Results from The Big MetaFilter Survey 2015

December 9, 2015 5:57 AM

After too long a wait, here are some initial results from The Big MetaFilter Survey 2015.
What We Talk About When We Talk About MetaFilter - information about your interactions with the site.
Tell Us A Little About Yourself - information about the personal lives of your fellow users.
The Food Wars - what kinds of foods are acceptable and what kinds are garbage nightmares.
Other Results [pdf] - includes curated responses to the more interesting open-ended questions and some other numerical data.

So, it took much longer than I thought, and was more complicated than I thought. Partly that's on my being busy and/or procrastinating, partly that's on Google Forms for being very difficult to export useful data from. In many cases, the best I could do was to screenshot charts and graphs. In any case, the links above will provide you with the basic results. If you'd like access to the data for your own wrangling, please send me a MeMail or email. I'm not going to post the full data publically, as I think there should be at least a little bit of a road block in accessing the data, and that's how the privacy statement said the data would be available, so I don't want to go back on that now.

I hope the others I have already sent the data to will comment with their own observations, if they have any.

Sorry for the excess delay, and sorry that I wasn't able to spend as much time as I wanted really digging into the data - it's harder and more time consuming than I thought. It was fun to do, and I'd love to see someone with a bit more expertise (and better time management skills) pick up the ball and run with it next year.

posted by Rock Steady to MetaFilter-Related at 5:57 AM (358 comments total)

This. is. for. the. 26.9%. who. prefer. double. spaces. after. periods.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 6:05 AM on December 9, 2015 [13 favorites]

you you first. that whole thing. what what what. buttoned.
posted by unliteral at 6:19 AM on December 9, 2015

(The comment box automatically strips out consecutive spaces, so that's an unhappy 26.9%.                        But maybe not if you use the entity code?)
posted by nobody at 6:20 AM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

Wow, 55% glasses.

Also you would think Google would order the bars by percentage. Kind of silly to do it the way they do.
posted by smackfu at 6:28 AM on December 9, 2015

(Technically, the comment box doesn't strip out spaces.   HTML does, unless you use a non-breaking space.)
posted by smackfu at 6:29 AM on December 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

In re the bedtime calculation at the end of the PDF, did you try shifting them all by 12 hours so the 11:59 p.m./12:01 a.m. divide becomes 11:59 a.m./12:01 p.m. on the same day?
posted by Etrigan at 6:33 AM on December 9, 2015

UNPROFESSIONAL
posted by halifix at 6:33 AM on December 9, 2015

Hah! Suck it, Tomato-based chowder eaters!
posted by bondcliff at 6:37 AM on December 9, 2015 [17 favorites]

In re the bedtime calculation at the end of the PDF, did you try shifting them all by 12 hours so the 11:59 p.m./12:01 a.m. divide becomes 11:59 a.m./12:01 p.m. on the same day?

You can achieve this by swapping AM with PM or vice versa for each time in 12-hour format btw. Just make sure you swap again after you've found the average and have it back in 12-hour format.
posted by Quilford at 6:41 AM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

38% don't drink whiskey? Like, ever? never? How? Why? Never? Really?


Really? Never? Never ever? How?
posted by crush-onastick at 6:43 AM on December 9, 2015 [15 favorites]

For example, if your data set is 11:30 PM, 12:00 AM, 12:30 AM and 1:00 AM I'm assuming Excel would spit out an unhelpful average of 6:15 AM?
If you swapped AM and PM to get 11:30 AM, 12:00 PM, 12:30 PM and 1:00 PM, your average would be 12:15 PM; swap back for a more helpful average of 12:15 AM.
posted by Quilford at 6:50 AM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

HA HA! I am not alone in my withering scorn for the Bae. Moisten and squirt your panties, my little bae.....
posted by dorothyisunderwood at 6:56 AM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

The only thing that horrified me more than the fact that apparently I am the only person who pictures a plate of boiled string beans is that 54% of respondents nominated Vegemite as a food they disliked!! WHO ARE YOU PEOPLE
posted by Quilford at 6:57 AM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

Wow, I'm a long-time user!
posted by Lucinda at 6:57 AM on December 9, 2015

Hey bae, smear your comely ointment on the spongy and dampy larva. Nourish the foodie!
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 7:13 AM on December 9, 2015 [12 favorites]

38% don't drink whiskey? Like, ever? never? How? Why? Never? Really?

Judging from AskMe we have a lot of people in recovery or who have dodgy relationships with alcohol. I just hate the stuff which is the secret reason I don't work here anymore (cortex's aggressive whiskey hazing! beware new mods!). I am so sorry for people who wake up at 7:30 am on average.

Fun project!
posted by jessamyn (retired) at 7:14 AM on December 9, 2015 [15 favorites]

I'm glad 55% of Mefites are civilized enough to not wear their shoes indoors; it reaffirms my faith in humanity.

Also confirms that "pop" is a bizarre regionalism for soda.
posted by pravit at 7:14 AM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

38% don't drink whiskey? Like, ever? never? How? Why? Never? Really?

1) Nope.
2) Not since college.
3) Not anymore.
4) With ease.
5) Because after college the smell still makes me feel ill and I don't really feel the need for whiskey in a world where gin exists.
6) Nope!
7) Really.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 7:20 AM on December 9, 2015 [14 favorites]

Quilford: "You can achieve this by swapping AM with PM or vice versa for each time in 12-hour format btw. Just make sure you swap again after you've found the average and have it back in 12-hour format."

That gets 11:44:11 PM, which seems reasonable based on the data. Thanks for that idea!
posted by Rock Steady at 7:21 AM on December 9, 2015

I think the distasteful words question was hopelessly biased by not including the worst word in this or any language, "pleasure" as a verb. Bleeeeeeeeeech.
posted by zeptoweasel at 7:23 AM on December 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

cortex's aggressive whiskey hazing! beware new mods!

FINE I'll apply
posted by shakespeherian at 7:24 AM on December 9, 2015 [32 favorites]

Yup, that "I don't drink whiskey" vote by me is a proxy for "I more or less don't drink alcohol at all", which wasn't an option. My life is full of loved ones in recovery and I have no desire to tempt them. I drink once a year, on an annual out-of-town trip with friends where that's not an issue, and then it's about two beers and to sleep with me, because I have no tolerance from the rest of the year of non-drinking.

I used "bae" for the first time a week or so ago and I felt instantly dirty and will probably never do it again.
posted by Stacey at 7:24 AM on December 9, 2015 [6 favorites]

38% don't drink whiskey? Like, ever? never? How? Why? Never? Really?

Some of us don't drink.

--

RockSteady, this is extremely cool. Thanks for doing it!

The shower/bathe question is fascinating. Also, what is unpleasant about the word "panties"? Can someone enlighten me?
posted by zarq at 7:25 AM on December 9, 2015

Mee-fee

There are literally dozens of us!
posted by phunniemee at 7:25 AM on December 9, 2015 [6 favorites]

I really don't get the problem with "bae". Is it just because it's new and there's a "get off my lawn" thing, or are these people who hate any term of endearment already?
posted by Rock Steady at 7:29 AM on December 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

I am so sorry for people who wake up at 7:30 am on average.

I saw that and thought "Wow, how indulgent!" and now I feel sad.
posted by Ufez Jones at 7:30 AM on December 9, 2015 [56 favorites]

A couple years ago at work, the fedex guy (who I had a chatty-friendly serviceperson relationship with) called me bae.

I thought this was funny so I im'd my coworker to tell him.

Coworker replied: bae caught me shippin

That is the best and only bae story I have.
posted by phunniemee at 7:33 AM on December 9, 2015 [43 favorites]

I really don't get the problem with "bae".

If I try to pronounce it any differently than "bay", it feels gross in my mouth. Like "bleh". Bad for a positive word.
posted by smackfu at 7:35 AM on December 9, 2015

smackfu: "If I try to pronounce it any differently than "bay", it feels gross in my mouth. Like "bleh". Bad for a positive word."

...but it is pronounced "bay".
posted by Rock Steady at 7:38 AM on December 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

Ah. Thanks!
posted by zarq at 7:38 AM on December 9, 2015

38% don't drink whiskey and 28% don't eat pork barbecue, which is interesting because I am, by mass, 38% whiskey and 28% barbecue.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 7:39 AM on December 9, 2015 [41 favorites]

Are any of the data recipients going to dig around for correlations? Because that's potentially even more fun than averages and percents-of-totals.

If the answer is "not yet", maybe I'll put in request and take a shot.
posted by paper chromatographologist at 7:41 AM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

If I try to pronounce it any differently than "bay", it feels gross in my mouth. Like "bleh". Bad for a positive word.

We need a new survey: how do you pronounce bae?
posted by phunniemee at 7:44 AM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

This is awesome - thank you for doing all of this work!

I tried to acquire a taste for whiskey and failed. It's too burn-y. I'm 95% a beer & wine type of woman, occasional cocktails.
posted by Fig at 7:44 AM on December 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

...but it is pronounced "bay".

To be perfectly honest, I have never heard this word said.
posted by smackfu at 7:48 AM on December 9, 2015 [10 favorites]

Wow. All the cool kids have smartphones. *sigh*
posted by JanetLand at 7:48 AM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

Good work! The Google forms data was pretty convoluted and horrible. It's not easy to get any kind of analysis out of it!

I wonder what happened with the XKCD survey which inspired this?
posted by Just this guy, y'know at 7:49 AM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

I'm not sure how the question was phrased in the survey, but looking at the answers, I'm guessing the "other" body mods that 10% of MeFites have is "no body mods".

Also, yeah, I've never heard "bae", I've only seen it in print. I assumed it was pronounced "bay", but it's not?
posted by Bugbread at 7:50 AM on December 9, 2015

That gets 11:44:11 PM, which seems reasonable based on the data. Thanks for that idea!

No probs! Thanks for all the interesting stats!
posted by Quilford at 7:54 AM on December 9, 2015

Some nonsense correlations, please.
posted by Going To Maine at 7:56 AM on December 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

Okay, not drinking alcohol at all makes sense. That actually clears things up. It just seems odd to me that a person who drinks alcohol never drinks whiskey--like, "never", not "does not prefer it" but "never".
posted by crush-onastick at 7:56 AM on December 9, 2015

Wow. All the cool kids have smartphones. *sigh*

Smartphone use in the US is at around 64% now so the 90-ish% response for MeFi is really well outside of US averages.
posted by jessamyn (retired) at 7:57 AM on December 9, 2015 [5 favorites]

This. is. for. the. 26.9%. who. prefer. double. spaces. after. periods.

Or 4.4% for "it depends"???!? It depends on WHAT? People, people, people. Smh.

It depends on whether I'm using a typewriter or a computer, of course.
posted by JanetLand at 7:57 AM on December 9, 2015 [7 favorites]

I had forgotten I participated in this and am so glad I did. Yay for data!
posted by Twicketface at 7:58 AM on December 9, 2015

In regards to the "long, thin sandwich" question, I'm frankly shocked that only 29 respondents say "hero." To read some of the comment sections, you'd think that every fifth Mefite or so was a New Yorker.

Also I, too, just now learned that direwolves are not fictional.
posted by uncleozzy at 8:01 AM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

41% of us have tattoos. THAT surprised me. Cool!
posted by terrapin at 8:06 AM on December 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

> 38% don't drink whiskey? Like, ever? never? How? Why? Never? Really?

Look at it this way: More for us!

