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I live in Oakland, CA and would like to move somewhere in the Bay that feels safer during the day and at night. I am a single Asian woman. Please recommend some neighborhoods? [more inside]
posted by anonymous at 2:08 AM - 14 answers

How is life these days living in East Hollywood? Purposely keeping this wide open to get the widest range of responses. But thinking about safety, vibes, feel on the street, good places to eat and hang out, etc.
posted by ojocaliente at 6:48 PM - 1 answers

Does the Irish language / culture have a particularly philosophy of viewing emotions as fleeting? Or is it just the way its grammar works? [more inside]
posted by iamsuper at 12:45 PM - 3 answers

According to my late dad my family on his mom's side was from a town on the border of the two countries that was one country and then became another. I'm assuming it would have happened a while ago (at least +60 years) but that's all I've got.
posted by rileyray3000 at 1:14 AM - 3 answers

Please recommend a book or two for someone looking to get a better understanding of the origins and historical context of the Israel/Palestine conflict. Being "unbiased" or "objective" is less important than being interesting, but I'm not looking for a polemic (unless it's a really informative polemic).
posted by lex mercatoria at 12:38 PM - 7 answers

I'm trying to remember the name/author of a story that I'm fairly sure I read in a 'Best Horror of the Year' anthology (edited by Ellen Datlow). It concerns a spy or member of some security force in the UK trying to get someone to take seriously the presence of an alien or monster that security forces had been tracking, but had now lost track of due to retirement or bureaucracy or similar. I think the monster lives in a suburban house and was impossible to kill. There may have been some kind of code word that would set it on an unstoppable killing spree? I also remember something about how it could walk through oceans? I've had no luck googling, and I can't currently access my big pile of BHOTY anthologies. Does this sound familiar to anyone? It's driving me crazy and I'd love to re-read it.
posted by sedimentary_deer at 7:45 AM - 3 answers

It's not hard to find movies shot in Newfoundland, and even set there, but they generally go light on the local Newfoundland dialect, known as Newfinese. What movies and books have an accurate representation of it? I have some books on the dialect itself, but it would be nice to see how it all comes together -- especially how it came together in the early 1900s.
posted by musofire at 10:07 AM - 8 answers

What sources, books, essays, can I read or watch that explain Japanese history from an anti-imperial and decolonial perspective. Is there a book for Japan like what Howard Zinn did for the U.S. or the Indigenous Peoples history of the U.s. but for Japan? [more inside]
posted by mxjudyliza at 7:38 PM - 7 answers

I saw a story, I believe on CBS a few years ago, about a program that took uneaten food from Las Vegas casinos, freeze dried it on the spot, and took it directly to homeless shelters. [more inside]
posted by CollectiveMind at 10:08 PM - 3 answers

I returned to University to get my Master's degree at age 61. It turns out that the school seems to have ageist policies that some of my teachers (off the record) have confirm. Outside of AARP, what other advocacy and legal aid groups are available to me.?
posted by goalyeehah at 9:35 AM - 8 answers

She is perplexed by talk of "nonbinary" and "transgender" and says she wants to learn more (I'm her token liberal she goes to with these kinds of questions). She specifically wants a book to read. Any recommendations? [more inside]
posted by dede at 8:58 AM - 19 answers

I have vague memories of a song we sang as Mariner Scouts (the branch of Senior Girl Scouts that learned about sailing) in southern CA in the late 90s/early aughts. I can't find any record of its existence and it's driving me crazy. Lyrics fragment below the fold. [more inside]
posted by potrzebie at 5:21 PM - 6 answers

As part of a discussion/awareness raising group, I'm going to be facilitating an exercise examining problematic advertising (from an equality or social justice perspective) . Think sexism, racist imagery, reinforcing gender norms, etc. I'm looking for more recent examples, from anywhere in the world. They need to be able to be printed and handed out (so no video). Overt or subtle welcome. If you'd rather not post it here, feel free to memail me. Examples below the fold [more inside]
posted by Gorgik at 7:39 PM - 17 answers

We're having our second in less than two weeks, and my parents are coming to watch our toddler and will help for a day or two. I'd like a script to help my mother not be overbearing with the newborn and try to do too much as she did with newborn last time. Help me with a strategy/script on this that makes this likely and ensures my wife gets to spend quality first couple days with the baby. Snowflakes inside [more inside]
posted by sandmanwv at 7:19 AM - 15 answers

Back in February, I used PayPal to buy an item through eBay. The item seemed to be shipped but never arrived, and the seller issued a refund. I thought that was the end of it. But yesterday, I got a notification that the item was delivered to me – except that it actually wasn't. Is this a scam of some sort or an unusual glitch? More details below. [more inside]
posted by alex1965 at 7:39 AM - 4 answers

I'm going to be dog sitting in Los Angeles for two and a half weeks. I'll be in Eagle Rock, and will be working and looking after said dog (who's old and has needs), so this isn't exactly a vacation, but I will have some time to go do stuff. I have a short list right now, mostly museums. Do you have suggestions for anything particular I should see or do -- or eat? I lived there briefly in the early 90s and haven't been there since.
posted by swheatie at 11:31 AM - 21 answers

If a lightly connected person to you (i.e a neighbor) provided help when you had a newborn, what was helpful? If you helped someone in the same situation you didn't know that well and felt like it wasn't too much of chore but felt helpful, what did you do? [more inside]
posted by sandmanwv at 1:22 PM - 17 answers

In my cohort of white or white-adjacent urban/liberal I-don't-call-myself-rich-but-really-I-am parents, every single kid's (i.e toddlers) birthday party has a big disclaimer of "No Gifts!" Is this toddler thing, a rich person thing, an urban we don't have space thing, a cultural thing or a Millennial parent thing. [more inside]
posted by sandmanwv at 11:37 AM - 42 answers

I'm looking for academic books about privacy - histories, anthropological studies, literary studies, anything that looks at how understandings of privacy have changed over time or vary between cultures. I'd like a meaty book, if one exists, rather than articles. I've tried looking myself, but google is so terrible these days, and even google scholar is just giving me awful undergraduate essays, so a personal recommendation would be great. There's quite a lot of material available on attitudes to online privacy, but I'm more interested in offline privacy, or at least material that addresses both.
posted by Tremble, Burglars! at 1:13 PM - 8 answers

I did a very poor job of expressing myself. Any recommendations about how to fix it? [more inside]
posted by SageTrail at 7:01 AM - 10 answers