The Sword of Benny Andajetz

April 12, 2013 8:24 PM

What's Your Metafilter moment?

For me, it was the dumb realization that after ten some years of seeing the name Benny Andajetz in posts/comments etc, that it was not just some weird assed Serbian name I would never really be called on to pronounce right out loud.

It was fuckin Benny and The Jets.

Christ what an asshole.

Ten fuckin years yo.

Yours?
posted by timsteil to MetaFilter-Related at 8:24 PM (248 comments total)

Unexpectedly trapping coldchef and others in the never ending hellscape loop that is the Foodfight livestream.
posted by hellojed at 8:30 PM on April 12, 2013 [10 favorites]

I probably have more than one but the one that leaps to mind is that Blasdelb and blasdelf are actually two separate (but equally important!) people, and not just me not being able to read or remember properly.
posted by rtha at 8:43 PM on April 12, 2013 [9 favorites]

i, clavdivs
posted by ocherdraco at 8:48 PM on April 12, 2013 [63 favorites]

When I realized that there isn't always a direct correlation between the amount of time put into crafting a comment and whether it turns out well.

I spent 31 minutes on this.
posted by SpacemanStix at 8:58 PM on April 12, 2013 [37 favorites]

The guy who has lee majors in his name
posted by dfriedman at 9:10 PM on April 12, 2013 [2 favorites]

There's a user named dg and we were in chat at the same time. I found this very exciting.
posted by bq at 9:14 PM on April 12, 2013 [6 favorites]

The first time I called Blazecock Pileon BP, as if I knew him. And I got a Favorite. And I felt like I belonged!
posted by Splunge at 9:18 PM on April 12, 2013 [4 favorites]

The McSchnell Fascists.

My brain still parses it that way every time I see it, even though I finally realized it was a Woody Guthrie reference. Probably always will.
posted by Balonious Assault at 9:18 PM on April 12, 2013 [7 favorites]

It's always someone with the fucking jellyfish. Those are my metafilter moments.
posted by kuujjuarapik at 9:25 PM on April 12, 2013

The first time I decided to be publicly vocal about surviving sexual assault trauma was on MetaFilter, and in the years since I've gone on to discuss those issues passionately with others in meat and digital spaces. I'm not always the best communicator, but I do credit the gentle reception I was given here as giving me the first seed of confidence to do these things. And that meant, and still means, a whole lot to me.

Ten and a half years. Phew!

sorry to take it to the REAL TALK zone it's all good

Also, meeting young rope-rider and Greg Nog at a bar in Brooklyn and actually having a fanboi moment for MetaFilter users. IRFH, avoid me at all costs, I will probably ask for your autograph. On a legal document. Marrying us.
posted by lazaruslong at 9:26 PM on April 12, 2013 [48 favorites]

When Jon_evil was at a book reading I was doing and I recognized him from Meetups but this wasn't a meetup he just showed up and we went OH HEY I KNOW YOU FROM INTERNET.

There was also a Mst3k theatre showing like this but more.
posted by The Whelk at 9:26 PM on April 12, 2013 [1 favorite]

Also, the majority of the Christmas cards on the mantle are from people I've never physically met.
posted by The Whelk at 9:28 PM on April 12, 2013 [13 favorites]

The "oh that's what that name means" thing? I do it about twice a month. The latest one was "Katjusa Roquette".
posted by benito.strauss at 9:30 PM on April 12, 2013 [2 favorites]

Oh also finding out me and apparently ten other mefites we knew all lived in the same four block area of Brooklyn in the early 2000s.

That was spooky.
posted by The Whelk at 9:32 PM on April 12, 2013 [2 favorites]

i, clavdivs

*GASP!!*
posted by SLC Mom at 9:34 PM on April 12, 2013 [13 favorites]

Who would want a dirty, numb bagel and what does that even mean?
posted by ODiV at 9:34 PM on April 12, 2013 [48 favorites]

Eery silent doppleganger.
posted by Mr. Yuck at 9:35 PM on April 12, 2013 [1 favorite]

benson.

You know who I'm talking about.

uosuaq
posted by LionIndex at 9:36 PM on April 12, 2013 [16 favorites]

that Blasdelb and blasdelf are actually two separate (but equally important!) people, and not just me not being able to read or remember properly.

Oh. This explains why I frequently double-take at the upper case/lower case difference. Note to self: TWO DIFFERENT PEOPLE.
posted by ambrosia at 9:38 PM on April 12, 2013 [2 favorites]

benson.

You know who I'm talking about.

uosuaq

!!!
posted by Elementary Penguin at 9:39 PM on April 12, 2013 [21 favorites]

I think it was the first time one of my songs was podcasted. That was kind of cool. Also Jessamyn said I was one of her favourite mefites, which was very surprising to me, and I would imagine she has changed her opinion by now*, but anyway. It made me realize I was part of a community.
posted by unSane at 9:41 PM on April 12, 2013 [1 favorite]

*because I am not always a big team player here
posted by unSane at 9:41 PM on April 12, 2013

I feel like I didn't ever really get MetaFilter until I got my Gold Membership. Then? Yeah.
posted by carsonb at 9:45 PM on April 12, 2013 [5 favorites]

When I found out that The Whelk lost his virginity to a knight at the RenFest I went to as a kid.

Oh, plus that time that skull that was in my parents' basement as a kid went and bought his own account.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 9:53 PM on April 12, 2013 [7 favorites]

Oh, also: realizing greg nog was probably not a ds9 reference.

Though it should be.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 10:02 PM on April 12, 2013 [6 favorites]

So I been wanting to report this and it seems germane. I bought that Jay Guevera shirt after the FPP. A long ass time later I got a package in the mail, I didn't even open it because I didn't even remember buying anything. Couple days later later I get another package. This is now getting intriguing. Open both packages. They sent me two shirts in two different packages. Thought "can't wait to tell metafilter I actually got the shirt". I keep meaning to send one back but I keep forgetting.
posted by Ad hominem at 10:04 PM on April 12, 2013 [1 favorite]

This comment by cortex on one of my posts.
posted by zarq at 10:06 PM on April 12, 2013 [1 favorite]

Er. Well.

If I have to pick a moment, it was probably right after I got divorced, when I was still living in the house my ex-wife and I had lived in when we were together, so of course the place was a terrible mess and I was pretty much in pieces on the floor. And cortex was doing his world tour thing (where he flew around to a bunch of different places, probably he has a site for this but I don't know it) so I volunteered (for no reason I can think of) to host him for a few days. And so I kind of cleaned up my house as much as I could, and I guess it wasn't too bad, but then when he came it turned out he was really sick with an awful cold. So I said to myself, "well, I'll do my best to make it comfortable here, and at least he won't notice how much my life is in shambles," except I've always had this suspicion he did know and he could totally tell what a wreck I was and he was just being very nice about it (especially because I'm sure I told him lots of awful divorce stories and all that) but at least it was nice to be kind of a good host and try to make sure he was comfortable while he was dealing with that cold and everything. And (this is kind of selfish, but) it actually turned out to be very good for me, because suddenly I felt like I had friends out in the world that I was actually connected to, people who had at least some small, tiny interest in who I was and how I was doing and all that. Which was a big boost for me in a lot of ways. And so over the next few months I planned and schemed and checked Craigslist and finally found a new place to live, with nice people who took me in and were wonderful roommates and friends to me. And I don't think I could have done that without that secret tiny knowledge that I carry around inside me an invisible web of connections with all sorts of people I care about and even love but haven't actually met yet.

So that was the big Metafilter moment for me, I think. There are other moments – the moment when lonefrontranger confirmed that "you're totally not an asshole in real life!" at my first meetup, or the several moments when real life and metafilter-life have intersected when I've discovered old college friends who are Mefites too, or the metatalk post nasreddin made when I disabled my account once, or the few awesome Mefi-gifts I've gotten in the mail, which are really neat and make me happy – but that's the one that probably meant the most to me, even though it's kind of silly and minor I guess.

And next year I get to celebrate my ten-year Metafilter anniversary. I am totally looking forward to that.
posted by koeselitz at 10:19 PM on April 12, 2013 [86 favorites]

Probably going to an actual place (Tommy O'Doyle's on Harvard Square) in actual real life and meeting people from some web site I browsed too often.

And then watching as said people kicked a whole bar's ass at trivia night.
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 10:24 PM on April 12, 2013 [7 favorites]

When I found out that The Whelk lost his virginity to a knight at the RenFest I went to as a kid.

well we're like the same age so just imagine hot sexy knight in the woods time as concurrent with any same teenage interludes.

but seriously, if you have the opportunity for Knight Sex In The Woods I HIGHLY recommend it.
posted by The Whelk at 10:35 PM on April 12, 2013 [11 favorites]

When I made a comment about mittens and snipers that got (at last count) 199 favorites, I knew I had found my people.
posted by KathrynT at 10:49 PM on April 12, 2013 [16 favorites]

(That was an awesome comment, KathrynT.)
posted by koeselitz at 10:53 PM on April 12, 2013

but seriously, if you have the opportunity for Knight Sex In The Woods I HIGHLY recommend it.