I have to go look at results and see if there's anything about pie in there. Like, do enough people not like pie that there will be more for me?
posted by rtha at 8:12 AM on December 9, 2015 [7 favorites]

I think I just found the perfect gift for rtha.
posted by taz (staff) at 8:22 AM on December 9, 2015 [6 favorites]

38% don't drink whiskey? Like, ever? never? How? Why? Never? Really?

after careful thought and consideration i decided i would rather live a normal human lifespan instead of dying in the firey wreckage of my home or car at around 40.
posted by poffin boffin at 8:26 AM on December 9, 2015 [13 favorites]

38% don't drink whiskey and 28% don't eat pork barbecue, which is interesting because I am, by mass, 38% whiskey and 28% barbecue.

This is another one of those situations where I knew who wrote the comment before actually seeing who wrote the comment.
posted by phunniemee at 8:28 AM on December 9, 2015 [5 favorites]

The curated responses PDF does not include any of my comments and is therefore invalid.
posted by Spathe Cadet at 8:29 AM on December 9, 2015 [5 favorites]

> I think I just found the perfect gift for rtha.

That is the funniest booze review I have ever read!

In truth, I prefer my whisk(e)y to be whisk(e)y-flavored. If it's Scotch, it should taste like a campfire. I will have pie next to it!
posted by rtha at 8:30 AM on December 9, 2015 [5 favorites]

Come on, booze reviews are serious business folks. Stop trying to turn them into a joke.
posted by Drinky Die at 8:32 AM on December 9, 2015

Ah yes, Piehole Whiskey. Available in many of your finer $1-each, five for $3, nip bins.
posted by yhbc at 8:33 AM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

I'm amazed that over 40% of respondents have asked an anonymous question and that over 30% have met people who turned out to be MeFites. Fascinating results; thanks for doing the work!

Also: boy, a lot of you mispronounce MeFi.
posted by languagehat at 8:33 AM on December 9, 2015 [9 favorites]

meffy
posted by poffin boffin at 8:35 AM on December 9, 2015 [18 favorites]

> Also: boy, a lot of you mispronounce MeFi.

NO U
posted by rtha at 8:37 AM on December 9, 2015 [7 favorites]

Be honest, you haven't tried organ meats in years.

More single malt drinkers than bourbon drinkers? Rich elitists.
posted by Drinky Die at 8:38 AM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

MEEF-EYE

Also, ~30% of respondents have slept with another mefite! :)
posted by zarq at 8:39 AM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

You can achieve this by swapping AM with PM or vice versa for each time in 12-hour format btw

There are existing methods for dealing with averaging values that come from a periodic phenomenon like time-of-day; is this AM/PM switch related to any of them?
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 8:40 AM on December 9, 2015

Also, ~30% of respondents have slept with another mefite! :)

I'd also like to give a shout out on that question to my fellow 8% 'not sure' responders.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 8:42 AM on December 9, 2015 [22 favorites]

1.18 Mefites per home? You have seen my ass then?
posted by Oyéah at 8:43 AM on December 9, 2015 [5 favorites]

"It's giant mechanoid Jerry Falwell! Save us, Super Immorality Woman!"

"Oh, no! He's summoning a dog and superfarting all at once! My only weakness!"
posted by Drinky Die at 8:48 AM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

69% of you are HEATHENS. Old layout all the way!

Also I'm kind of pleasantly charmed that 22% of the response sample has had sexual relations with other mefites. I think that's a higher percentage than some dating sites!
posted by corb at 8:48 AM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

For further time-based analysis, data-wranglers may find converting to 24 hour time simplifies things.

Also, panties are for little girls. Women wear lingerie, underwear, delicates, etc.
posted by congen at 8:49 AM on December 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

rtha you are hereby invited to my house as not only do I frequently bake pies and eat them for breakfast but I also eat them for dinner and in the evening at what some call proper pie time (otherwise known as dessert) accompanied by a nice glass of Scotch.

and for lunch too cuz let's be honest, if I bake a pie I see it as 24 hours of meals

(this morning I made a blueberry galette with a white chedder crust, although I'm not sure if a galette counts as a real pie or is just a pie you can't fuck up and thus doesn't count)
posted by barchan at 8:49 AM on December 9, 2015 [10 favorites]

Be honest, you haven't tried organ meats in years.

Did I ever tell you guys about that time I thought I had gout because I had been binging on pate and my toe hurt?
posted by phunniemee at 8:52 AM on December 9, 2015 [16 favorites]

This is really cool. It's likely just a coincidence, but the chip dipping bars have a pleasingly staggered distribution. It's as if basically everyone likes ketchup, moves on to accepting vinegar and mayonnaise, then eventually anything becomes acceptable. Strawberry milkshake is truly the best though.

(I'd also like to just cast into the ether my contention that "ask vs. guess" carries an implicit slight, and it bugs me every time I read it. It should be something like "ask vs. assess". We're not guessing, you weird, outgoing people.)
posted by lucidium at 8:56 AM on December 9, 2015 [9 favorites]

Galette is totally pie. The correct time to eat pie is always.

Over the weekend, I made empanadas and I brought a couple to work for lunch. Sadly I have no whisky here, but I think one of the senior VPs still has a bottle of High West Campfire on her bookshelf in her office....
posted by rtha at 8:59 AM on December 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

My pancake recipe and I are honoured.

Also I think it was somewhere on Suzette Haden Elgin's livejournal that it was switched to ask vs hint, which I like somewhat better.
posted by jeather at 9:01 AM on December 9, 2015 [5 favorites]

22% of you have had sex with each other? Man, I should be going to meetups.
posted by Anonymous at 9:01 AM on December 9, 2015

Whisk(e)y gave me a three day hangover about 15 years ago. I still can't yet stomach the smell, let alone the taste. I get it as a gift sometimes at the end of a job, I just give it away.

You all need to try my kangaroo and oyster mushroom pie, it's excellent. It has beer in it too.
posted by deadwax at 9:19 AM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

All my answers were from before the move; pretty much everything is the same, except we don't wear shoes in the house in our new place up north, so maybe move one from "Yes" shoes in house to "No" shoes in house.
posted by notyou at 9:27 AM on December 9, 2015

Did I ever tell you guys about that time I thought I had gout because I had been binging on pate and my toe hurt?

Speaking of guessing who wrote a comment before you saw the handle...
posted by MCMikeNamara at 9:33 AM on December 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

It was either her or The Whelk.
posted by shakespeherian at 9:40 AM on December 9, 2015 [13 favorites]

22% of you have had sex with each other?

I'm more concerned with the 8% who aren't sure.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 9:41 AM on December 9, 2015 [13 favorites]

The 22% could also just represent one user who really gets around.
posted by Rock Steady at 9:45 AM on December 9, 2015 [6 favorites]

> It should be something like "ask vs. assess".

Really confused for a minute about why you were calling guessers asses.
posted by congen at 9:45 AM on December 9, 2015 [8 favorites]

22% strikes me as rather low. Starting a metatalk to see how we can correct this...
posted by naju at 9:46 AM on December 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

soooo I totally test panicked on the sex question because my husband became a MeFite way after me so I was all - well at one time he wasn't, even though he is now so does that count? I mean, it's not like I met a MeFite and then did awesome dirty MeFite deeds what do i do ohno- and even though the answer seems pretty obvious NOW I was feeling the overthinkin' bubble rise in my belly and sweating and shit, so I hit not sure because that was the quickest way off that train.

So yeah.
posted by barchan at 9:52 AM on December 9, 2015 [20 favorites]

It just seems odd to me that a person who drinks alcohol never drinks whiskey--like, "never", not "does not prefer it" but "never".

Okay, but I like alcohol AND I never drink whiskey. Never, ever. It's not that I simply don't prefer it, I full stop don't like it. It is possible to like alcohol but dislike whiskey. For me, it tastes like campfire, and YES I KNOW that's why some people like it but I'm one of those people who stands at the edge of the fire and dashes away when the smoke starts to indicate that it MIGHT waft my way and I don't actually camp because I CANNOT SLEEP if my hair smells like a campfire so I HAVE to take a shower whenever I encounter outdoor fires, and if I take the dog out at night and someone in the neighborhood is burning leaves or has a fire in their fireplace and the smell gets on me, I MUST shower when I come inside. In my defense (not that one is necessary, really), I have asthma and I am super sensitive to all smoke smells.

So. Yeah. I don't like whiskey.
posted by cooker girl at 9:54 AM on December 9, 2015 [8 favorites]

The podcast listening numbers are surprisingly low. It is well worth listening to and requires far less effort and attention than many of the more popular ones. It's very clever, but it moves quickly from topic to topic, so you can miss a few minutes and still follow along. I find it a great thing to listen to when I'm stuck in bed sick.

If you didn't listen to the most recent podcast, you missed cortex and jessamyn doing a parrot-y back and forth of parity and parody.

If you didn't listen to this podcast, you don't know how great Eyebrows McGee's accent is.
posted by congen at 9:55 AM on December 9, 2015 [6 favorites]

Hah! Suck it, Tomato-based chowder eaters!

I'm assuming the 1.7% "Other" chowder eaters are all from Rhode Island.

Rhode Islanders: I love you guys, really (I married one of you!). Clam cakes? Delicious! Coffee milk? Wonderful! Bakery pizza? Divine! But oh god, please stop it with the chowders. I know you know how to make a proper, creamy clam chowder, please stop trying to feed me super-thin milky white chowder, or bowls of clam juice you're claiming are somehow a clear chowder.

(The less said of fish chowder, the better)
posted by tocts at 10:07 AM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

> You can achieve this by swapping AM with PM or vice versa for each time in 12-hour format btw

better yet, add another column that is =IF(timevalue<0.5,timevalue+1,timevalue)
Average that, then choose whatever time formatting you understand. It'll be right.
posted by scruss at 10:15 AM on December 9, 2015

I love the answer "Probably Jingle Rock Bell or else things about tax policy" as an answer to the best thing you've learned on metafilter. You know, one of those two.
posted by something something at 10:15 AM on December 9, 2015 [15 favorites]

I never drink whiskey, because the first time I tried it was whiskers and waters the night Bush won the first time, and now it always tastes like sadness.
posted by corb at 10:23 AM on December 9, 2015 [5 favorites]

The 22% could also just represent one user who really gets around.

*blushes*
posted by JanetLand at 10:24 AM on December 9, 2015 [10 favorites]

I only stopped doing the hard drugs I used to get through the Bush years.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 10:24 AM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

I grew up LDS and although I'm not LDS anymore--and I occasionally venture into alcoholic drinks--nobody has ever sat me down and introduced me to whiskey etc.

Hint, hint.
posted by wintersweet at 10:44 AM on December 9, 2015 [11 favorites]

The percentages given seem misleading? Note, for example, that the exact same number of people—45—is said to be "4%" of the whole in the third-to-last table on this page, and "4.9%" in the last table.

My best guess is that these represent the percentages of the people who answered a given question? If so, having that total for each question, as well as the overall number of survey participants, would be useful. (The confusion is not helped by statements like "What 'other' body mods do 10% of MeFites have?", considering that there apparently was no option in that question covering people with no body mods.)
posted by Shmuel510 at 10:51 AM on December 9, 2015

Also: Trying to figure out what time they go to bed is hard, as all the early morning times (12 AM, 1 AM, etc) appear to push the average earlier in the day rather than later. The calculated value is 2:30:33 PM, but if you know of a better way to calculate that average in Excel, let me know.

I would guess you'd want to change the line of demarcation from midnight to noon. If you can convert the time data so that noon = 0:00:00, and a second before noon is 23:59:59, could you then use that new data to create a more useful average?
posted by Shmuel510 at 11:02 AM on December 9, 2015

For those of you who are sadly afflicted by whiskey hate, I will offer up my services as a Whiskey Disposal Consultant. No need to thank me -- I've gotten a lot from this community, and it's time I gave something back.
posted by KathrynT at 11:08 AM on December 9, 2015 [26 favorites]

Shmuel510: "My best guess is that these represent the percentages of the people who answered a given question? If so, having that total for each question, as well as the overall number of survey participants, would be useful."

