some solitary activity" from my past: Almost as soon I could walk my parents started sending me on quests to find and retrieve various items throughout grocery stores, then put them back and find another if they weren't quite what was asked for. Wasted almost none of their time while keeping me entertained and feeling (while learning to be) useful to them in that context.
...you should NOT paint your room and lose your deposit if you are not decently-off financially.
Unless the apartment owners and managers only care what it looks like when you leave and you can afford to add a few layers of white base paint just before doing so, to avoid losing the deposit. Such policies are often clearly delineated in the lease contract, and you can sometimes negotiate leniency with the management as long as you do so in writing and have it attached to the contract pre-signature. YMMV
I was not aware of this rumor. How did you come to the conclusion it is widespread, and why do you think it's worth taking seriously?
For those who've never used a command line interface and find them intimidating (one of my hurdles on the way to learning to program), I'd recommend Learn Code the Hard Way: The Command Line Crash Course. The exercises are designed to trip you up and force you to figure some things out for yourself, which has quickly increased my confidence and self-reliance so far.
I have not finished the book, but am already getting slightly addicted to "commanding" my computer to do my bidding instead of having to dig my way through windows explorer and context menus to get anything done. Am I right in thinking this may be good prep for migrating to linux?
This wasn't done. "My enemy is status signalling" is a moderately effective general purpose attack against positions one doesn't like but doesn't apply here (except in the Hansonian "Everything is Signalling" sense.)
I don't consider Vaniver an enemy, but will forgo brevity and taboo "status" to better show where I think I disagree with you:
I agree with the content of the message; that frivolous use of the word "rationality" and its conjugates in post titles needs to be curtailed and prevented.
I object to that message's delivery, which seems to me to imply that an acceptable reaction to those who make that mistake are, "That was so stupid, I'm not even going to explain
Is the temporary amusement of some at the sniping of those others' status worth potentially alienating them from the community, even if they number less than "most"? I do not want such "ridicule of the less socially experienced and/or quick to read sequences" norms to become prevalent here.
The game aspect is trying to get a higher "score" of hi-fives at the end of each day. Sort of like Tetris or Bejeweled where you always run out of space/time eventually, but can play again to improve your score.