The armor. The horse. The lance. I could never do this.
posted by Mr. Yuck at 11:20 PM on April 12, 2013

When I realized "mathowie" was not the phonetic spelling of a nickname for the French form of "Matthew."
posted by Snarl Furillo at 11:36 PM on April 12, 2013 [5 favorites]

There is a joke I make probably once a month in real life, even though I get nothing but crickets. It got 99 likes here. (*sniffsniff*) You guys really get me.

It's true, too. To picture me now, simply think of old, fat D'Onofrio from Criminal Intent. For my younger, more comely self, recall younger, comelier D'Onofrio.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 12:15 AM on April 13, 2013 [9 favorites]

Mittens and Snipers just became my new band name.

My old band name? LOS ROLLBAR.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 12:47 AM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

This, of course, alludes to you
posted by Pyrogenesis at 1:08 AM on April 13, 2013 [2 favorites]

NOOOOOOBZ
posted by Joseph Gurl at 1:16 AM on April 13, 2013

The time(s) I've slipped up and made a Meta in-joke while lecturing have become too many to count. I once even introduced the Crusades as "Well, this will never Wendel, and we all know it..." and got a room full of blank looks from my freshmen.

But I did at least get a laugh from a very nerdy student in the back of one of my classes when I once said "So, this war, it vibrates?"

I have also introduced the concept of Beanplating to a lot of students at my tutoring job. "Look, this isn't as complicated as you want it to be, this is algebra, it is a plate of beans. Stop over thinking it!" (Unrelated to meta, I've also taught them Rubber Duck Debugging and a few other things.)
posted by strixus at 1:32 AM on April 13, 2013 [12 favorites]

I first found out about Metafilter because my friend was dating a guy who was a member. He was also kind of a dick and I would stalkishly read his posts to find out more about him and his dickly way of thinking.

Then I got sucked in myself and actually, that guy didn't really participate a ton, even then. But he posted a question recently and I had this bizarre moment of cognitive dissonance, feeling again like this was his place that I was secretly intruding into, even though I've participated way way more at this point than he ever did...
posted by cairdeas at 1:39 AM on April 13, 2013 [2 favorites]

Non-member lurking for many years, but too scared to join in; the place just seemed intimidatingly intelligent, and feared I would be found out and mocked for my lack of same. Then noticed one of my library advocate hero's was a mod, joined last year. 4 out of my first 7 posts deleted. Kept at it, trying to figure out the science, or perhaps the art(?) of posting well.

But the moment for me was posting about typewriters, being a complete typewriter nerd (despite being totally impractical due to transient and "between continents" lifestyle, owning several). Thinking, pessimistically, that it would generate few or even no comments, and would be ignored.

Instead, there was a long stream of many great comments. Especially the ones by Mrs. Pterodactyl and sonascope. Enjoyed this thread so much created a private little ebook out of it to keep on my kindle (yes, ironic considering the subject matter, I know).

MetaFilter: come for the banter, stay for the writing.
posted by Wordshore at 2:36 AM on April 13, 2013 [7 favorites]

Now every one is trying to think about exes they were dicks to.
posted by empath at 2:38 AM on April 13, 2013 [10 favorites]

I'm pretty new here, but I can honestly say that TheRedArmy's response to my first question on AskMe (The TLDR: My friend's wife is driving me fooking crazy) was a paradigm-breaker for me. Cliche as it may sound, it really opened my eyes - made me realise that the first change I needed to make was in my own attitude, not in how I externally reacted to this annoying person in my life.

I was spending waaaay too much time upsetting myself over this woman's behavior - really stewing over things she'd said and done, long after the fact. I won't pretend I don't still get annoyed with her occasionally, but I can honestly say I have not come anywhere near the depths of useless, self-defeating anger I was experiencing before. Because TRA is right: you will die before people stop being annoying. Something in that just clicked for me.

So yeah, strange as it may seem: my life is a little bit better now thanks to the advice of an anonymous stranger on the internet. That's pretty awesome.
posted by Broseph at 3:10 AM on April 13, 2013 [5 favorites]

"crouton petter" became a thing
posted by DU at 3:29 AM on April 13, 2013 [17 favorites]

Realizing that "melsky" was not, in fact "Mel Sky" and that I have owned a couple of pieces of her art for years.

("Twilight Zone" theme, please)
posted by MonkeyToes at 4:11 AM on April 13, 2013

Finding a bunch of people to walk the length of Broadway in Manhattan with me. Which reminds me that it is time to start planning this year's walk.
posted by sciencegeek at 4:24 AM on April 13, 2013

When I made a comment about mittens and snipers that got (at last count) 199 favorites, I knew I had found my people.

Swords into ploughshares, mittens into chicken puppets.
posted by Slap*Happy at 4:36 AM on April 13, 2013 [3 favorites]

When I realized that it was DefectiveYeti and not DetectiveYeti, and then I was disappointed, because a crime-solving, gumshoe Yeti would be about the coolest thing ever.
posted by jquinby at 5:16 AM on April 13, 2013 [24 favorites]

I live in the middle of nowhere in a red state. I lurked on Metafilter for years before I joined in 2008 and still I didn't know a single MeFite in real life. Last year through a freakish series of coincidences involving a bug in IRL and a librarians' conference, it somehow happened that for a good six months the only MeFite I had met in real life was Jessamyn.
posted by workerant at 6:04 AM on April 13, 2013 [2 favorites]

Oh also finding out me and apparently ten other mefites we knew all lived in the same four block area of Brooklyn in the early 2000s.

Yesss. I don't remember exactly how this went, but I know Decani and I lived on literally the same block in south Williamsburg ~2004. Did you live over there too or are you thinking of different people?

And Whelk and I worked down the block from one in the East Village another for well over a year.
posted by griphus at 6:08 AM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

Miguel.
posted by St. Alia of the Bunnies at 6:18 AM on April 13, 2013 [9 favorites]

I'm doing pretty cool volunteer work now thanks, in part, to a chance encounter at a mefi meetup.
Next step; finding paid employment through mefi. (Sadly, nothing on jobs ever appears to be in my fields.)

On the subject of user names, I parsed croutonsupafreak as "croutons up a freak" rather than "crouton supafreak" for a while.
posted by ActionPopulated at 6:23 AM on April 13, 2013 [2 favorites]

Discovering that I had been quoted on the site about two weeks before I even joined.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 6:24 AM on April 13, 2013 [2 favorites]

Going to the Flavortown meetup last December was kind of a... holy shit, people on MetaFilter are way more awesome in person than I possibly could have imagined. It turns out that kicking ass at Internet Things is sometimes a talent that people who kick ass at other things also possess!

(still never gonna move to new york. your peer pressure will not work.)
posted by Rory Marinich at 6:30 AM on April 13, 2013 [3 favorites]

When I realized I had known doctorschlock via three completely separate avenues. I had been going to his movie nights for years, worked in the same building, and knew him via Metafilter, but hadn't connected the dots for, like 8 years.

AND when I met piedrasyluz, the first time independently of Metafilter when I ushered him through the process of becoming a wedding officiant (he gave me a bottle of absinthe!) then not a month later via his crazy parade float project. That was really bizarre.
posted by MrMoonPie at 6:31 AM on April 13, 2013

When I realized that Theta States was the source of some of the most awesome music I have listened to in the past few years.
posted by theBigRedKittyPurrs at 6:41 AM on April 13, 2013 [2 favorites]

Wordshore: "MetaFilter: come for the banter, stay for the writing."

Good evening! Uhh, would you care for something to... talk about? Our special tonight is minorities!
posted by mannequito at 7:06 AM on April 13, 2013 [2 favorites]

I knew I had found my people.

There's a certain thrill in introducing people who you think will hit it off and it turns out they don't just like each other a bit but get along like a fucking house on fire. And this is also true for introducing people to communities and not just individuals.
posted by rmd1023 at 7:11 AM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

Also, I always have a little "yay!" moment when I read someone's comment or look at someone's userinfo page and realize that I know them through some other path (online or in person). It just makes the internet seem more friendly. "Oh, yeah, that's so-and-so - I see them around here and there and at that other place, too"
posted by rmd1023 at 7:15 AM on April 13, 2013

When some of the St Louis crowd rescued me from the worst christmas day ever.
posted by scruss at 7:23 AM on April 13, 2013 [3 favorites]

Uh, raise your hand if YOU didn't get "Benny Andajetz" until RIGHT NOW.

And my moment was when I noticed I'd gotten faved by the 'hat, for sure.
posted by clavicle at 7:28 AM on April 13, 2013 [10 favorites]

When the world wouldn't stop shaking violently, and I was able to connect with people is met through this site, and was able to find out they were all okay. When, after too long a time, we found out Flapjax was okay, just stuck away from home.