There are currently 1169 total responses, and I think you are right, the percentages are based on the numbers of answers to each question. If you'd like to calculate the total number of answers for each question I'd be happy to send you a link to the data.

Shmuel510: "The confusion is not helped by statements like "What 'other' body mods do 10% of MeFites have?", considering that there apparently was no option in that question covering people with no body mods."

Again, I'm not a statistician and I'm speaking casually when I say things like "10% of MeFites". If you'd like to do more rigorous analyses, the data is available.
posted by Rock Steady at 11:13 AM on December 9, 2015

If you are trying to acquire a taste for whiskey, I would start by finding a nice bar with a bartender you like and doing a bit of experimenting. Start with a high quality whiskey and soda to get the taste of whiskey without all the burn, and if you like it or don't hate it enough to stop trying move on to some classic whiskey cocktails like a Manhatten or Old Fashioned or even a Whiskey Sour. That will give you an appreciation for how the spirit can compliment other flavors. At this point you will probably know if you like whiskey or not, and then you can try some straight tasting. Personally, all my experimentation has led me to like whiskey and soda the most as a nice refreshing (but pleasantly warming) beverage.
posted by Drinky Die at 11:14 AM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

OMG, narwhals. Last week, one of my coworkers (a biology PhD student!) turned out not to know that narwhals existed. We all teased him and laughed, but clearly he was not alone! I will have to tell him that he is not the only person who somehow missed the existence of unicorn whales.
posted by sciatrix at 11:22 AM on December 9, 2015 [12 favorites]

Can we have more 'other' responses, or are they super boring? Personally, I would be happy to read just the raw data of that for hours.
posted by sciatrix at 11:36 AM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

I grew up LDS and although I'm not LDS anymore--and I occasionally venture into alcoholic drinks--nobody has ever sat me down and introduced me to whiskey etc.

Hint, hint.

First: read about "whisky" and "whiskey".

Second: buy a bottle of Irish whiskey (Bushmills or Jameson). Don't let the Scotch snobs fool you into wasting money, after a couple of doubles (neat) you won't care about the nuances.

Third: sing rebel songs, write poetry, punch someone and then stagger halfway to somewhere and pass out.
posted by MikeMc at 11:36 AM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

I drink, but I don't drink whiskey because it wakens up some evil little fuckwit that lives in my head that I mostly keep placated with gin and chocolate. I am fairly chilled, but I learned a long time ago that no matter how lovely a time we're having if I drink whiskey I WILL FIGHT YOU.
posted by billiebee at 11:36 AM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

Gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin gin semantic satiation gin gin gin gin gin.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 11:40 AM on December 9, 2015 [12 favorites]

"Sing rebel songs, write poetry and punch someone then stagger halfway to somewhere and then pass out."

They just said they want to taste whiskey, not be Dylan Thomas.
posted by Oyéah at 11:53 AM on December 9, 2015 [9 favorites]

sciatrix: "Can we have more 'other' responses, or are they super boring? Personally, I would be happy to read just the raw data of that for hours."

Here's a Pastebin of all the responses to the "What Have You Learned From MeFi?" question. It's not formatted all that well, and a couple of the answers are jerkish if not offensive, to be honest. I'll try to do the other open-ended questions later this afternoon.
posted by Rock Steady at 11:56 AM on December 9, 2015 [5 favorites]

(Somehow I missed that the time-average thing was exhaustively dealt with the start of this thread. I hang my head in shame!)
posted by Shmuel510 at 12:01 PM on December 9, 2015

Here's a Pastebin of all the responses to the "What Have You Learned From MeFi?" question.

ctrl-f emotional labor more than 100 matches
posted by Melismata at 12:16 PM on December 9, 2015 [7 favorites]

Here is the full text of the responses to the bad habit question.
posted by Rock Steady at 12:16 PM on December 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

Here are all the superpowers.
posted by Rock Steady at 12:19 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

If you are trying to acquire a taste for gin...don't.
posted by Drinky Die at 12:21 PM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

All the beans.
posted by Rock Steady at 12:22 PM on December 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

If you are trying to acquire a taste for gin...don't.

I agree. You can't acquire a taste for it. Fortunately, some of us are born with a taste for it, like how others are born with perfect pitch or enormous penises.
posted by bondcliff at 12:32 PM on December 9, 2015 [9 favorites]

This is great. I could, however, make time for further elaboration from the solitary mefite who self-identifies as neither right-handed, left-handed, or ambidextrous but "not sure." The only scenario I am coming up with is someone lacking arms entirely, or perhaps quadriplegic since a very young age. Is there another rationale which I am overlooking?
posted by ricochet biscuit at 12:36 PM on December 9, 2015

They have some skill with both hands, but aren't sure if it rises to true ambidexterity?
posted by rewil at 12:37 PM on December 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

Or perhaps they generally use one hand for some activities, and another hand for other activities, and aren't sure which counts more?

Or maybe they started out left-handed, were compelled to switch to right-handed writing at an early age and are now stuck that way, and don't know how to score that?
posted by Shmuel510 at 12:41 PM on December 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

Also confirms that "pop" is a bizarre regionalism for soda.

Having grown up in Michigan, where we drink pop, I was surprised and interested to see what a small percentage of Mefites use the word.
posted by not that girl at 12:50 PM on December 9, 2015 [5 favorites]

It's okay, everyone; I drink enough whiskey for the rest of you combined. And I don't like gin, but don't tell Mrs. Pterodactyl.

Also, I really did meet my partner at a MeFi meetup! Would recommend.
posted by capricorn at 12:54 PM on December 9, 2015

But there are so many wonderful flavors in the liquor cabinet, why would you only drink one type?
posted by crush-onastick at 12:56 PM on December 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

The 22% could also just represent one user who really gets around.

*raises hand*
posted by not that girl at 12:57 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

Everyone listen to crush, she knows more about cocktails than seems possible.
posted by shakespeherian at 12:58 PM on December 9, 2015

Everyone listen to crush, she knows more about cocktails than seems possible.


Would you go so far as to say that she knows more than you can possibly imagine?
posted by not that girl at 12:59 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

I was about to say that but I didn't want her to think I was being sarcastic because I am afraid of her
posted by shakespeherian at 1:10 PM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

I drink alcohol, quite a lot and reasonably often and in variety. And I never drink whiskey or anything like it, yes never really never. This is because it both tastes and smells disgusting. Rum also. My husband pretty much stopped drinking rum or bourbon when I'm home because I won't come near him both while he's drinking it and when it's on his breath afterwards. I just really don't like it.

But then I do really like gin. I have six different kinds on my cupboard right now.
posted by shelleycat at 1:22 PM on December 9, 2015

especially that one video of the little goat jumping and knocking over his friend over and over again
What is that video pray tell? This one?

Also, those responses (all of them, not just the 'what have you learnt' ones) have reminded me that Mefites are My People and made me all schmoopy. I love you all! (nearly all)
posted by ClarissaWAM at 1:25 PM on December 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

Whiskey makes me angry (so I don't drink it anymore), but not nearly as angry as people who pronounce it "Mee-Fee" when it's obviously "Meef-Eye." Gah!
posted by Xavier Xavier at 1:33 PM on December 9, 2015 [6 favorites]

I form my drinking rules by old versions of Dylan lyrics:

"Well I don't drink whiskey,
no, I don't drink gin
But I'm so dirty honey,
I've been working all day in the coal bin"
posted by sweetmarie at 1:34 PM on December 9, 2015

Today I learned: (1) there are people who drink but not any of the many types of whiskey; (2) someone else is scared of me.
posted by crush-onastick at 1:36 PM on December 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

I could, however, make time for further elaboration from the solitary mefite who self-identifies as neither right-handed, left-handed, or ambidextrous but "not sure."

I think -- THINK -- this was me. I am dyspraxic, and although I favor my right hand for most things, my hand-eye coordination and fine motor control is poor enough in both hands that I am officially considered "ambisinister."
posted by KathrynT at 1:38 PM on December 9, 2015 [10 favorites]

What's something you used to think was fictitious but it turned out to be real? Again, a couple of the answers are kind of shitty.
posted by Rock Steady at 1:45 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

MEH-FEE. Obviously.

WTH is Wendy's Frosty?

And utterly mystified that those I love here choose gin over whiskey. Vodka I might understand but gin?
posted by bearwife at 2:04 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

I WILL FIGHT YOU
posted by billiebee at 2:09 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

gimlets, yo.
posted by Going To Maine at 2:10 PM on December 9, 2015

If you don't know what a frosty is, then your MeFi pronunciation opinion is moot. Moot, I say!
posted by Xavier Xavier at 2:11 PM on December 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

Also was there some legendary narwhals post that everyone read or something? What a random answer to "what have you learned?". That it seems to tie roughly with "love" as the most popular reply is exactly the sort of reason why I love you all.
posted by billiebee at 2:12 PM on December 9, 2015

I'm more concerned with the 8% who aren't sure.

Seems logical to me. I don't know the MeFi status of everyone I've had sex with in the past. (I'm surprised its as low as 8%, really, but I suspect people thought about this question in slightly different ways). I mean, 70% of you are actually sure none of your exes, one night stands, etc have a Metafilter account?
posted by thefoxgod at 2:13 PM on December 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

bearwife: "WTH is Wendy's Frosty?"

About $1.99, same as in town.

thefoxgod: "I don't know the MeFi status of everyone I've had sex with in the past."

You're not just having sex with a MeFite, you're having sex with all the MeFites that MeFite has ever had sex with.

billiebee: "Also was there some legendary narwhals post that everyone read or something? What a random answer to "what have you learned?"."

No, narwhals and love are things MeFites thought were fictional but are real.
posted by Rock Steady at 2:25 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

Ack! That's what I meant to write. But what made so many people realise they were real? (Mainly the narwhals, I mean)
posted by billiebee at 2:29 PM on December 9, 2015

bearwife: "WTH is Wendy's Frosty?"

About $1.99, same as in town.

I am VERY fond of you Rock Steady, and this is such a fun post, but the idea of dipping anything like fries/chips in a sweet frozen thing makes me feel like retching. Almost as much as the word "bae."
posted by bearwife at 2:44 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

Are you calling me a dip?
posted by still_wears_a_hat at 2:55 PM on December 9, 2015

bearwife there's a cafe in the town where I grew up that makes its own ice cream (it's an Italian family who own it) and lots of people swear that dipping their chips (fries) in the ice cream is beautiful but I could never bear to try it. My childhood best friend especially loved to smother her chips in vinegar before commencing the dipping. *shudder*
posted by billiebee at 2:56 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

It's the combination of the salty and the sweet that (I think) people are going for when dipping fries in ice cream. Never done it, but I can see it as very similar to the enjoyment I have in letting a piece of bacon get some maple syrup on it while I'm eating pancakes. Very tasty.
posted by nubs at 3:04 PM on December 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

Re: Low Podcast listener number
Currently, I don't listen to it because it is in the 2 hour range, I just don't have that much time available. If the Podcasts were also available in smaller chunks, (15 -30 mins) I would definitely listen to them.
posted by NoraCharles at 3:10 PM on December 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

McDonalds strawberry shake plus fries for dipping was my 10 year old self's idea of heaven.
posted by tocts at 3:12 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

Fortunately, some of us are born with a taste for it, like how others are born with perfect pitch or enormous penises.

dear askme, someone gave me a bottle of gin with an enormous preserved penis in the bottle, is it okay if i regift this?
posted by poffin boffin at 3:15 PM on December 9, 2015 [7 favorites]

Be honest, you haven't tried organ meats in years.
Correct, and after watching Hannibal, I have no intention of trying again.