When I got home, and said so, and said the cat was okay after a four hour walk through post-end-of-the-world earthquake, and people I've never met responded with such love and concern.

That's about when I realized how important this place is to me.
posted by Ghidorah at 7:37 AM on April 13, 2013 [19 favorites]

When I spent every weekend in October 2007 playing Team Fortress 2 with other people from MeFi.
posted by absalom at 7:45 AM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

A certain person's username always makes me think:

divabam
divabas
divabat
divamus
divatis
divabant

Sadly there's no actual verb divare, though were there it would likely mean something like "to become a she-god".
posted by Jehan at 8:21 AM on April 13, 2013 [25 favorites]

Did you live over there too or are you thinking of different people?


Yes, but like 2002ish.

Eventually we're gonna figure out we where all in the same cortexiphan trails or something.
posted by The Whelk at 8:36 AM on April 13, 2013 [3 favorites]

My moment was learning that not a small percentage of people stand up to wipe.
posted by roboton666 at 8:55 AM on April 13, 2013 [14 favorites]

I knew Metafilter & I were going to get along fine when one of my favourite users, Divine_Wino, stuck up for me in a thread I posted back when I was still noobin' around.

A few years later, an AskMetafilter comment of mine was quoted in a book, which I thought was pretty damn cool.
posted by Fuzzy Monster at 9:02 AM on April 13, 2013

Banjos and soap. I'd found my tribe.
posted by arcticseal at 9:16 AM on April 13, 2013

My moment was learning that not a small percentage of people stand up to wipe.

That thread is in a bookmark folder called "Read This If You Need To Laugh." Sometimes I have a shitty day on top of a tendency to depression, and if I can get to that point of silent, quaking laughter, it can re-set my serotonin or something. That thread is so funny it's THERAPEUTIC.
posted by KathrynT at 9:23 AM on April 13, 2013 [6 favorites]

The username that got me: the Winsome Parker Lewis

...because Parker Lewis can't lose.
posted by leotrotsky at 9:23 AM on April 13, 2013 [9 favorites]

Every time Peacheater posts something I start wondering what it would mean to cheat at peas. And then once again I go. "Ah, Peach. Eater."

Every single time.
posted by Joe in Australia at 9:32 AM on April 13, 2013 [16 favorites]

A guy next door once had the vanity plate 10S PLR on his car. It only took me three years to get it. Talk about Endless Love.
posted by y2karl at 9:33 AM on April 13, 2013 [2 favorites]

Oh jeez, we have to pick only one?

Heck with that, these are mine:

My first ask.me.

Civil_Disobedient answering a photo question for me. Backstory: This comment on a post was the first time I'd ever seen or heard of MeFi. So C_D is kind of a hero of mine.

These incredible relationshipfilter threads.

I guess I'm going to have to figure out how to make it to a meetup, aren't I?
posted by ZakDaddy at 9:35 AM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

KathrynT, I hope you have the AskMe about whether or not cats fart in that folder.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 9:36 AM on April 13, 2013 [3 favorites]

Oh, also sonascope.
posted by ZakDaddy at 9:37 AM on April 13, 2013 [5 favorites]

I almost walked past that first meetup in '09 because of nerves, but I turned around & went in, and erased the line between real life & Metafilter in one fell swoop. Went to lunch again with Jessamyn the next day, and cemented what's turned into a really cool friendship which I really treasure.
posted by Devils Rancher at 9:43 AM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

What's Your Metafilter moment?

Still waiting...
posted by mazola at 9:43 AM on April 13, 2013

KathrynT, link?

Now I feel self-conscious about my toilet training, so thanks
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 9:44 AM on April 13, 2013

Oh, also sonascope.

I am such a fanboi.
posted by Devils Rancher at 9:44 AM on April 13, 2013 [3 favorites]

divabam
divabas
divabat
divamus
divatis
divabant

That should be divabamus and divabatis. Fail.
posted by Jehan at 9:48 AM on April 13, 2013 [10 favorites]

The Great Wipe Hope

QWOP

cortex derails a MeTa to talking about QWOP again

those are three of the laughingest threads I know of.
posted by KathrynT at 9:49 AM on April 13, 2013 [7 favorites]

Joe Beese
posted by ryanrs at 9:49 AM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

Okay, the cat fart thread is pure comedy gold.
posted by rmd1023 at 9:50 AM on April 13, 2013

thank you Metafilter for making me sing "Cats...Fart" to the tune of David Bowie's "Let's Dance."
posted by The Whelk at 9:52 AM on April 13, 2013 [5 favorites]

Went to lunch again with Jessamyn the next day, and cemented what's turned into a really cool friendship which I really treasure.

I, too, really like how people who have been my MeFiSocciates can turn into insta-longtime friends once we first get to meet each other.

I have also gotten over confusion over middleclasstool and mcstayinskool both of whose names I was parsing incorrectly originally.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 9:58 AM on April 13, 2013 [3 favorites]

thank you Metafilter for making me sing "Cats...Fart" to the tune of David Bowie's "Let's Dance."

Hardest level in Elite Beat Agents.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 10:01 AM on April 13, 2013 [4 favorites]

Also, if the standard for this thread is "when did you get it?", I guess this post by sonascope is mine. 'Cause just after it I explicitly commented:

Wow, wait until you discover sonascope!

I searched around a little, and I didn't get it.

Now, I get it.

posted by benito.strauss at 10:12 AM on April 13, 2013

My moment was when I had a New York area code come up on my phone, and it was EmpressCallipygos calling to start an epic phone conversation about sparing her computer from certain death (which resulted in this MetaTalk, and about 150 MeMails). Made me feel like I really was doing some good for this community.
posted by deezil at 10:20 AM on April 13, 2013 [7 favorites]

> On the subject of user names, I parsed croutonsupafreak as "croutons up a freak" rather than "crouton supafreak" for a while.

Hold on. It's not...?

whoa.
posted by ardgedee at 10:22 AM on April 13, 2013 [5 favorites]

I tried to play matchmaker between captaincrouton & croutonsupafreak after a chance near encounter, one time. I mean, it seemed like destiny.
posted by Devils Rancher at 10:31 AM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

I was still just a lurker when I went to the 10th anniversary meet-up in Portland. I didn't know that mathowie and cortex and waxpancake and all these mefi celebrities would be there and I got much too drunk and thanked mathowie profusely for helping me survive my 9-5, which was really killing me at the time. It was wonderful. Every subsequent meet-up I've gone to has been awesome and MeFites are even better in person than they are on the internet.

Or maybe the time Jessamyn found a Lutoslawski recording at a record store and bought it and hated it and offered it to me. That made me blush and feel incredibly special and like omg she knows my username.

Over the years this place has taught me so much and I credit a lot of me not being an insufferable asshole* to this place.

not always being an insufferable asshole.
posted by Lutoslawski at 10:31 AM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

I always thought joelf was meant to be read as "jo elf" and probably a short woman named Jo. Then I met joelf at a meetup, and learned it's meant to be read as Joel F. And that he had thought I was a gay man.
posted by orange swan at 10:41 AM on April 13, 2013 [7 favorites]

Ha, I always thought joelf was jo elf, too.
posted by ocherdraco at 10:42 AM on April 13, 2013

uncleoozy will never not be read as Un Cleo oozy to me.
posted by The Whelk at 10:46 AM on April 13, 2013 [5 favorites]

ocherdraco: "i, clavdiv"

I hear ya.

I suppose my other one recently was realizing that dasein and Decani were different users. "Jesus, I had no idea that [user]'s political leanings went THAT way ...! ... OHHHHHHHH"
posted by barnacles at 10:48 AM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

The first two moments that I think of are both connected with my first post. Needless to say, I was nervous, and I made the typical n00b move of leaving an awkward, self-deprecatory first comment, which was immediately seized and harpooned by quonsar. You might think this would upset me, but I was thrilled—I'd been lurking for a year or so, and to me quonsar was one of the Elder Gods, so it was "Hey, I'm really a member: q snarked at me!" But I was getting a little disconsolate that nobody seemed to think my link [which, amazingly, still works!] was particularly cool, when evanizer left a long, enthusiastic comment that made my day.

I miss evanizer.
posted by languagehat at 10:51 AM on April 13, 2013 [9 favorites]

Joel F.
!!!
Mind blown.
posted by zarq at 11:29 AM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

I miss evanizer.

Who, I just learned, is not eva nizer.
posted by Devils Rancher at 11:33 AM on April 13, 2013

By the way, before one of the Boston-trivia-night MeFites shows up, the bar is Tommy Doyle's, not O'Doyle's.
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 11:46 AM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

I'm a functioning, sane adult because of Metafilter. This is not hyperbole. Realizing that is probably my Metafilter moment.
posted by inertia at 12:04 PM on April 13, 2013 [4 favorites]

I am always a little worried about going to New York. Because, if I met the Whelk, I would not know whether to address him as "Mr. Whelk" or "Mr. The Whelk." Etiquette issues like this keep me up at night. (And I would never call him snotwinkle," that is too familiar!