Also, did nobody imagine the Glitch icon for a plate of beans?
posted by ktkt at 3:19 PM on December 9, 2015

i often dream about eating the raw hearts of my enemies torn straight from their chests so tbh i feel like the organ meats thing doesn't really apply to me
posted by poffin boffin at 3:20 PM on December 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

anyway the survey needed more questions about anger management
posted by poffin boffin at 3:21 PM on December 9, 2015 [12 favorites]

i often dream about eating the raw hearts of my enemies torn straight from their chests

Yes, but would you dip them in a Wendy's Frosty?
posted by nubs at 3:27 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

If the Podcasts were also available in smaller chunks, (15 -30 mins) I would definitely listen to them.

You might like Out of the Blue, then!
posted by Shmuel510 at 3:32 PM on December 9, 2015

If the Podcasts were also available in smaller chunks, (15 -30 mins) I would definitely listen to them.

You might like Out of the Blue, then!

Hopefully, hiring a new mod will increase their frequency.
posted by Going To Maine at 3:38 PM on December 9, 2015

It's kind of amazing how many of these "didn't know this was real!" answers are some variant of animal. Antelope, seahorses, tanuki (also very popular), coelacanth, ligers, eels, gila monsters, giant squid, dragons both real [?!?!] and komodo, chiggers, Tasmanian devils, hedgehogs, reindeer, buffalo....

(Brontosaurus still isn't real, though, unless you count an apatosaur with some poor Camarasaurus' head stuck on 'real'. In which case, yeah okay.)

(I would also love to extend a happy biologist fistbump to whoever put in the bone conduction of hearing answer, too, because OMG I love that so much. Mammalian evolution is so cool!)
posted by sciatrix at 3:40 PM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

tanuki

what?

[ Googles ]

WHAT
posted by Old Kentucky Shark at 3:41 PM on December 9, 2015 [13 favorites]

Be honest, you haven't tried organ meats in years.

I imagine this varies widely by region/cuisine. Organ meats (especially chicken) are fairly common in yakitori/yakiniku for example, so I've eaten quite a lot in Japan in the last few years. Gyutan (beef tongue) restaurants are super common.

Traditional sausage casing is intestines, and lots of people probably made stock from turkey giblets over Thanksgiving, to name two common uses in the West. And of course foie gras and pate.
posted by thefoxgod at 3:42 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

-"pleasure" as a verb = ugh, worst

-also we should have included "lover" = ugh, barf

-"panties" = somehow both infantilizing and leering, yucko. Recommend "underpants" - like Leela buying all hers at the bulk barn; plus you can say it like Tom Lennon in the Otto Bimini sketch from the State.

-dipping = tortilla chips in ice cream
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 3:50 PM on December 9, 2015 [7 favorites]

I'm not sorry to inform you all that a new study came out this year that brought Brontosaurus back and made it real again. Except that study has been controversial. So whether or not it's real is up in the air. SO EXCITING.
posted by barchan at 3:51 PM on December 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

It just seems odd to me that a person who drinks alcohol never drinks whiskey--like, "never", not "does not prefer it" but "never".

Does it mix with Clamato? No? Well, there's your reason.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 4:03 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

That gets 11:44:11 PM, which seems reasonable based on the data. Thanks for that idea!

That time, despite being a palindrome, was almost REALLY cool.
posted by Celsius1414 at 4:03 PM on December 9, 2015

fun stuff. I still maintain that I am exactly average here, & this list does nothing to dispel that. Go team classic, bleh to liver, yay for glasses, I am, however, left-handed.

- sent from my Mac laptop.

See?
posted by Devils Rancher at 4:04 PM on December 9, 2015

some places, people, animals that folks thought were fictitious (I love this):

Timbuktu! Lots of Timbuktu!
Chincoteague
Santorini
Zanzibar
Albania
Troy
Wales
China

huns
knights
Hannibal
Englebert Humperdinck
Colonel Sanders
Dolly Parton
Hootie and the Blowfish

seahorse
platypus
narwhal! so much narwhal
pony
tasmanian devil
giant squid
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 4:18 PM on December 9, 2015 [8 favorites]

Is that what's meant by "BRONTOMANCY," barchan? Because someone was really excited to learn about that and if it's not, I want to know what it is.

(I am envisioning the art of CALLING DOWN BRONTOSAURUS ON ONE'S ENEMIES but surely it can't be that wonderful...)
posted by sciatrix at 4:22 PM on December 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

-"panties" = somehow both infantilizing and leering, yucko.

Just the other day I asked a Walgreens clerk where the pantyhose was (for my MIL) but couldn't think of the word and asked about "leg panties" and it was horrible.

Is that what's meant by "BRONTOMANCY," barchan?

I have no idea but what I really hope it is based on what you said and is the ability to smite those who commit taxonomic shenanigans or rouse vertebrate paleontological rabble by deliberately starting conflicts of nomenclature for egomaniacal gain. By smiting I envision a cage at Society meetings in which the said offender is placed with a sign detailing their sins and people get to throw mushy bananas at them.

I would pay thousands of dollars to see that in the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature.
posted by barchan at 4:33 PM on December 9, 2015 [7 favorites]

ME TOO. Perhaps we can endow a fund.

Oh my god, who eats powdered gravy packets as a snack?!?!?! Mefi, truly you contain multitudes.
posted by sciatrix at 4:34 PM on December 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

The words that squick you out category is a weird one because there are many reasons why one might be squicked - the sound of the word, the baggage it carries, how unnecessary it is (Let's conference about that issue, Dude!), etc. In my case, having spent too much time around someone who treats the word "bae" as an all purpose term (interjection, noun, adjective, adverb, etc.) has made me loathe it. Maybe if she cut it down to one use per sentence ...
posted by julen at 4:35 PM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

I have never heard of bae until this thread. I’m doing something right.
posted by bongo_x at 4:38 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

I used to be okay with panties, but then Piers Anthony ruined it and now I have no words for underthings.
posted by corb at 4:49 PM on December 9, 2015

Piers Anthony ruined a lot of things for a lot of people.
posted by the uncomplicated soups of my childhood at 4:54 PM on December 9, 2015 [15 favorites]

I just want to be clear, when I see that 78% of respondents have played solitaire on the computer AND with actual cards, I assume everyone is talking about that one time, like eight years ago, when you were really bored, found a pack of cards, thought it would be neat to play solitaire, and then got bored and gave up after like 10 minutes.
posted by teponaztli at 5:09 PM on December 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

I am talking about endless, viciously competitive games of Quadruple Solitaire played with actual cards on family vacations. And everyone always let my sister cheat because she was the BABY and I'm still not over it 25 years later.
posted by Stacey at 5:14 PM on December 9, 2015 [6 favorites]

I played solitaire with a pack of cards before I had my own computer/other device. I don't think I have done so in a long time, though I've played untold number of games on my various devices since.
posted by mountmccabe at 5:39 PM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

Emily Bröntesaurus, mythical saurian poet.
posted by Oyéah at 5:39 PM on December 9, 2015 [8 favorites]

Oh yes, Multiple solitaire. That's my family's official card game. They were playing it before I was born and we just played it on Thanksgiving and my wounds are still healing.
posted by octothorpe at 5:40 PM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

LobsterMitten: "some places, people, animals that folks thought were fictitious"

How is "Nantucket" not on that list? I only found out last year that it is a real place, not just a convenient limerick device.
posted by Bugbread at 5:43 PM on December 9, 2015 [6 favorites]

ktkt: Correct, and after watching Hannibal, I have no intention of trying again.

I had the exact opposite reaction! After watching Hannibal I specifically purchase, cooked, and ate liver and heart. I also used turkey gizzard (etc) in stuffing. I haven't gotten to kidney but it's on the list.
posted by mountmccabe at 5:43 PM on December 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

Piers Anthony ruined a lot of things for a lot of people.

I prefer to think that a lot of us grew up and, in doing so, ruined Piers Anthony for ourselves.
posted by Going To Maine at 5:50 PM on December 9, 2015 [5 favorites]

The superego is over represented here
posted by Joseph Gurl at 5:53 PM on December 9, 2015

brontomancy is the eldrictch summoning of diplodocidae, come on
posted by poffin boffin at 6:05 PM on December 9, 2015 [4 favorites]

Brontomancy is telling the future by means of thunder. Feel free to carry on with the dinosaur-related puns, of course.

(Everything is 20% cooler if you name it with Greek. Like "alectryomancy," divination by means of roosters.)
posted by lysimache at 6:17 PM on December 9, 2015 [5 favorites]

"Bae" is pleasantly short, non-sexual and gender neutral. "Moist" is an a abomination that should be banished from the English language.
posted by Mizu at 6:18 PM on December 9, 2015 [5 favorites]

Englebert Humperdinck
Colonel Sanders
Dolly Parton
Hootie and the Blowfish

This was actually the only Only Connect category that ever totally stumped me.
posted by Wolfdog at 6:22 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

"Bae" is pleasantly short, non-sexual and ... "Moist"
posted by Wolfdog at 6:22 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

I am enjoying my fantasies of throwing bananas at terrible paleontologists while dancing around them to the original version of the Banana Boat song and crying WHO'S YOUR TAXONOMIC GOD NOW

you are either ruining it or making it better, I can't decide
posted by barchan at 6:35 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

74.1% of MeFites have an ear piercing? Assuming an equal gender distribution, and even assuming that 100% of women have pierced ears (which obviously isn't true), then that means nearly half of the men have at least one ear piercing as well, which strikes me as almost impossibly high. (I'm sorry, other-gendered people; I acknowledge your existence but you're just not statistically relevant at this particular moment.)

Are pierced ears really that universal nowadays?
posted by Faint of Butt at 6:38 PM on December 9, 2015

I am so heartened by how many other people don't like tomatoes. My entire family treats my dislike of tomatoes as some sort of bizarre personality quirk. I also don't like soda/ pop/ soft-drinks/ whatever-quaint-regionalism-you-use, but they seem much less weirded out by that.

So I haven't met someone and later realized they were a Mefite, but twice I have realized that a Mefite was someone whom I knew/ used to know IRL. Is that a common experience?
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 6:43 PM on December 9, 2015

Brontomancy is telling the future by means of thunder.

ruiner stop ruining
posted by poffin boffin at 6:44 PM on December 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

74.1% of MeFites have an ear piercing?

I think thats 74.1% of MeFites who have a body modification (since there is no "None" category), which seems much more reasonable (ear piercing being likely the most common one in general, and obviously on Metafilter).

[That said, I am a guy with pierced ears myself]
posted by thefoxgod at 6:45 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

-"panties" = somehow both infantilizing and leering, yucko. Recommend "underpants"

Agree with this, but would also accept "gutchies."
posted by DingoMutt at 6:53 PM on December 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

Got my ear pierced when I was 18 (1973) by a roommate with a sewing needle, anesthesia by Budweiser. In Alabama. Not a lot of long-haired guys with jewelry back then. I got some Looks.

I quit wearing it regularly a few years later, but the hole never closed up, so I now wear a small gold star when my band performs. Rock guitarists are required to have a piercing of some sort, I believe. Fervently.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 6:59 PM on December 9, 2015 [5 favorites]

"panties" doesn’t strike me that way at all, but "underpants" is one step from "diapers". I would be uncomfortable with an adult that referred to their underpants.
posted by bongo_x at 7:00 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

I was surprised that more people dislike brussels sprouts than dislike (i.e., HATE HATE HATE HATE) cilantro.

The two aren't equivalent, though, and cilantro is really in a separate category from all of the other potentially disliked items on that list. Because: With the exception of horseradish, tomatoes, and mushrooms, everything else on that list is something you can avoid by not ordering it/not buying it/just deciding not to consume it. So, let's put those aside.

Horseradish is an ingredient or a condiment. Tomatoes and mushrooms can be stand-alone edibles, or they can be ingredients. Let's focus on the ingredient aspect. As ingredients rather than foods unto themselves, tomatoes, mushrooms, and horseradish can pretty much always be avoided by people who dislike them because they are disclosed as ingredients. The problem with cilantro is that it is sometimes sprung on those of us you HATE HATE HATE HATE it because people who don't HATE HATE HATE HATE it don't disclose it.

The data are therefore skewed, I think. You can't compare dislike for brussels sprouts and cilantro because the nature of their presence in a dish is completely different. Unanticipated brussels sprouts are a rarity. Unanticipated cilantro is a certainty.

Thus, we cilantro haters are put upon, uncared for, and disrespected, and the other 82.5% of you ought to be ashamed of yourselves.
posted by mudpuppie at 7:15 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

hm. Does whiskey mix with Clamato? Which whiskey? My to-do list now includes buying Clamato. Anyone want to come over and try a variety of whiskeys in the horror that is Clamato?
posted by crush-onastick at 7:16 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

"underpants" is one step from "diapers". I would be uncomfortable with an adult that referred to their underpants.

You have to say it as if you're a vaguely European fashion designer from a sketch comedy show -- "hunderPEE-ANCE."
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 7:17 PM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

Oh, and I'm one of the 38% who self-identified as non-whisky drinkers (despite even having drunk whisky with YOU, crush-onastick!), but that's because I reached my lifetime limit of whisky consumption well too early.

(Still have a litte ways to go before maxing out the wine tho.)
posted by mudpuppie at 7:19 PM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

DingoMutt: "Agree with this, but would also accept "gutchies.""

I didn't have to check your profile page to know where you lived.
posted by octothorpe at 7:20 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

mudpuppie: "As ingredients rather than foods unto themselves, tomatoes, mushrooms, and horseradish can pretty much always be avoided by people who dislike them because they are disclosed as ingredients."

That's what you'd think unless you actually disliked one of them. My son dislikes mushrooms, and you would be amazed how many dishes contain undisclosed mushrooms. I had never noticed it before (because I like them), but, man, when you have to eat with a person who hates mushrooms you find out secret mushrooms are everywhere.
posted by Bugbread at 7:22 PM on December 9, 2015

ah-ha! I knew it! You people who "never" drink whiskey are using some spurious definition of "never"!
posted by crush-onastick at 7:24 PM on December 9, 2015

ah-ha! I knew it! You people who "never" drink whiskey are using some spurious definition of "never"!

It's not that -- it's that the question used a verb tense that made answering via radio button fraught with unintended meanings!
posted by mudpuppie at 7:27 PM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

crush-onastick: "ah-ha! I knew it! You people who "never" drink whiskey are using some spurious definition of "never"!"

I have tasted whiskey a few times, so it would not be fair to say "I have never drunk whiskey". However, I'd say that I have between a sip and half a shot glass every five years or so to double-check if I still don't like it, because, you know, tastes can change. So every half decade or so I take a little sip, grimace, and think "Yeah, I don't like that taste". So a few sips of whiskey per decade. Does that count as "I never drink whiskey"?
posted by Bugbread at 7:33 PM on December 9, 2015

I think of "I never drink whiskey" (the wording shown in the result) as meaning now-ish to future, not "have you ever drank whiskey". If your last whiskey was 10 years ago and oyu never plan to have it again, you don't drink whiskey.

Now, what if there was a plate of beans cooked in whiskey...
posted by thefoxgod at 7:35 PM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

I like Manhattans, but I've never been able to take whiskey straight.

Although everyone talking about Scottish whiskeys that taste like campfires made me want to try again.

Also, I can't drink more than, like, a thimbleful of alcohol before I think I've had enough, so maybe whiskey just isn't for me.
posted by teponaztli at 7:36 PM on December 9, 2015

we cilantro haters are put upon, uncared for, and disrespected, and the other 82.5% of you ought to be ashamed of yourselves.

We also call you dirty mutant freaks of nature. Sorry about that, sport.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 7:37 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

Drink alcohol but not whiskey (or liquor much even). Beer and wine only.

No piercings/tattoos/etc.

And if anyone I know said "bae" I would be extremely confused. I assumed that was an Internet thing like "on fleek" or something. But I don't interact with the kids much anymore so I am extremely out of touch and yet somehow OK with that.
posted by downtohisturtles at 7:38 PM on December 9, 2015

Scottish whiskeys that taste like campfires

Lagavulin 16 is the one thing Ron Swanson and I agree on.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 7:38 PM on December 9, 2015

We also call you dirty mutant freaks of nature. Sorry about that, sport.

* proudly flies freak flag *
posted by mudpuppie at 7:40 PM on December 9, 2015

Listen. Long time Mefite here, heavy whiskey drinker, and frequent Meetup attender. I have not knowingly slept with a Mefite of either gender but am now realizing how left out I am, and am offering myself up, for research of course. I am not currently espousenated to any particular Mefi individual, to my knowledge.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 7:42 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

Was the last book you read fiction or non-fiction?

Fiction: 763, 66.9%
Nonfiction: 375, 32.9%
I have never read a book: 2, 0.2%

I hate to spoil the mood, but it has come to my attention that 2 Mefites are LIARS WHO WALK AMONG US.

I feel comfortable saying that only because being on Metafilter for more than 5 minutes surely counts as having read at least a novella. PANTS ON FIRE.
posted by Errant at 7:42 PM on December 9, 2015

And if anyone I know said "bae" I would be extremely confused

Yeah, this is one I've only seen like in print online. I've never heard it in real life and or even on video. I'm assuming its pronounced like it looks, but I don't recall ever hearing it actually said out loud.
posted by thefoxgod at 7:43 PM on December 9, 2015

I've only ever seen 'bae' on Metafilter and have no idea if it actually exists outside of this place.
posted by octothorpe at 7:50 PM on December 9, 2015

The bae hate really bugs me. After all, it's a fairly common Korean family name.

Bae, also sometimes romanized Pae or Pai, is a Korean family name. The South Korean census of 2000 found 372,064 people by this surname, or slightly less than 1% of the population.

posted by Joseph Gurl at 7:52 PM on December 9, 2015

And "Kosinski" (and its variants) is a popular Eastern European name, but "cuz" can still be bothersome to the ear. The two are unrelated, as are "bae" and the Korean surname. Homophones, man. Homophones.
posted by mudpuppie at 7:56 PM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

The bae hate really bugs me. After all, it's a fairly common Korean family name.

Yes, but as an affectation it forever sounds like someone got a case of lazy tongue at the second syllable. “Bae” as a name is someone’s name. “Bae” as a term of endearment sounds like “I’m too tired for consonants.”
posted by Going To Maine at 7:56 PM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

Poor ol' Vegemite. Lots of butter and just a *smear* of Vegemite on your toast, people! Best thing for a hangover.
posted by h00py at 8:04 PM on December 9, 2015

Wait, so the Bae hate is just a distaste for abbrevs and contrxns?
posted by Joseph Gurl at 8:33 PM on December 9, 2015

Whatevs
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 8:49 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

It certainly isn't because people dislike Bae Doona; that's frankly impossible.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 8:54 PM on December 9, 2015

All I know is that the intersection of clams, tomatoes (i.e. Clamato) and horseradish is amazing, especially the morning after drinking all of the whiskey, or whisky, as taste and availability may dictate. Cilantro, while optional, is a welcome addition, particularly in combination with hot sauce.
posted by bonehead at 8:57 PM on December 9, 2015

Where do you stand on kir: royale or nah?
posted by Joseph Gurl at 9:06 PM on December 9, 2015

O yeah!
posted by Oyéah at 9:12 PM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

I haven't met someone and later realized they were a Mefite, but twice I have realized that a Mefite was someone whom I knew/ used to know IRL. Is that a common experience?

yea, I recognized an old friend of mine because of his weirdly suggestive username.
posted by 5_13_23_42_69_666 at 9:13 PM on December 9, 2015

Agree with this, but would also accept "gutchies."

I'm a little ambivalent about but mostly fond of "gitch".
posted by cotton dress sock at 9:26 PM on December 9, 2015

I would be uncomfortable with an adult that referred to their underpants.

My husband and I will cure* you of this malady by arriving at your residence (or other location of your choosing) and singing you our special Underpants Song, the lyrics of which are as follows:

Hooray for UNderpants!
They keep you separate from your OTHer pants!
They are clean and stretchy
(tho when visible, sketchy)
and so we saaaaaaay
HOORAY FOR UNDERPANTS!

*"cure"
posted by KathrynT at 9:53 PM on December 9, 2015 [12 favorites]

Holy crap, I made the "other" list.

You guys like me. You really like me.

OK, some of you. But still...
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 10:16 PM on December 9, 2015

What super power do you want?

Best answer: cock punch over IP
posted by klausman at 10:20 PM on December 9, 2015 [8 favorites]

I am looking askance at 25.3% of you. Askance.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 10:44 PM on December 9, 2015

Where do you stand on kir: royale or nah?

I prefer to sit when drinking kir royales because it avoids the falling over after the seventh.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 11:15 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]

Wait, so the Bae hate is just a distaste for abbrevs and contrxns?

No: it’s distate for abbreiaios and contraios.
posted by Going To Maine at 11:18 PM on December 9, 2015 [2 favorites]

30% identify with Ask Culture, while 40% identify with Guess Culture.

That really goes against the reputation that Mefites have of being hardcore Ask Culturites. Especially in AskMetafilter, the majority of the regular answerers definitely come from an "Ask" mindset.

Upon reflection, this kind of makes sense. If you're really from Guess Culture, it's a lot harder to answer anonymous strangers' interpersonal-relationship questions, and thus be a regular advice-giver. Most posts don't give the total social context that, as a Guesser, you expect to be carefully reading and subtly adapting to.
posted by Harvey Kilobit at 11:19 PM on December 9, 2015 [3 favorites]

It's not called GuessMetafilter, clues right there in the name.
posted by Just this guy, y'know at 11:43 PM on December 9, 2015 [11 favorites]

"Agree with this, but would also accept "gutchies.""

I didn't have to check your profile page to know where you lived.

I did have to check, and was surprised! So that has to be related to the Albertan ginch/gonch/gitch/gotch, but, like, how?
posted by Sys Rq at 12:30 AM on December 10, 2015

Okay, not drinking alcohol at all makes sense. That actually clears things up. It just seems odd to me that a person who drinks alcohol never drinks whiskey--like, "never", not "does not prefer it" but "never".

Whiskey tastes gross.

There, I said it.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 3:40 AM on December 10, 2015 [8 favorites]

I'm having this weird feeling where I don't remember if I filled in the survey or not. The questions are familiar, and I spot an answer in the superpowers section that's very "me" (unless someone else chose social shapeshifting) but somehow the memory of the actual survey isn't very solid?? idk.

I wonder how much of the 'bae' hate is laced with racism given its roots in Black culture.

Re "If you don't eat barbecue, are you really living?": (a) Halal, kosher, and veg*anism exist (b) many other cultures have barbeques of other meats that are yummier :P
posted by divabat at 3:40 AM on December 10, 2015 [6 favorites]

I wonder how much of the 'bae' hate is laced with racism given its roots in Black culture.

Anecdotal data point - I had no idea as to its origin, I've only seen it spreading like kudzu in social media and didn't dig it.