My real MetaFilter moment was realizing that I had read a sentence here that I would never have seen otherwise. Here is one example.
posted by GenjiandProust at 12:56 PM on April 13, 2013 [4 favorites]

Mr. The Whelk

My understanding is that Mr. The Whelk is The Whelk's husband, further complicating things.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 12:59 PM on April 13, 2013 [16 favorites]

My understanding is that Mr. The Whelk is The Whelk's husband, further complicating things.

Huh. I think that Emily Post would tell us that I would have to call him "Mr. Mr. The Whelk" until we were properly introduced. Then, if prompted, I could call him the less formal "Mr. The Whelk." Or, if, by some act of Providence (the celestial power, not the city) we became friends, perhaps go as far as "Mr. The." One doesn't wish to fall into the clutches of vulgar informalism.
posted by GenjiandProust at 1:02 PM on April 13, 2013 [12 favorites]

I've had a couple of moments:

Realizing it's ocherdraco, as in the color, not ocho..
Going to the 10th as a lurker and running into someone I actually knew outside of MeFi, and being welcomed as though I weren't a lurker..

As a side note:
The support from this community in the last 2 years with my mom's illness and death has been invaluable, an actual lifeline from the edge of the pit of despair. So I guess you're stuck with me as I keep trying to pay that forward.
posted by ApathyGirl at 1:24 PM on April 13, 2013 [5 favorites]

When I was called out for excellence.
posted by Drinky Die at 1:26 PM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

I still get excited when I post something, get the Me-Mail, and assume that someone wants to talk to me instead of realizing it's just the automatic success message.
posted by codacorolla at 1:28 PM on April 13, 2013 [21 favorites]

But it's kind of neat when it turns out to be a non-automated message!

I have a friend who doesn't check his gmail enough, so when I am trying to get people together, and a day goes by with no response from him, I send him a MeMail. Interestingly, he's always checking that.
posted by GenjiandProust at 1:35 PM on April 13, 2013

Automated? I guess I'm lucky that mathowie notices all my posts and gives me a heads up when there are events in London. He's a sweetheart.
posted by ersatz at 1:47 PM on April 13, 2013 [3 favorites]

Is this what the blue is to become, another tired retread of digg and reddit, a pale fark without the snark?

Something has to balance out the filthy light thief posts.

That made my week.

Oh, and I was a member here less than a year, and out of the blue, ErWenn memailed me with a link to the comment that inspired my MeFi handle.
posted by filthy light thief at 2:23 PM on April 13, 2013

When someone thought that my username referred to some sort of weird sexual thing instead of the boring reality.
posted by double block and bleed at 2:25 PM on April 13, 2013 [2 favorites]

This.
posted by vrakatar at 2:30 PM on April 13, 2013 [2 favorites]

After lurking since the site began, finally realizing shortly after September 11 that I should actually create an account.

Not always the sharpest knife in the drawer am I.
posted by bendy at 2:37 PM on April 13, 2013

This thread is kinda doing it for me now. I don't participate much anymore, never really knew if it was helpful or interesting to people when I did; but when I freelanced I used to read the site pretty much "cover to cover," every day... for years. Now I'm lucky if I can find half an hour a week in which to get funky to enjoy this site. It's like a long distant relationship now and it makes me sorta sad.
posted by milarepa at 2:40 PM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

Discovering that I had been quoted on the site about two weeks before I even joined.

Discovering that I had been linked in a MeTa six and a half years before I joined.
posted by immlass at 2:46 PM on April 13, 2013 [2 favorites]

It's actually Dr. Mr. The Whelk
posted by The Whelk at 2:49 PM on April 13, 2013 [22 favorites]

Taters.
posted by mynameisluka at 2:57 PM on April 13, 2013 [2 favorites]

It's actually Dr. Mr. The Whelk

Oh, hell. After this blunder I won't even be able to pass through New York! Etiquette is that strict.
posted by GenjiandProust at 3:14 PM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

Deezil didn't share the punch line to his moment, which came after a week-long series of memails and questions and an epic phone call in which both of us tried to fix my computer over the phone while both of us were drunk; after everything was fixed and fine, a couple days later I dropped it.

And after the first immediate "whoashit is everything okay" checkover, my very next thought was, "man, I GOTTA tell Deezil about this."
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 3:39 PM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

I've always believed that AskMe was about the questions, not the answers. My Metafilter moment was realizing AskMe posters posed questions I always had but never knew to ask.

To wit: tonsilloliths
posted by klarck at 3:54 PM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

Here's how narcissistic I am: ANY time I see ocherdraco's username, I see it as "other draco."

Because many years ago, in my teens, I did magic for banquets and parties under the stage name Draco. So, since obviously *I* am Draco, she must be "other Draco."
posted by The Deej at 4:05 PM on April 13, 2013 [2 favorites]

The other night I had a metafilter dream. In it my son had been kidnapped (he's 21; it wasn't a nightmare, more of an annoyance) and cortex knew where he was. Naturally, I went directly over to mathowie's house. "I know," I said portentously, "That cortex totally knows where he is."
"Very likely," said mathowie
"No," I said, "I KNOW. And you have to get him to tell me."
"Well," said mathowie politely, "That could take a while. cortex moves at his own speed. Let's watch some TV."
So we did and there was a commercial for sitars made of blue gel. "Those look cool," he commented,
"I don't know," I said, "I played one of those blue gel mandolins the other day and it wasn't all that."

SO. This dream, however amusing, isn't the point of this anecdote. The point is that I then told this dream to my daughter and a couple of my RL friends. They all immediately said, "Blue gel sitars?" because they already knew exactly who mathowie and cortex are and why they are important enough in my life - even though I have never met either one of them - to show up in my dreams. Musical instruments made out of some kind of weird gel, though, that's new.
posted by mygothlaundry at 4:05 PM on April 13, 2013 [24 favorites]

The Whelk lost his virginity to a knight at the RenFest I went to as a kid.

oh what a knight.
posted by octobersurprise at 4:13 PM on April 13, 2013 [32 favorites]

Oh thanks a whole hell of a lot for the earworm.
posted by rtha at 4:18 PM on April 13, 2013 [5 favorites]

This thread. Because it was the first time I'd ever seen total unity on the green, and because we were all heartbroken together.
I go back and re-reread it every so often, when I need to be reminded that people will go to heroic efforts to help complete strangers.
posted by Brody's chum at 4:41 PM on April 13, 2013 [8 favorites]

Mine would be about 11 years ago. I was in Grand Central Station trying to catch a train when I heard a voice yell "Jon! Jon!" The name being as common as it is, I ignored it. Then it said "jonmc! jonmc!" I froze dead in my tracks utterly wigged. I turned around. It was palegirl, who I'd met at a meetup a few months previous. Definitely a moment that told me I was living in a different world.
posted by jonmc at 5:02 PM on April 13, 2013 [3 favorites]

Because many years ago, in my teens, I did magic for banquets and parties under the stage name Draco. So, since obviously *I* am Draco, she must be "other Draco."

Don't worry, I always read it that way too, without even having an excuse.
posted by Miko at 5:41 PM on April 13, 2013

I read it as "ochahedro," like some sort of geometric shape.
posted by Devils Rancher at 5:50 PM on April 13, 2013

I spent a night tweeting about RuPaul's Drag Race with louche mustachio and we geeked out over my boyfriend's job and I knew I was finally a real live MeFite.
posted by xingcat at 5:53 PM on April 13, 2013

I had the biggest lurker crush on Sara C. forever and I just got back from meeting her and giving her my Deanna Troi action figure.
posted by avocet at 6:07 PM on April 13, 2013 [7 favorites]

I read uncleozzy as being someone who lacked the quality of being cleozzy.
posted by idiopath at 6:11 PM on April 13, 2013 [16 favorites]

idiopath, me too!
posted by mygothlaundry at 6:19 PM on April 13, 2013

rtha and Miko were the two awesome women from opposite coasts with 4-letter usernames, but it took me forever to associate the appropriate oceans.
posted by Devils Rancher at 6:21 PM on April 13, 2013

[not cleozzy-ist]
posted by Devils Rancher at 6:22 PM on April 13, 2013

I was reading a Community thread while supervising some student group work, and one group kept talking about "magnitude" and I badly wanted to say "POP-POP!" Dr. Zira dared me to do it. So I did.

It turned out none of them watched Community. But I got 48 favorites!
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 6:35 PM on April 13, 2013 [4 favorites]

Keyboard coprolalia v. real world actions.
posted by buzzman at 7:04 PM on April 13, 2013

(O what a Knight!)

In the woods beyond the trees

He was in armor, I was on my knees

As I remember he was a Knight

(O what a Knight!)