(Although, I dislike the synonym "boo" even more.)
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 3:43 AM on December 10, 2015 [1 favorite]

Sys Rq: ""Agree with this, but would also accept "gutchies.""

I didn't have to check your profile page to know where you lived.

I did have to check, and was surprised! So that has to be related to the Albertan ginch/gonch/gitch/gotch, but, like, how?"

It seems to come from Polish and/or Ukrainian. Are there a lot of eastern Europeans in Alberta?
posted by octothorpe at 4:09 AM on December 10, 2015

I think it's because women wear underwear (or "pants", elsewhere) just like men, and don't appreciate a cutesy, diminutive form just for them.

Then how to explain the ubiquitous use of the term "knickers" in the UK?

"panties" = somehow both infantilizing and leering, yucko.

Yup, that's how I feel about "knickers".
posted by klausness at 4:12 AM on December 10, 2015

"panties" makes me dry-heave but I use "knickers" and I don't see it as cutesy. It feels more...no-nonsense or sturdy? Like, knickers can be tiny scraps of lace or beige belly-warmers or anything in between. (Also it's a good alternative swear word in polite company, maybe because you can shout it loudly in frustration and still feel the satisfaction of the "-ck" sound without risking too much pearl-clutching)
posted by billiebee at 4:43 AM on December 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

Knickers always meant long golfing shorts to me so leering references to them in British songs and TV were always confusing.
posted by octothorpe at 4:48 AM on December 10, 2015 [1 favorite]

Ah, not a fan of the New York Knickerbockers, I presume!
posted by Joseph Gurl at 4:59 AM on December 10, 2015

Does it count as "sleeping with a fellow MeFite" if it happened 10+ years before MeFi even existed?
posted by drlith at 5:33 AM on December 10, 2015

I wonder how much of the 'bae' hate is laced with racism given its roots in Black culture.

Anecdotal data point - I had no idea as to its origin, I've only seen it spreading like kudzu in social media and didn't dig it.

(Although, I dislike the synonym "boo" even more.)

Boo is popular in Black American culture too, heh.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 5:38 AM on December 10, 2015 [6 favorites]

Divabat,I remember filling it out, but I don't remember my answers!
posted by yhbc at 5:49 AM on December 10, 2015 [3 favorites]

So happy to be part of the 9.9%!
posted by Juso No Thankyou at 5:58 AM on December 10, 2015

Boo is popular in Black American culture too, heh.

For the record, I've mainly encountered it on a DIY style blog that's sort of like Martha Stewart for the Pinterest set.

Also for the record: I generally tend to dislike any cutesy term for "one's significant other" - "schnookums", "cutie-pie", etc. Jim Gaffigan could have coined "boo" and I'd still wince at it.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 7:12 AM on December 10, 2015 [1 favorite]

That really goes against the reputation that Mefites have of being hardcore Ask Culturites. Especially in AskMetafilter, the majority of the regular answerers definitely come from an "Ask" mindset.

Upon reflection, this kind of makes sense. If you're really from Guess Culture, it's a lot harder to answer anonymous strangers' interpersonal-relationship questions, and thus be a regular advice-giver. Most posts don't give the total social context that, as a Guesser, you expect to be carefully reading and subtly adapting to.

I think it's because by the time someone's asking a question on AskMe, they've usually already done all the hinting and guessing that's reasonable, and the situation is still stuck, and being a bit more explicitly Ask-y is really the next best step.
posted by jaguar at 7:19 AM on December 10, 2015 [1 favorite]

Boo is popular in Black American culture too, heh.

For the record, I've mainly encountered it on a DIY style blog that's sort of like Martha Stewart for the Pinterest set.

That's nice, but FYI, it's popular in Black American culture and clearly came from there. Make of that what you will.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 7:21 AM on December 10, 2015 [3 favorites]

Brandon: what I'm responding to is what is sounding like a subtle attempt to portray me as racist, and I'm not sure why you're pursuing that.

If I've mistaken your intent, I do apologize, but that is the source of my current comments.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 7:26 AM on December 10, 2015 [1 favorite]

It's ok to not like a word. And it's ok for people to say where a word comes from or where they know it from. This doesn't at all have to be some kind of personal fight.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 7:32 AM on December 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

I'd also like to just cast into the ether my contention that "ask vs. guess" carries an implicit slight, and it bugs me every time I read it. It should be something like "ask vs. assess". We're not guessing, you weird, outgoing people.

Totally agree.
posted by klausness at 7:41 AM on December 10, 2015

I can't believe the use of AAVE on a DIY style blog that's like Martha Stewart for the Pinterest set would be annoying!
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 7:44 AM on December 10, 2015 [3 favorites]

Also, how can it not be MEH-fee?
posted by klausness at 7:45 AM on December 10, 2015 [6 favorites]

Brandon: what I'm responding to is what is sounding like a subtle attempt to portray me as racist, and I'm not sure why you're pursuing that.

I don't know you well enough to say whether you're racist or not, though I assume not. However, that doesn't mean you or anyone else is free from racist actions or thoughts.

I am noting that one person of color noted possible racist thought about the dislike of the word Bae, to which you mentioned not liking another word, which comes from Black American culture. It *sounds* like you're doubling down on the "I am not a racist" idea, but you're also inadvertently sounding ignorantly racist by citing a website that doesn't feature black people that is clearly using a word from black culture to look cool.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 7:47 AM on December 10, 2015 [7 favorites]

Also, how can it not be MEH-fee?

Because that would be ridiculous. Me - as in "Woe is me." Fi as in "Hi-fi". Mee-fye.
posted by Sophie1 at 7:50 AM on December 10, 2015 [5 favorites]

but i pronouce metafilter as meatyfeelter
posted by poffin boffin at 8:00 AM on December 10, 2015 [9 favorites]

klausness: "Also, how can it not be MEH-fee?"

For those who may have missed it, the pronunciation of MeFi and MeFite was the subject of iamkimiam's dissertation earlier this year. I know that question was not exhaustive of all the options, and mostly just included it as an interesting hook for correlations and concordances.
posted by Rock Steady at 8:00 AM on December 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

Faint of Butt: Are pierced ears really that universal nowadays?

Well, as a guy: I had two earrings in one ear in college…though I let them heal up and now there's nary a scar left there.

(And TBH, I forget how I answered this question!)
posted by wenestvedt at 8:31 AM on December 10, 2015

Okay, not drinking alcohol at all makes sense. That actually clears things up. It just seems odd to me that a person who drinks alcohol never drinks whiskey--like, "never", not "does not prefer it" but "never".

I don't drink much but don't really see the point of non-beer. Obviously people differ and that's fine, but to me hard liquor mostly just tastes like rancid burning unless it's diluted into a cocktail. And even then, I'd basically never order a cocktail because I could order a beer instead and beer is better.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 8:32 AM on December 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

I like that hard liquor gets me drunk quicker and more efficiently in calories than beer. I gather the fancy scotch drinkers just like the taste though. :P
posted by Drinky Die at 8:37 AM on December 10, 2015 [1 favorite]

I rarely drink hard liquor anymore because I drink very very quickly, and I can no longer handle multiple-martini nights the way I used to.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 8:40 AM on December 10, 2015

Yeah, both "bae" and "on fleek" are Black things, not internet things. And I agree with Brandon Blatcher that the widespread, memetic dislike of these words and others probably results from a racist culture. Each individual person's dislike of the term(s) doesn't constitute racism--no, having a kneejerk dislike of the word "bae" does not make you a hateful, racist person, regardless of whether you knew they were Black slang--but on a whole we all exist a culture that stigmatizes Black speech and it's valid to point that out every once in a while.
posted by capricorn at 8:53 AM on December 10, 2015 [18 favorites]

Meet the Chicago Teen behind 'On Fleek.'
posted by zarq at 9:06 AM on December 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

Also for the record: I generally tend to dislike any cutesy term for "one's significant other" - "schnookums", "cutie-pie", etc.

Then, were you me, you would have been even more mortified than I was when the now-Mr.-Freedom sent me a letter at school addressed to "Sarah 'Snookie-Boo' Surname".
posted by chainsofreedom at 9:15 AM on December 10, 2015 [1 favorite]

Does it count as "sleeping with a fellow MeFite" if it happened 10+ years before MeFi even existed?

If you haven't slept with him since, then the answer is "No." Contact Rock Steady to correct the database.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 9:24 AM on December 10, 2015 [1 favorite]

Know Ya Boo!
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 9:27 AM on December 10, 2015

Ugh, I can't stand "Surname."
posted by Wolfdog at 10:39 AM on December 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

Fair enough, cap - I think I was responding more to a matter of timing than anything else. Most of the time I'm completely oblivious as to where slang terms come from; and while I agree it's important to know, it just felt like "hey, that word comes from THIS place" coming right on the heels of my saying I didn't like it was coming across as a retort to my not liking it.

Brandon, looks like I was reading something into it, and I apologize.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 10:43 AM on December 10, 2015

Does hooking up with a fellow MeFite require you, or the other person, or both, to have been a MeFite at the time of said hookup?

Assuming it requires me to have been a MeFite, does that mean I need to have had an account? Like many others I lurked for many years first.

And what about the case where you met someone entirely separately and later convinced them to get an account? MeFi is a socially transmitted virus, after all. I've been infected over ten years myself, who knows how many people I've passed it to. Or when exactly said passing happened, in comparison to when any hooking up might have happened.

So I'm unsure both because the question is inadequately specific, and because even if it were specific, it's the sort of question that's much easier to answer for sure in the positive. I could only prove that I *have* hooked up with another mefite, not that I haven't, unless I know the complete histories of everyone I've ever hooked up with up until the last time I did so.
posted by nat at 10:53 AM on December 10, 2015

nat: "So I'm unsure both because the question is inadequately specific, and because even if it were specific, it's the sort of question that's much easier to answer for sure in the positive."

Don't worry about it. The penalty for getting it wrong barely leaves a scar.
posted by Rock Steady at 10:59 AM on December 10, 2015

Ugh, I can't stand "Surname."

How do you feel about French Guana?
posted by Sys Rq at 11:05 AM on December 10, 2015 [21 favorites]

God, I just feel so moist today, y'know? Deep down in the cockles of my soul, just a really all-around moistness.
posted by the uncomplicated soups of my childhood at 11:18 AM on December 10, 2015 [3 favorites]

Through the internet+metafilter I learned what bashi-bazouk means.
Decades after reading Captain Haddocks curses in Tintin.
posted by jouke at 11:30 AM on December 10, 2015 [1 favorite]

I just learned this now, despite having a Tintin related tattoo! Thank you!
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 11:32 AM on December 10, 2015

38% don't drink whiskey? Like, ever? never? How? Why? Never? Really?

I...can't. Used to back in college, but I had a bit too much of it once (woke up next to a puddle of my own vomit, which is fun in a 'good thing I wasn't lying on my back' kind of a way), and now just the smell of it makes me retch.

Also, the industrialization of Scotch whisky is a byproduct of the forced expulsion of my ancestors from Scotland, so I'm okay not drinking it on a "fuck you and the genocide you rode in on" basis.

But mostly it just makes me insta-barf.
posted by Sys Rq at 11:43 AM on December 10, 2015

> I had a bit too much of it once

This happened to me with gin. Did you know that if you drink too much gin the scent starts oozing out of your pores and you can't get rid of it no matter how long and hot a shower you take and you just have to stagger off to work not only feeling like shit but reeking of gin? (If you're very lucky, your indulgent boss will let you lie down for a while in the break room until you're fit to be seen in public.) I could barely look at a gin bottle for a long time, let alone drink the stuff; I think it took a decade before I dared try another gin & tonic. I enjoy them now, but... one at a time.