You know I didn't even know his name

But I was never gonna be the same

What a man's man, what a Knight!

(O what a Knight!)

Oh, I got a funny feeling when he couched his lance

And as I recall there was not much romance

Oh, what a role-player, oh what a Knight.

(O what a Knight!)
posted by Slap*Happy at 7:15 PM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

Is this something I would have to leave the Fortress of Solitude to understand?
posted by fleacircus at 7:29 PM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

Speaking of rtha, I always (still) pronounce her name as "artha," but when I met I learned it's inspired by RTHA, the birders' acronym for red-tailed hawks.

I'm sure I have a few more stories like that but none are coming to mind just now.
posted by Miko at 7:29 PM on April 13, 2013 [6 favorites]

Scott Adams getting hoisted on his own retard.
posted by bardic at 7:34 PM on April 13, 2013 [5 favorites]

When I realized both my ex-wife and my (now ex) girlfriend were on Metafilter, and I'd never be able to post a nonanonymous askme about relationships without offending at least one of them.
posted by davejay at 7:35 PM on April 13, 2013 [4 favorites]

Speaking of rtha, I always (still) pronounce her name as "artha,"

WORNGZ! Y U no hand in ur nerd card naow?

EARTH-a. Sexiest of the Catwomen.
posted by Slap*Happy at 8:04 PM on April 13, 2013 [9 favorites]

lurv
posted by not_on_display at 8:14 PM on April 13, 2013

Call me whatever you want as long as you don't call me late for pie.
posted by rtha at 8:29 PM on April 13, 2013 [3 favorites]

I met MetaFilter via my now ex husband. I have now been on MetaFilter more than twice as long as we were married.

Tough seriously, that "longboat" became a THING blows my mind.
posted by sonika at 8:39 PM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

I started reading this yesterday and sort of skimmed it. Now Mr. Pterodactyl is in bed and I'm sort of poking around the internet and I thought I'd give this thread another look and I just saw Wordshore's thoughtful comment in which he mention something I wrote! The grandfather I mentioned in that thread died a few months ago and I've thought about that story often and how glad I am that he and I were able to share that moment and that I was able to share it with Metafilter. I always hope (but never expect) to see my name come up in these threads or "favorite comment" threads or whatever; this was a total surprise and I am feeling surprisingly emotional about it.

I've also been really discouraged recently; I'm looking for work and I don't know when that's going to end and I'm temping but I feel like my life is on hold while I try to find something real and substantive and long-term so I can do all the other things I want to do. Seeing that something I wrote was meaningful to someone on Metafilter is feeling really good right now and it meant a great deal to me to hear it.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 8:58 PM on April 13, 2013 [17 favorites]

It still blows my mind which of you are she's and which of you are he's. I thought English was non-gendered, but no, apparently even my pronunciations of made up names have male and female connotations (and not necessarily the correct ones).
posted by maryr at 9:10 PM on April 13, 2013 [7 favorites]

Probably when I realized that Metafilter led me to my grad school and my apartment (both of which are working out pretty all right, thanks, guys!).

Or when I was at a class with about 5 other people a couple months ago and looked up from browsing AskMe to see someone reading the blue across from me. It's a small world.
posted by mlle valentine at 9:29 PM on April 13, 2013

I am still half-convinced that rtha is a tribute to Eartha Kitt, although I briefly thought that it was a blanket admonition to read the h______? article.

Your friend,
Purple C. Lover
posted by purpleclover at 9:37 PM on April 13, 2013 [4 favorites]

My moment was going to the PDX meetup when the Four Admins were mathowie, jessamyn, cortex and pb, just before vacapinta agreed to take on the night shift. I met all 5 of them and had my picture taken by da shiv. If that's not epic enough, this dream thread, because I thought I was the only one who ever dreamed about metafilter. Good times, good times.
posted by Lynsey at 9:42 PM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

Purple C. Lover

Mind. Blown.
posted by rtha at 10:00 PM on April 13, 2013 [4 favorites]

One night I had a dream where I was being forced to eat something which was a pancake-flat thing but was kind of sprawled on a pan, called pressed rat.

God. Damn. You. @Pressed Rat
posted by Space Coyote at 10:20 PM on April 13, 2013

I got a hug from Jessamyn at that PDX meetup (8th anniversary?) and remember feeling surpringly honored. She gives good hug. I also remember being linked by cortex after that night though I'm pretty sure I never talked to him. Later, I passed out drunk on the floor of a friends art gallery around the corner and the next morning drove home a sweaty cycling team who'd just finished the STP.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 10:22 PM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

I remember paying my 5 bucks and having an immediate feeling that I belonged.
posted by mazola at 10:46 PM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

I was doing fine until I came across this comment:

"I always thought joelf was meant to be read as "jo elf" and probably a short woman named Jo. Then I met joelf at a meetup, and learned it's meant ..."

and this is where I thought, "Oh, so it's not jo elf, it must be ... *reads name again* uh ... Joe L. F. Got it."

"... to be read as Joel F."

DANGIT. Even when I'm told it's not how I think it is I manage to make it another way. Speaking of which, I'm not sure if you're aware but the word "genjian" is a modifier, used in sentences like:

"Now take for example this particularly genjian Proust, seen here displaying ..."

I have yet to be able to glean from context its meaning, nor have I been able to glean it from cortex.
posted by komara at 11:00 PM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

Brody's chum: This thread. Because it was the first time I'd ever seen total unity on the green, and because we were all heartbroken together.

Holy fuck! That was painful and unpleasant to read, and the fact that there was no resolution posted (obviously, things weren't going to change overnight) has left me queasy.

Um... wow. Does anyone know if he got out of that situation?
posted by tzikeh at 11:02 PM on April 13, 2013 [1 favorite]

I had a little moment the other day when I realized I've as of just recently hit the threshold at which I have been a mod here for longer than I've been not-a-mod.
posted by cortex (staff) at 11:48 PM on April 13, 2013 [10 favorites]

Because I am still new, apart from getting favourites (ooh! still thrilling) it's a tie between shothotbot actually trying out the kamehameha and the fact that a "hey, I think this is cool" FPP spawned a whole MetaTalk thread. Kinda embarrassed about that one, actually. And this post is pretty damn awesome too.
posted by Athanassiel at 12:03 AM on April 14, 2013 [1 favorite]

I had the biggest lurker crush on Sara C. forever and I just got back from meeting her and giving her my Deanna Troi action figure.

Oh e-crushes. Something like 5 or 6 years ago, when I had joined and was reading but didn't post much, I asked an anonymous question. I was so dazzled by the brilliance of one of the replies that I ended up reading almost everything that person wrote for a long time and was their biggest fan. I think that is what really triggered me to become way more active.
posted by cairdeas at 12:19 AM on April 14, 2013 [1 favorite]

It took me until one of those name threads to realize that rtha isn't Arthur. Also, even though I know him from elsewhere by another name, and even though he's been xingcat all over the internet for a long time, I don't know if the cat is exxing or Ching or x in the key of G.
posted by gingerest at 12:24 AM on April 14, 2013

This sonascope piece is a work of art. I used to show it to people, to try and help them see what make MetaFilter such an amazing place.

Also I've had some pretty great memail conversations. One exchange in particular had a very positive influence on my personal life.
posted by Doleful Creature at 12:56 AM on April 14, 2013 [1 favorite]

Mine was realizing how many people I know already are also on here.
posted by michaelh at 1:07 AM on April 14, 2013

Scott Adams getting hoisted on his own retard.

His antics were just not cricket, but your substitution of petard isn't terribly classy either.
posted by ersatz at 4:01 AM on April 14, 2013 [13 favorites]

Mine was when some one put up photos of a meetup in Sydney, and Melissa May said that she was happy to see a face to go with my posts.
posted by dhruva at 5:19 AM on April 14, 2013 [1 favorite]

I've also been on two trips now where I posted a little "hi, I'm gonna be in [insert city here], anyone wanna meet up?" message first, and ended up having fine adventures both times; it's too early in the morning right now to remember anything about them save for Grangousier introducing me to new cider flavors and running order squabble fest helping me cope with a broken oyster card reader in London, and trying to teach Coldchef's niece to knit and getting unexpected birthday cake from radioamy in New Orleans.

....Wait, I'm gonna be in Rome in a month....(heads over to the IRL thread)
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 5:30 AM on April 14, 2013

I think my username aha moment had something to do with It's Raining Florence Henderson, but now I can't remember what it was. Is it a reference to Henderson the Rain King?
posted by oulipian at 6:04 AM on April 14, 2013

I had kind of an inverse one-of-those-moments when cortex pronounced by username 'U.S.-onian' in the February podcast - in my brain it's always been 'you-sonian', as in the architectural style developed by Frank Lloyd Wright, a handle picked in haste when I was jumping into a Quake I deathmatch 15 years ago. Even before the cortex shout-out, though, I've been increasingly aware that 'usonian' seems to be gaining currency as an alternative to 'American', so my reaction wasn't annoyance, just mild worry that some people see my username and assume I'm some kind of frothing jingoistic conservative talk radio fan.
posted by usonian at 6:12 AM on April 14, 2013 [2 favorites]

Holy crap, that post by sonascope is amazing.
posted by running order squabble fest at 6:24 AM on April 14, 2013

Getting sidebarred for describing what it's like hanging out with penguins. Eight years ago and I still have the screenshot of the sidebar. Squee.

By way of a very late update to that post, I finally got around to putting up those photographs of my pal Jeff getting walked all over by a king penguin chick (sorry, it's a fb album, but it's public, so hopefully viewable).
posted by penguin pie at 6:27 AM on April 14, 2013 [7 favorites]

He has a penguin chick on his butt! That is so great!
posted by rtha at 6:42 AM on April 14, 2013 [3 favorites]

Heh - I had a bennyandajetz moment as well. I also had an uncleozzy moment (I still have a hard time NOT seeing it as un-cleozzy, instead of uncle-ozzy) And I always wonder, what does it mean to cleozzy something.
posted by symbioid at 7:52 AM on April 14, 2013

Oh oh and for the longest time having difficulties distinguishing between Pastabagel and Blazecock Pileon (because pb and bp).
posted by symbioid at 7:55 AM on April 14, 2013

I still find myself singing this song more than I'd admit to anyone but you guys.
posted by Sweetie Darling at 8:00 AM on April 14, 2013

Mine was going to an open mic night just to see someone whose opinion on comedy I enjoyed reading on MF, ifoody. Turns out he was not only a great guy but one of the best, funniest, most interesting comics I've ever seen. Miss ya buddy!
posted by Potomac Avenue at 8:19 AM on April 14, 2013

I've always read usonian as 'you-sonian' (even though I didn't know it was a real word with a real meaning).
And as for xingcat, he's always been 'zingcat' in my head.
posted by Brody's chum at 8:31 AM on April 14, 2013 [1 favorite]

I am never amazed at how to pronounce another user's name as no one would ever guess that my user name is actually pronounced, "Steve".
posted by JohnnyGunn at 8:43 AM on April 14, 2013 [2 favorites]

EARTH-a. Sexiest of the Catwomen.

This sounds like a pitch for a DC comics series where they completely undo "Crisis on Infinite Earths," bt this time, to be different, the Earths have lower case letters instead of numbers.

Speaking (however tangentially) of cats, I'd kind of like to see angrycat and xingcat team up to fight crime. Eventually, they would recruit Battlecat, anniecat, and others to form the League of Cats and save town of cats from Cat Pie Hurts. Perhaps on Earth-cat.
posted by GenjiandProust at 9:30 AM on April 14, 2013 [2 favorites]

We could have an army of kittens with us!
posted by rtha at 9:34 AM on April 14, 2013 [2 favorites]

Eartha was better on Mission Impossible, savvy, one of the team yet retaining that free-lance style.
posted by clavdivs at 9:35 AM on April 14, 2013 [1 favorite]

I don't remember how/when I found MetaFilter, but I clearly remember the first time was up too late reading a thread, which must've been a few months before I joined. It always seemed like my own secret part of the Internet that none of my real life friends knew about. Then one day I discovered that one of my oldest friends, whom I've known since we were about 3, was a lurker. Not too long, I discovered what I believe is his account.

In September 2012, I had an awesome few days at an academic conference that iamkimiam organized, and I was tickled that I could explain to people who knew her work that we'd met through MetaFilter, while others had no clue of our Seekrit Internet Friendship Basis.
posted by knile at 9:39 AM on April 14, 2013 [1 favorite]

Sonascope is a mefi treasure.
posted by zarq at 9:39 AM on April 14, 2013 [1 favorite]

That sonascope comment is worth it for "passerbees" alone.
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 9:41 AM on April 14, 2013 [1 favorite]

for some odd reason I saw Benny Andajetz at first glance as some amalgamation of

Bene Gesserit (pron.: /ˈbɛniː ˈdʒɛsərɪt/ BEN-ee-JESS-ər-it)

wvnderfvl.

miss evan too, I.
posted by clavdivs at 9:43 AM on April 14, 2013 [4 favorites]

Aaaaaaaa penguins!
posted by bq at 9:46 AM on April 14, 2013 [1 favorite]

These incredible relationshipfilter threads.

Not only is that thread amazing, but it almost makes me sad how much they used to let repliers actually have a back and forth with eachother about answers. The whole thing just kinda feels like a higher level of discourse than the average thread. It's pretty top form for the community in general.

That said, mine would be the times that I realized well thought out replies to relationshipfilter questions applied to my own life and relationship as well. And then reading the questions and responses to my partner and actually making an effort to walk what I talked. I feel like this site has genuinely made me a better person, which is a lot more than much of the rest of the Internet has done.

Oh, that or wanting to post a comment a few months ago and realizing I've had an account since 2006 and had just lurked the entire time.
posted by emptythought at 9:54 AM on April 14, 2013 [4 favorites]

I always joke that the two things that have had the biggest influence on who I am today are Harry Potter fanfiction and Metafilter. I started reading and writing fanfic when I was eleven, which was the first time I wrote for an audience and cared about a cohesive plot and learned how to interact with people online that I disagreed with. I stumbled across Metafilter as an impressionable teen and spent a fair number of years mainlining the human relations questions in AskMe. So much of what I know about depression and anxiety and setting boundaries and focusing on my own reactions rather than trying to control other people's actions comes from AskMe. Sometimes if I'm grappling with a thorny issue I'll write it out as a post, and the act of making it concise and understandable for a public audience is itself enough to crystallize the solution in my mind.

My first Metatalk was a seriously misguided attempt at sounding insightful, and the community was pretty gentle about it - I've seen other teenage antics eviscerated by MetaTalk and am frankly amazed I got off so lightly. (Plus cortex was nice to me.) I also recently re-read this question I posted in 2007 about college, and was really surprised to find how many of the activities I've since come to think of as definitive landmarks of my college life were, indeed, suggested by kindly MeFites who took the time to calm a hyperanxious freshman. (And then there was that period of time in my college career when I would start pretty much any research project by browsing relevant tags on MeFi, skimming the threads that showed up, and use the opinions of people much smarter than me as jumping off points for digging deeper.)

So many of the people I hold dear I met through Metafilter, either at meetups or via Twitter. I remember the first time I went to a big meetup and someone emailed me afterwards to say that they'd enjoyed chatting with me and asked if I wanted to hang out - it delighted me so much that I then made a point of reaching out to other MeFites I clicked with at meetups, if geography permitted. When I moved after college, it was MeFites who welcomed me to their circle of friends. When I moved to a place where I knew no one, it was MeFites who cheered me up and provided long-distance support. I met the partner I'm currently living with through AskMetafilter, when a bit of Photoshop advice posted long ago led to a thank you email and a subsequent friendship.

Even though I've been here almost seven years I still often feel like an annoying little pup yapping at the ankles of people who are much cooler than me. I think this comment by jessamyn and this subsequent comment by shakespeherian was the first time I felt like my contributions in the past years have meant something, and that I was part of this community that everyone talks about, not just a bystander looking in. Since then I've thought about those comments a fair bit, and am often sad that I'm not better than I am. I get shouty and angry at other members sometimes, and I get frustrated with both individual members and the site in general, and I wish I were better at being kind and giving people the benefit of the doubt. Both by explicit instruction and by countless example, Metafilter makes me want to be a better person. You can't say that for every site out there.

Anyway, sorry so sappy. It's been a weird week.
posted by Phire at 10:14 AM on April 14, 2013 [11 favorites]

Whenever some address me by (user)name.
posted by GuyZero at 10:20 AM on April 14, 2013

This photo of Greg Nog and me (taken by Jessamyn) definitely captures a MetaFilter Moment.
posted by usonian at 10:33 AM on April 14, 2013 [2 favorites]

Holy crap, that post by sonascope is amazing.

I don't even have to know which post you mean in order to agree with you.
posted by en forme de poire at 10:50 AM on April 14, 2013 [4 favorites]

For me it was honestly from the very start, when I made my first comment on the blue and the poster - Bardophile, still one of my favorites - responded, and even called me by my silly username. I haven't been commenting very much lately but I still check mefi as often as I can, and it's a source of great pleasure to me that I found a place that from the very beginning of has been welcoming, interesting, and fun.
posted by villanelles at dawn at 11:03 AM on April 14, 2013 [1 favorite]

....those guy found that person's cat for her.