With scotch, fortunately I can't bear to drink the cheap stuff when I have single malt, and I can't afford to drink more than a finger or two of my beloved Lag, so no danger of overdoing it.
posted by languagehat at 12:38 PM on December 10, 2015 [8 favorites]

languagehat: Best of both worlds.
posted by Sys Rq at 1:07 PM on December 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

I had a bit too much of it once (woke up next to a puddle of my own vomit, which is fun in a 'good thing I wasn't lying on my back' kind of a way), and now just the smell of it makes me retch

This happened to me on a holiday with friends 20 years ago with tequila and even the thought of drinking it now makes my stomach churn. Also once at University I drank far too much Southern Comfort and literally spent the next day alternately throwing up and lying in the hall outside the bathroom because I was afraid to venture more than a few steps away. The smell now reminds me of vomit, carpet and tears. Good times.
posted by billiebee at 1:12 PM on December 10, 2015 [3 favorites]

I have a friend whose spouse is born on the poet Robert Burns birthday. Each year 40 or more friends and old acquaintances sing, play instruments, perform poetry, eat bannock, and beans and barley soup, and drink Scotch. I was thinking I never drank whiskey, but I ha a wee bit 'o the smoke in a glass yearly for auld lang sine.
posted by Oyéah at 1:25 PM on December 10, 2015

To whomever wanted the superpower of Cock Punch over IP — truly, you are my people.
posted by culfinglin at 3:05 PM on December 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

Cheap booze is for people who drink too much.
posted by Joseph Gurl at 8:22 PM on December 10, 2015 [1 favorite]

I think Bae is great cheap security. Unless Big Bey has voice prints, who is Bae anyway?
posted by Oyéah at 10:34 PM on December 10, 2015

languagehat: Best of both worlds.

AND LO! CHOIRS OF ANGELS DID SING

I'm one of the whatever percent who hooked up with a Mefite once. Didn't know beforehand, had a really amazingly lovely time together (he made me watch Pontypool, and then we watched Police Squad (!!!!) and maybe I was slightly smitten). Sometime in between the ahem we got talking about the interwebs, and Mefi came up, and he's like "omg you're a mefite" and I'm like "omg you're a mefite" and by mutual agreement we did not disclose our usernames.

In my sample size of one (that I know of), Mefites are world class kissers.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 10:52 PM on December 10, 2015 [10 favorites]

Okay, so fffm has just given me a great idea for a new subsite: a mefi online dating site. You would be required to use your actual username. No sock puppets allowed. Mefi could even bring in some extra cash by charging a monthly fee for anyone who wanted to use the service.

Obviously this would never happen in a million years, but I still think it would be pretty awesome.
posted by litera scripta manet at 11:40 PM on December 10, 2015 [1 favorite]

Also, it still boggles my mind that the majority of mefites pronounce use Mee-fye. Does this also mean they pronounce askmefi as ask-mee-fye? And what about mefi mail? It just sounds so wrong. to me.

Personally, I'm team Meh-fee all the way, and it never even occurred to me that people would pronounce it any other way.
posted by litera scripta manet at 11:47 PM on December 10, 2015 [2 favorites]

Do you also say hee-fee? Wee-fee? See-fee?
posted by Sys Rq at 12:18 AM on December 11, 2015 [1 favorite]

Meh-ta-Fee-lter. Meh-fee.
posted by divabat at 12:21 AM on December 11, 2015 [1 favorite]

Well no because

Hi fi = Hi(gh) Fi(delity)

Meh-Fee is the only logical choice and I will die on this hill
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 12:21 AM on December 11, 2015 [1 favorite]

So you say Hi-Fih? Sci-fih?
posted by Sys Rq at 12:22 AM on December 11, 2015

(Me is a word. It's pronounced "mee." Fi is a common abbreviated suffix dealy. It is pronounced "fye." There is no thought required in pronouncing it THE ONE TRUE WAY.)
posted by Sys Rq at 12:27 AM on December 11, 2015 [4 favorites]

So, teaching my kids to read, they both thought it was kind of strange that "Mrs." is pronounced "Misses" and "Mr." is pronounced "Mister".

In the exact same way, when I read "MeFi" I mentally pronounce it as "Metafilter".
posted by Bugbread at 12:36 AM on December 11, 2015 [2 favorites]

What a wonderfully diverse, varied community we are, I totally appreciate it.

Except for you lot that pronounce it mee-fye. UGH ICK PATOOIE.

(The correct way is meh-fee, use your eyes and just read it like it's spelled.)
posted by like_neon at 1:46 AM on December 11, 2015 [1 favorite]

Isn't "HiFi" a marketing term though, with "WiFi" and "SciFi" aping it? Mee-fye reads like a greasy brand name to me, like "NEW! From Excessive Audio Cables ltd: MeFi, the fidelity you need."

I hear MetaFilter as one word, despite the capitalisation, and MeFi as subsequent single word that it's naturally shortened to, like refridgerator to fridge. I think the vast majority of other words with a trailing "i" are pronounced "ih", and most words beginning consonant-e-consonant are "eh". At the very least, basically every ?e?i word rhymes with "semi". So, that's why it's the way it is for me, I initially read it as a single pseudo-Latinate word.

All that said, I also initially read "miniseries" as "mih-NI-ser-ees" to rhyme with miseries, and "biopic" as "bi-O-pic" to rhyme with myopic.
posted by lucidium at 1:55 AM on December 11, 2015 [1 favorite]

Also, while I'm working on this plate, the pair of syllables in HiFi, SciFi, LoFi and Meh-Fee are all sort of matched in a way that rolls off the tongue easier. Short and not diphthongs maybe? I don't know the right terms, but mee-fye feels like changing gears mid abbreviation.
posted by lucidium at 3:04 AM on December 11, 2015

Does this also mean they pronounce askmefi as ask-mee-fye?

I'm pretty sure the last syllable of askmefi is silent :)
posted by ktkt at 3:36 AM on December 11, 2015 [2 favorites]

Lehigh, knee-high, Eli, three-ply, fee-fie, brie pie, bee guy, queer eye--see why?
posted by Joseph Gurl at 4:43 AM on December 11, 2015 [6 favorites]

I'm one of the whatever percent who hooked up with a Mefite once. Didn't know beforehand, had a really amazingly lovely time together (he made me watch Pontypool, and then we watched Police Squad (!!!!) and maybe I was slightly smitten). Sometime in between the ahem we got talking about the interwebs, and Mefi came up, and he's like "omg you're a mefite" and I'm like "omg you're a mefite" and by mutual agreement we did not disclose our usernames.

That's amazing.
posted by Rock Steady at 5:38 AM on December 11, 2015 [4 favorites]

Look, even Dear Leader knows it's not "meh-fee." That's not even wrong.


"mee-fye" and professional white forever, y'all
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 7:17 AM on December 11, 2015 [1 favorite]

The inclusion of "Wendy's Frosty" as a fries dipping choice 100% makes up for the fact that I missed the survey when it was posted.

Frosty dippers know what's up!
posted by ImproviseOrDie at 7:19 AM on December 11, 2015 [3 favorites]

Does this also mean they pronounce askmefi as ask-mee-fye?

So you call it Ask-meh? I can't even with that!
posted by Sophie1 at 7:35 AM on December 11, 2015 [2 favorites]

Heh, people thinking language follows specific rules at all times.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 7:35 AM on December 11, 2015 [2 favorites]

Who's going to fess up to this from the bad habits responses:

Anonymously posting my faeces to people I dislike
posted by ImproviseOrDie at 7:50 AM on December 11, 2015 [2 favorites]

sciatrix: "OMG, narwhals. Last week, one of my coworkers (a biology PhD student!) turned out not to know that narwhals existed. We all teased him and laughed, but clearly he was not alone! I will have to tell him that he is not the only person who somehow missed the existence of unicorn whales."

Geez, he had never listened to "Rock Lobster"?
posted by Chrysostom at 8:57 AM on December 11, 2015 [1 favorite]

I initially read it as a single pseudo-Latinate word.

Semper fih?
posted by Sys Rq at 10:15 AM on December 11, 2015 [2 favorites]

>Geez, he had never listened to "Rock Lobster"?

Thanks a lot, buddy.
(That song is my #1 earworm, and I love it, but still now I will be hearing it all weekend.)
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 10:53 AM on December 11, 2015 [2 favorites]

Semper fih?

Well that's a whole other can of worms.
posted by lucidium at 11:06 AM on December 11, 2015 [2 favorites]

somebody rang?
posted by everybody had matching towels at 11:11 AM on December 11, 2015 [6 favorites]

Meh-Fee is the only logical choice and I will die on this hill

While I prefer Meh-Fee,I think a case could be made for Meh-Fie, Meh-Feh, Meh-Fih, or some such variant. But the first syllable has to be "Meh".
posted by klausness at 12:45 PM on December 11, 2015 [2 favorites]

SO my husband's cousin was telling a story last Christmas which was building up to a punchline. Getting to the punchline, the Cousin incidentally mentioned the WiFi, calling it "wheeeeeee!feeeee!" and I, thinking that was the punchline, burst out laughing. (It was not the punchline, incidentally, I have no idea what the funny part actually was.)

That was the first last and only time I have heard anyone call it anything other than WhyFi.
posted by crush-onastick at 12:56 PM on December 11, 2015 [2 favorites]

Wait I want to hear from whoever thought C-sections were imaginary!
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 1:43 PM on December 11, 2015 [2 favorites]

IT WASN'T A ROCK
IT WAS A...
posted by a halcyon day at 3:37 PM on December 11, 2015

This is really great and I am only just now caught up on it. Nice work, Rock Steady, I'm glad it came together okay in the end. And interesting to hear that google's forms stuff is such a bear; I've never tried working with it I don't think.

I thought the whisk[e]y number wasn't super surprising when I saw it; a lot of folks don't drink, a lot of folks who drink only occasionally probably are more wine/beer folks. And as far as just not liking whiskey or scotch, as a fan of 'em I'm totally okay with that; different folks liking different drinks is fun for arguing about and often has some good stories attached, and in any case it's just more for me, so hey.

The prominence of bae as a word aversion jumped out at me as well; I like the word, I think it's got good utility, but the two things about it that seem to really stand out compared to most of the list are (a) it's a young word and (b) it's a black culture word. And I have no idea how to sort those two out totally, or to sort it out from the systemic racism that I agree at some large scale probably informs how it's such a standout word regardless of the actual racism or not involved in any given person's aversion.

Like, word aversion to new slang is hardly unusual. It'd be interesting to me to see, instead of that list that's composed in significant part of broadly-established vocab (and even sort of infamously aversion-begging examples, like moist and panties), a comparison of bae and a bunch of other similarly new (or not new but short-lived and already out of vogue) bits of slang. A lot of people find new words offputting for a variety of reasons.

But also the apparent newer-than-newness of the word to a lot of white folks who are encountering it significantly independent of black culture—coming across it being used essentially by white folks for white folks as a second-order, varyingly appropriative promulgation of the word out of its original context—is a great big weird mess of its own. And having two different uptake cycles for a word—one where it's a little less brand-new and basically totally accepted and established in black pop culture, one where it's still new-new and getting a stronger front of that that "ugh new slang I hate it" pushback neologisms get—probably just serves to highlight the strange topography of language across cultural boundaries and the weird societal shit that can inform that.

Also wondering what the correspondence is between people averse to "yolk" and people who just don't like eating eggs.
posted by cortex (staff) at 5:57 PM on December 11, 2015 [6 favorites]

(b) it's a black culture word.