Priceless.
posted by mule98J at 11:03 AM on April 14, 2013

I've always sort of autocompleted rtha as Read The Hucking Anual despite this not making any sense
posted by titus n. owl at 11:18 AM on April 14, 2013 [2 favorites]

As Greg Nog noted a little while ago, it's obviously Read the Hellacious Article.
posted by villanelles at dawn at 11:21 AM on April 14, 2013

I don't know if it's unusual to get both a positive MeTa callout and a negative one (not gonna link), but it's certainly kept me humble.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 11:23 AM on April 14, 2013

Was reading an AskMe probably six or seven years ago in which the OP was looking for ideas for mind-altering experiences along the lines of shrooming or hang-gliding. One or two people said something along the lines of "You want your worldview rocked? Have kids. It will alter your entire belief system." I thought, That sounds cool. Really helped me come around to the idea of parenthood. Got three kids now. Worldview thoroughly rocked.

Long story short: Metafilter made my babies.
posted by etc. at 11:34 AM on April 14, 2013 [2 favorites]

I first discovered Metafilter in the pre-Facebook days when one needed to do a google search for someone if they wanted to find information on a lost friend or acquaintance. I was searching for an old high school friend who I had lost touch with years earlier, and came across a blog he had at the time which included many links to Metafilter, where he was heavy contributor. After several years of lurking I finally signed up. Interestingly enough, this friend of mine appears to have stopped participating in Mefi for the most part, while I remain a constant, if not prolific, user. I guess he got busy with some other activities.

My "Mefi" moment came a year or two back when a Facebook friend, a woman I used to go to Hebrew school with well over 20 years ago, made a post that she had just received her "Secret Quonsar" gift and I had to do a huge doubletake.
posted by The Gooch at 11:40 AM on April 14, 2013

Hard to say, but possibly when Abiezer thanked me for teaching him how to type traditional Chinese characters using Pinyin input in SCIM, in an otherwise kinda weird and unproductive thread, and seemingly long after everyone else had stopped reading.
posted by jiawen at 12:21 PM on April 14, 2013

More Mefi awesomeness.

I was in a real crisis in my life and faced with a hard decision. Iminurmefi posted a really long and obviously thoughtful response with advice that I followed exactly. Things worked out so much better than I could have hoped for and I continue to reap the rewards every day. I have had an until-now-secret crush on her and have been mefi-stalking her ever since and the thing is, *all* of her AskMe responses are brilliant.

The birth of my first baby was a minor topic of discussion around here at the time.

Also, making the sidebar twice
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 12:22 PM on April 14, 2013

Epilogue to my Caspar Babypants post: a couple weeks later I found him busking at the Ballard Farmer's Market and we talked about my post about him and his Metafilter appearance. (He was so gracious and grateful for the exposure.) We got to chatting it up and the few times I've seen him perform since then I've taken my son up to shake his hand and talk to him. He wound up striking up a friendship with the drummer in my band, who is now developing a Caspar Babypants iPad app, to be released soon.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 12:32 PM on April 14, 2013

Metafilter makes me want to be a better person. You can't say that for every site out there.

This is indeed the crux of the biscuit right here.

And, it's "read the helpful article."
posted by Devils Rancher at 12:33 PM on April 14, 2013 [2 favorites]

Walking into a bar for my first meetup and having some guy say, "Metafilter?" like we recognized each other. We were the first two there, no tables saved or signs, etc. It was just a KNOWING sort of a thing. Eerie.
posted by Marie Mon Dieu at 1:06 PM on April 14, 2013

The first response to an anonymous relationship question I asked was something to the effect of, "Oh, for fuck's sake, just call him!"

I did, and we've been together for 4+ years, so, yeah, I'd say that MetaFilter changed my life. (Still mustering the courage to go to a meetup, but someday!)
posted by coppermoss at 1:28 PM on April 14, 2013 [1 favorite]

As Greg Nog noted a little while ago, it's obviously Read the Hellacious Article.

I think the punctuation is off. It should be: Read "the" -- Hellacious Article. Although why "the" should be more hellacious than say "a" or "an," I have no idea.
posted by GenjiandProust at 1:37 PM on April 14, 2013 [1 favorite]

Making the podcast two months running made me feel that I had made it, in at least a very small way.
posted by Chrysostom at 3:15 PM on April 14, 2013

Fuck, that reminds me - I still owe Cortex a dozen donuts.
posted by Devils Rancher at 3:25 PM on April 14, 2013

It seems my policy of pronouncing all usernames as 'Steve' until personally researched is not so terrible after all.
posted by pompomtom at 4:43 PM on April 14, 2013 [2 favorites]

...As of Thursday at least Caspar Babypants was touring with the PotUSA. And they were awesome.
posted by maryr at 5:48 PM on April 14, 2013

Shakespeherian's taters roundup. It was everything and more.
posted by Madamina at 6:07 PM on April 14, 2013

i was happier than i like to admit when mathowie favorited a comment i made about making your child's portrait session go better during the holiday season.

i treasure the memails i've received from abuse survivors that say, basically, "thanks for speaking up, i needed that today." i worry that i've become "that girl" so the encouragement helps. as such, i've tried to send more memails when i appreciate someone doing the heavy lifting.
posted by nadawi at 6:37 PM on April 14, 2013 [5 favorites]

It's actually Dr. Mr. The Whelk.

"Mr. The Whelk is my dad. I'm just The!"

(Also, it is, and forever will be, "Read the Heckin' Article.")
posted by Turkey Glue at 7:36 PM on April 14, 2013 [1 favorite]

I spent a night tweeting about RuPaul's Drag Race with louche mustachio and we geeked out over my boyfriend's job and I knew I was finally a real live MeFite.


No, wait. It's even better than that. Xingcat's boyfriend is (hope you don't mind me saying) creating a chronological index of every piece of animation made by all the mainstream studios. An epic undertaking very much after my own cartoon heart.

I have posted about animation, my animation blog was an FPP (that was DEFINITELY an awesome moment, by the way) and people know that animation is a thing I am all about, yet this connection came about because ...RuPaul's Drag Race.

Other moments include;

- Being spoused by Brandon Blatcher
- exchanging MeMails and emails with Greg Nog
- Discovering that two of my (former) co-workers are MeFites (COBRA! and advicepig)
- Finding out that NoMich is a dear old friend of Mr. Mustachio's from back in the day, via a worst show anecdote.
- madamejujujive told me she liked my blog. I have been blorted! Feels good.
- The upcoming NYC meetups! I am already over the moon that the young rope rider said she was excited to meet ME.

and surely some others that will come to light later.

Related to some other topics covered in this thread:

- Not long ago, I heard an audible "pfffrrrrrtttt!" come from the dining room, and saw Norma standing in the middle of the room, ears akimbo, a startled expression on her face. Cats fart. Sometimes their butts make noise. Sometimes it confuses them.

- SONASCOPE! All of his posts are the best. I must confess I want to hug him (with his permission, of course.) A great big burlybearman hug. He has the best mustache and he looks like he smells good.
posted by louche mustachio at 8:28 PM on April 14, 2013

I was quite happy, after LJ got quieter, to find Sonascope here. & I hope his portable little lectric typer is still kicking ass in a smartphone Bluetooth keyboard world.

Also, keeping an eye on my not so evil twin.
posted by tilde at 8:43 PM on April 14, 2013

Oh come on, they're definitely the evil one. Look at that moustache!
posted by pompomtom at 12:45 AM on April 15, 2013 [2 favorites]

Getting sidebarred. I am not ashamed to say that pretty much made my whole week at the time.
posted by kyrademon at 12:51 AM on April 15, 2013

Making it to the Mefi Ten meetup and realising that the Brisbane/SE QLD mefites were just as much a mix of the awesome and the deranged that I'd always suspected, only more so, and betterer.
posted by Jilder at 5:18 AM on April 15, 2013

Getting my own (indirect) MeTa callout.

Creating a muenster in MeTa.

I am also part of Team Un-Cleozzy.
posted by slogger at 7:37 AM on April 15, 2013

Then there was the time I got a favorite from Anil Dash, then I made a comment referencing the favorite from Anil Dash, which in turn received another favorite from Anil Dash. That was pretty great.
posted by slogger at 7:40 AM on April 15, 2013

Creating a muenster in MeTa.

Oh God, I once did that very same thing in real life.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 7:41 AM on April 15, 2013

Figuring out what "Lou Stuells" means, and also my first (and only, so far) Secret Quonsar swap, when all Sally Field-like I thought, "You mean _I_ can be in this? Cool!!"
posted by wenestvedt at 8:25 AM on April 15, 2013 [1 favorite]

My first meetup was great. It started out a bit odd, as we were in this weird restaurant with really low lighting, and a few people knew each-other, but I didn't know anyone beyond their MeFi handles.

We decided that after dinner, we should go to a local bar. But because we chose an in-between place where no one was local, we had to ask. We got directions that included "turn left after the big red barn," so we did. We found ourselves at a big barn of a western bar, complete with a big dancing area, and autographed and decorated dollar bills pinned to the ceilings and walls. We drank and had fun, made friends with random local people, and fun was had by all.
posted by filthy light thief at 9:03 AM on April 15, 2013 [2 favorites]

I find it weird that I have been here (lurking and otherwise) since 2000 or so, and have never once knowingly met another MeFite in real life. Not that I have tried; I mean, there have been meet-ups, but I haven't gone; I guess I just figured eventually someone I knew would be on the site. Right? Nope.