At the very least, this is part of the calculus.
posted by Joseph Gurl at 6:11 PM on December 11, 2015

Oh, as for fry dippings: McDonalds Chocolate Sundae all the way.
posted by divabat at 8:11 PM on December 11, 2015

I think the brontosaurus is Pluto's spirit dinosaur.
posted by rhizome at 10:21 PM on December 11, 2015 [2 favorites]

Just FYI, the whole "X is my spirit whatever" is something that a lot of First Nations/indigenous/aboriginal/NDN/Indian people really really really hate when a non-aforementioned person appropriates it.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 11:07 PM on December 11, 2015

(If you are one of the aforementioned people pls to be ignoring me)
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 11:08 PM on December 11, 2015

Fie! It's Meffy or GTFO.
posted by Klaxon Aoooogah at 2:47 AM on December 12, 2015 [3 favorites]

I think some of it is that if you don't have friends at the right intersection of age and race and culture, you literally do not hear this used at all. I have never, not even once, heard this word used in actual usage by someone I was talking to. My black friends are all over 30, and most of them are men. When my daughter's friends talk to me, they speak as little as possible because I am an Old, and never use slang. When I see that word, it's surreal, because people are telling me it's a thing, but evidence of my senses have never showed me it's a thing, and so it just seems bizarre. It's the same thing with "fleek", which I guess people are using somewhere I can't see? I'm not really on Twitter. So yeah, I guess I hate those words as words, but it's more because people are telling me they are words but they don't seem to me to be words and even the people telling me they are words aren't using the words themselves.
posted by corb at 5:40 AM on December 12, 2015 [3 favorites]

My only problem with "bae" is that when I hear it spoken, I hear "bay" which then confuses me in context because why are we suddenly talking about a body of water when we were just talking about people and then it takes a minute for my brain to catch up.
posted by cooker girl at 6:17 AM on December 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

I call my son Boo. His mom does too. Not sure how that started. I don't think we are ghosts. He doesn't seem scared.
posted by Mr. Yuck at 6:31 AM on December 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

Wee-fee?

In Spain it is often called "wee-fee".

FFFM, if I were you I would be DYING to know who that mystery Mefite was! Every time someone responded to one of my posts or comments, I would wonder IS IT YOU?!?!?!?!

That might make a good rom-com, incidentally. Pronounced "Rome Comb", of course.
posted by chainsofreedom at 1:24 PM on December 12, 2015 [5 favorites]

In Spain it is often called "wee-fee".

Man, it's almost like they have a different word for everything over there
posted by Joseph Gurl at 5:34 PM on December 12, 2015 [4 favorites]

Nah I actually like it this way. I think sometimes you share a moment with someone, and it is complete unto itself.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 10:45 PM on December 12, 2015 [2 favorites]

But now you've told the story and outed yourself!
posted by Literaryhero at 1:06 AM on December 14, 2015

cortex: "A lot of people find new words offputting for a variety of reasons."

ಠ__ಠ
posted by Rock Steady at 6:07 AM on December 14, 2015

First Known Use of OFF-PUTTING:

1828
posted by Chrysostom at 7:09 AM on December 14, 2015 [1 favorite]

First Known Use of OFF-PUTTING: 1828

So we can probably blame that for killing Schubert.
posted by Wolfdog at 7:53 AM on December 14, 2015 [1 favorite]

> cortex: "A lot of people find new words offputting for a variety of reasons."

ಠ__ಠ

What exactly is your problem? The word "offputting" is in every dictionary I own, with no indication that it's anything other than a perfectly normal, standard part of English. And as Chrysostom points out, it's been around for a couple of centuries. Man, people really will object to anything.
posted by languagehat at 8:12 AM on December 14, 2015

Excuse me, but I think you mean "any-thing." No need to thank me, every-one.
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 8:14 AM on December 14, 2015 [1 favorite]

I wasn't objecting to the word, I was objecting to cortex trying to slip what I assume is a subtle joke about neologisms past us.
posted by Rock Steady at 8:20 AM on December 14, 2015

I got no beef with neologisms, bae.
posted by Rock Steady at 8:21 AM on December 14, 2015 [1 favorite]

> I wasn't objecting to the word, I was objecting to cortex trying to slip what I assume is a subtle joke about neologisms past us.

Oh, sorry. You simply mistook "offputting" for a neologism, then. No harm, no foul—I'm just hypersensitive to peevery!
posted by languagehat at 8:24 AM on December 14, 2015 [1 favorite]

Well, I suppose it is not strictly a neologism, but it is definitely one of the words that people who complain about neologisms like to complain about. Knowing cortex and his love of wordplay, I'd be shocked if it wasn't intentional.
posted by Rock Steady at 8:34 AM on December 14, 2015

I do love wordplay and have been known to occasionally poke a pedant, but I honestly had no idea anyone found "offputting" offputting in that sense. It's a very neutral word in my mind, if anything maybe a little stodgy like something out of the dialogue from a Victorian drama or something.
posted by cortex (staff) at 9:17 AM on December 14, 2015 [1 favorite]

MetaTalk: like something out of the dialogue from a Victorian drama or something
posted by billiebee at 9:24 AM on December 14, 2015 [3 favorites]

cortex: "I honestly had no idea anyone found "offputting" offputting in that sense."

Wow! OK, nevermind then! Famous descriptivists </hamburger> Strunk and White say:

Offputting. Ongoing. Newfound adjectives, to be avoided because they are inexact and clumsy. Ongoing is a mix of "continuing" and "active" and is usually superfluous.

He devoted all his spare time to the ongoing program for aid to the elderly.
He devoted all his spare time to the program for aid to the elderly.

Offputting might mean "objectionable," "disconcerting," "distasteful." Select instead a word whose meaning is clear. As a simple test, transform the participles to verbs. It is possible to upset something. But to offput? To ongo?

posted by Rock Steady at 9:38 AM on December 14, 2015

I was not aware people found offputting so discromulent.
posted by Drinky Die at 9:44 AM on December 14, 2015 [2 favorites]

I think it is fair to say Strunk & White's advice is...not universally held as correct.
posted by Chrysostom at 9:44 AM on December 14, 2015 [6 favorites]

more like Stunk and Wack
posted by cortex (staff) at 10:00 AM on December 14, 2015 [6 favorites]

In case it's not obvious, I wasn't quoting S & W as authorities, just as an example of people who are put off by offputting. Elements of Style was burned into my head as a young person, but now I use it mostly as a "things to not get upset about" guide.
posted by Rock Steady at 10:25 AM on December 14, 2015

Bear in mind that Strunk was born in 1869, so when he was a wee tyke there might have been some excuse for seeing it as a neologism.
posted by languagehat at 10:59 AM on December 14, 2015 [4 favorites]

more like Stunk and Wack

I'm sure you mean, "More as Stunk and Wack."
posted by Wolfdog at 11:17 AM on December 14, 2015 [3 favorites]

Uprage! Outroar!
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 11:51 AM on December 14, 2015 [2 favorites]

Horseappling!
posted by Wolfdog at 2:12 PM on December 14, 2015

Slutch Calf-Lollies, doddi-pol Joltheads, and jobernol Goosecaps!
posted by clavdivs at 2:49 PM on December 14, 2015

And, and, the surgical, hairy, yet Invisible troll of the Dieppois!
posted by clavdivs at 2:53 PM on December 14, 2015

Milksteak!
posted by Joseph Gurl at 2:55 PM on December 14, 2015

Fie! It's Meffy or GTFO.

Re: pronunciation of "fi"-type words.

When I was in high school, everyone taking the Shakespeare class had to memorize a speech. This one poor kid memorized, "Fie, Fie, unknit that threat'ning unkind brow" from Taming of the Shrew.

She got up to deliver her monologue, and said, "Fee! Fee! unknit that threat'ning unkind brow." My friends and I were too kind to laugh in class, but later we cracked up over this. Even today, I can make myself laugh by thinking, "Fifi! Unknit that threat'ning kind brow!"
posted by not that girl at 3:04 PM on December 14, 2015 [1 favorite]

Missed the edit window. Of course I meant unkind.
posted by not that girl at 3:13 PM on December 14, 2015

What about BurgerFi? WTF kind of name is that? On the short list of things that make me irrationally irritated. Good burger, I guess. I couldn’t really taste it through the annoyance.

I mean, it’s no Massage Envy, but still...
posted by bongo_x at 3:15 PM on December 14, 2015

MetaFilter: hypersensitive to peevery!
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 3:24 PM on December 14, 2015

Beer in mind...
posted by Oyéah at 9:46 PM on December 14, 2015 [1 favorite]

...is worth two on the bus?
posted by Joseph Gurl at 10:56 PM on December 14, 2015 [2 favorites]

This is great. I could, however, make time for further elaboration from the solitary mefite who self-identifies as neither right-handed, left-handed, or ambidextrous but "not sure." The only scenario I am coming up with is someone lacking arms entirely, or perhaps quadriplegic since a very young age. Is there another rationale which I am overlooking?

I can't remember if I did the survey or not, but if I did, this would be me. I write with my right hand, but I throw with my left. I'm right handed for using scissors, and playing golf or pool. I kick with my left foot. I'm definitely not ambidextrous, as each activity has a preference for right or left. I don't know if it's related, but I have great difficulty remembering which is left and which is right. I generally remember "right" as "not left".
posted by salmacis at 6:47 AM on December 15, 2015

That's basically me also. I have "mixed dominance" so usually right-handed and left footed and left-eyed.
posted by jessamyn (retired) at 7:13 AM on December 15, 2015

Huh, neat, I don't know too many other people with mixed dominance. I do really fine motor stuff left-handed (eating with a fork, writing, and, oddly, shooting pool), but almost everything else I do right-handed or right-footed. I play guitar right-handed, too, possibly because I learned violin in elementary school and so left-hand-fretboard felt more natural.
posted by uncleozzy at 7:19 AM on December 15, 2015

LobsterMitten: "(That song is my #1 earworm, and I love it, but still now I will be hearing it all weekend.)"

How about if you watch Sleater-Kinney (with Fred Armisen!) cover it live?
posted by Chrysostom at 7:44 AM on December 15, 2015

RockLobsterMitten
posted by Going To Maine at 8:15 AM on December 15, 2015 [3 favorites]

Write, throw, and play guitar right-handed. Eat, play racquet sports, and brush teeth/hair left-handed.
posted by SpiffyRob at 6:55 AM on December 16, 2015

Oh, as for fry dippings: McDonalds Chocolate Sundae all the way.

Jeez, and people thought I was weird for preferring mustard and ranch dressing to ketchup.
posted by jonmc at 6:07 PM on December 16, 2015

I write, draw, and eat with my right hand, but I throw & kick with my left (and my left is better at foosball too). My parents told themselves for years that I was ambidextrous because that seemed neater than the truth.
posted by shakespeherian at 6:17 PM on December 16, 2015

I think you're supposed to kick with your feet actually
posted by Sys Rq at 6:40 PM on December 16, 2015 [5 favorites]

i'm bad at soccer
posted by shakespeherian at 6:54 PM on December 16, 2015 [2 favorites]

I also sidehug left.
posted by SpiffyRob at 7:09 AM on December 17, 2015 [1 favorite]

I am predominately right handed, but I play certain sports (notably hockey and lacrosse) left-handed. Handedness in those sports is determined by which hand is furthest on the stick. It never made much sense to me, until I was taking an archery lesson and the instructor deemed me left-eye dominant and therefore needing to shoot the bow left-handed; I figure that explains some of the odd cross-dominant things I do.
posted by nubs at 8:08 AM on December 17, 2015 [1 favorite]

Could we possible have a pastebin of the answers the to 'name an actor/actress question' please?
posted by Faintdreams at 1:45 PM on January 8, 2016