When I see a laptop screen with a blue background I can't help but wonder if it's Metafilter. But so far, nope.

Sometimes when traveling I wear my Metafilter shirt, despite my wife's eyerolling. Because I am waiting to have that moment where one of the nameless masses spots it, and we momentarily lock eyes, and silently exchange a nod to acknowledge our mutual membership, and walk on like nothing happened*.

Point is, I am the point of contact between Metafilter and everyone I know. And I share things I read here, or links I found, and people ask me "Where the hell did you hear about this?" and I realize that knowing this site exists makes life more fun for me, because I get to be the person who shares that weird-ass link with everyone.

So if you are in an airport or something, and you see a tall, bearded guy sporting a gray "I + Metafilter" shirt (and probably trying not to spill my coffee while wrangling a four-year-old), it's probably me, so gimme a nod or something.

*Really I am split between being noticed and being terrified someone will notice me, and then end up disappointed because they've never heard of me; after all, I am not one of the rara avis of Metafilter. Or worse, that the person who notices me and comments will be someone of quonsar-level notoriety, or someone I inadvertently (or even advertently!) pissed off X number of years ago, and either I will have no idea how to respond or it will end in pistols at dawn. Oh well. The shirt hasn't gotten me any perks that I know of, but at least I haven't been spit upon by an angry Redditor or something.
posted by caution live frogs at 9:45 AM on April 15, 2013 [4 favorites]

For me, it was making a comment in the Gary Gygax thread, and getting Memailed by Kattullus inviting me to join his gaming group, forever conquering my fear of mefites!
posted by likeatoaster at 10:19 AM on April 15, 2013 [3 favorites]

When jessamyn mentioned our awesome cat Yorvit on a podcast. We still tell him that he's internet famous. He's now met two mods and multiple other mefites.

Also, I have been known to refer to rtha as "rtha" in public on occasion. Pronounced "arr - tee -- ha" of course. For Red-Tailed HAwk.
posted by gingerbeer at 10:34 AM on April 15, 2013 [3 favorites]

a tall, bearded guy sporting a gray "I + Metafilter" shirt (and probably trying not to spill my coffee while wrangling a four-year-old), it's probably me, so gimme a nod or something.

Oh, you. I've seen you around.

.....I have not.
posted by Diablevert at 10:34 AM on April 15, 2013

So if you ever wondered why functionequalsform posted the word "Ass" in this thread, you now have your answer.

Flagged. and favourited. Sorry for wasting your time, mods.
posted by ambrosen at 11:57 AM on April 15, 2013

Pleeeease don't delete my ass.
posted by functionequalsform at 12:04 PM on April 15, 2013 [10 favorites]

If you promise not to do it again, I am willing to limit my modly reaction to a sort of stern look while the corner of my mouth twitches slightly.
posted by cortex (staff) at 12:06 PM on April 15, 2013 [20 favorites]

I got the Metatalk thread about me tattooed on my stomach in blackletter, so my Metafilter moment never has to end.
posted by Juliet Banana at 12:53 PM on April 15, 2013 [1 favorite]

I was on a plane once talking to a random stranger about stuff and he mentioned that he had a custom ring tone on his cell phone for his SO. I said I did too and he asked what it was. I had to admit that it was Punch 'em in the Dick.
posted by bendy at 4:29 PM on April 15, 2013 [2 favorites]

My son wouldn't exist without MetaFilter. We have created LIFE.
posted by Specklet at 5:48 PM on April 15, 2013 [4 favorites]

Realizing it's ocherdraco, as in the color, not ocho..

Up until three seconds ago I thought it was otherdraco. Like, this is a draco, but not the draco you're thinking of. Totally made sense to me.

Also, I think I figured out that you didn't need to use an underscore as a space in your username about five minutes after I signed up. Whatever. Underscores are cool.

I have no fucking clue how I figured out that clavicle was a mefite (I suspect she said something, I can be pretty fight clubby about my internet activities), but we've collected a few more in our meatspace meetings, and annoy the hell out of non-metafilter friends my talking about metafilter threads. We ended up explaining both Metafilter and Judiasm to a Korean guy and an Armenian guy over dinner Friday night. Think they got the jist of Judiasm okay, but the only thing keeping them from thinking that Metafilter was a fetlife equivalent was me pulling out my cell phone and showing them the website (any fetlife equivalent would have more pictures).
posted by dinty_moore at 6:06 PM on April 15, 2013 [1 favorite]

Plus very different website advertisements.
posted by rmd1023 at 6:53 PM on April 15, 2013 [1 favorite]

I wasn’t anywhere around when my favorite MeFi moment took place. My brother (aka MtDewd) came up behind SirStan in a grocery store checkout line in Montpelier and startled him by asking, "Are you SirStan?" He’d recognized Stan from a photo I’d taken at a meetup at Jessamyn’s house.

p.s. Benny’s name always was obvious to me, but I never knew about rtha. Which I always think is rtfa.
posted by LeLiLo at 10:24 PM on April 15, 2013 [1 favorite]

When I attended the Vegas wedding of jonmc and Pips in the company of a number of MeFites, none of whom I'd ever met before. (Elvis was in attendance too. He was commando under his white catsuit ...)

Despite my shyness, weirdness and social anxiety, everyone accepted me as one of their own, and friendships made that weekend have endured and flourished online and in meatspace to this day.
posted by essexjan at 3:11 AM on April 16, 2013

Huh, I've been pronouncing rtha like RZA but with a lisp - "rithah."
posted by griphus at 5:01 AM on April 16, 2013 [1 favorite]

I've always pronounced it "Arthur"
posted by unSane at 5:55 AM on April 16, 2013 [1 favorite]

I've always pronounced it "Arthur"

In my head, it's Eartha, as in Eartha Kitt.
posted by MonkeyToes at 6:50 AM on April 16, 2013 [1 favorite]

Brody's chum: This thread. Because it was the first time I'd ever seen total unity on the green, and because we were all heartbroken together.

For me "that thread" was the one where everyone united to help the Russian women. There and in the related MeTas were amazing unity in helping total strangers.
posted by TravellingCari at 6:54 AM on April 16, 2013 [1 favorite]

I was able to hide my MetaFilter habit from the normals for a long time, but then I started going to meetups, and meeting awesome people, and now I find myself at parties with zennie trying to explain (often multiple times, in various ways, to more than one person) what MetaFilter is and why exactly we would want to hang out with people from the internet.
posted by EvaDestruction at 9:13 AM on April 16, 2013

I just bought myself a Metafilter shirt so I could have a metafilter RL moment.
posted by bq at 10:20 AM on April 16, 2013

For me "that thread" was the one where everyone united to help the Russian women.

The thread I kept showing to people who didn't know anything about Metafilter was the AskMe, eight years ago, about 1939 Vienna.
posted by LeLiLo at 1:19 PM on April 16, 2013 [2 favorites]

I keep misreading Benny Andajetz as Benny Ajedrez.
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 1:31 PM on April 16, 2013

The thread I kept showing to people who didn't know anything about Metafilter was the AskMe, eight years ago, about 1939 Vienna.

Cannot believe that was 8 years ago!
I read a long time before I joined and that thread amazed me. I also played show and tell with it.
posted by TravellingCari at 1:44 PM on April 16, 2013

I would just like to add then when I'm looking in a long thread to see if anyone responded to me or to find an older comment of mine to refer back to, I always search the string "eyeb" because "eye" pulls up too many false positives while "eyeb" narrows it down to people raising their eyebrows at something ... but also to Eyebeams and eyeballkid, and I get sort-of excited every time I'm searching "eyeb" and pull up one of them, since it's like we're all part of eye-related morphology compound words with Bs. OBVIOUSLY A VERY EXCLUSIVE AND SEXY CLUB.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 3:44 PM on April 16, 2013 [6 favorites]

I didn't consider it at the time I opened my account, but have since discovered that "strau" is very, very rare.
posted by benito.strauss at 3:57 PM on April 16, 2013

I knew I'd arrived when user #1 gave me a best answer, which I totally deserved, but not as much as the other best answers in that thread.

I get peacheater and peachfuzz confused still.
posted by mgar at 8:00 PM on April 16, 2013 [1 favorite]

Well, now that you know one is Pea Cheater, that should help, since Pea Chfuzz doesn't really work.
posted by maryr at 8:27 PM on April 16, 2013 [1 favorite]

I consistently read peacheater as "pea cheater," not the more likely "peach eater."
posted by Miko at 9:04 PM on April 16, 2013

After reading this entire thread a thought struck me, and I felt the need to check whether the OP's username is based on a cockatiel belonging to somebody named Timothy.

Nope.
posted by Lexica at 8:40 PM on April 18, 2013