Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with cards

Cardmember since...?

dayintoday — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 11:58:18 -0800

How will getting an American Express card affect my credit? I have had the same Mastercard for over 10 years now. I always had a decent rate, so I never bothered getting any other type of card or getting one from a different bank. But recently, they jacked up my rate (as they have for many people lately in advance of the new regulations that are coming soon, I think). So I was thinking of getting an Amex (to have in addition to my Mastercard, not to replace the Mastercard), and use that for all smaller purchases that I can pay off each month.

My credit score is excellent (800, give or take, at last check). I do not have a large credit card balance, and typically pay it off every month. I have a mortgage and an unsubsidized student loan.

Would having a second card, specifically an Amex, affect my credit at all, negatively or positively?

Also, I've never had a card that gave points or rewards of any kind before. The Amex Zync offers points. Are these actually useful at all, or just a gimmick?

Game on!

timpollard — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 03:30:57 -0800

Does anyone know where in the UK I can buy sheets of blank (on both sides) printable playing cards, similar to the ones from the US site 'www.plaincards.com'? I want to print out a home-designed card wargame and perforated card sheets would make life so much easier! Thanks in advance...

Need help finding a Christmas/Hanukkah card

cerebus19 — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 12:00:28 -0800

Please help find a particular Christmas/Hanukkah card that my wife and I love! A number of years ago -- at least seven, but I'm not really sure -- I got my wife a holiday card that she just absolutely loved. See, I'm Jewish by heritage (though I'm not at all religious) and she's Catholic by heritage (though is Unitarian now). So every December we have both Hanukkah and Christmas.

This card, then, showed Santa Claus kneeling down and playing dreidel on the floor with a few kids. On the inside of the card it said something like "Even though we celebrate different things this time of year, we can still play well together." It may have been by American Greetings, but we're not certain of that.

My usually powerful Google-fu has failed to uncover anything about this card. Obviously, we'd like to know how to get our hands on a few copies.

There is another Christmas/Hanukkah interfaith card that was more of the type you write a note in and send to a bunch of folks, that showed a reindeer where its antlers made the shape of a Hanukkah menorah, complete with little candles in each. If you can help find that one, too, I'd greatly appreciate it.

Thanks!

What is the game where you put a card on your forehead?

Wink Ricketts — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 15:32:23 -0800

What is the card game where everyone puts a card on their forehead? Everyone has a card on their head and you can see everyone else's, so you're trying to figure out your own card based upon how others are betting looking at it. Where can I find rules?

Your best tips for working with stacks of 5x3" paper index cards?

NucleophilicAttack — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 20:11:23 -0800

Give me your best tips and tricks for dealing with large volumes of 5x3" index cards! As a preface, I'm looking specifically for tips on managing paper index cards, not recommendations or tips for programs, or moving to electronic systems.

For the purposes of memorizing information, I've been making decks of index cards, at the rate of one or two hundred new cards (one or two decks) a week. I anticipate doing this for a while, with an end product eventually of a few thousand cards, sorted into probably thirty to fifty decks, of one or two hundred cards, each.

While I don't specifically need to shuffle (I'll be reviewing each deck largely 'in order'), I would like to have a system where I can rapidly flip through a deck, add and remove cards very easily. I'm also using both sides of each card, for purposes of quizzing myself.

I'm finding it cumbersome to manage several decks of hundreds of loose cards each, and it's becoming quite a chore to keep the stacks neat, organized, separate, and clean. I'm also having trouble identifying what the content of a given deck is at a glance. Also, I'd like to be able to 'flag' a card for further review without removing it from its given position in a deck.

Other than the obvious rubber band, are there any tips, tricks, or tools that you have for managing decks of paper index cards? Should I hole punch them in one corner and put each deck on a giant round key ring, in order to review? Are there index card carriers? Any cool gadgets or organizational tips, would be greatly appreciated!

To close or not to close credit cards?

Tubman — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 13:42:41 -0800

DH has opened multiple credit cards with me as an authorized user. We just paid them down to a $0 balance and I want to know how many we can close without hurting our credit. My guess is closing the c/c will impact his credit score and not mine.

What is the gift/token of appreciation etiquette for teacher recommendations?

KWittman — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 15:15:01 -0800

My oldest, a HS senior, is applying to college and we are asking teachers to complete recommendations. Would it be permissible to include a note and small token of appreciation for each teacher in advance of the recommendation? We were thinking of including for each teacher a note of thanks in advance for their time, and an area business discount card that is being sold by one of the school district's sports teams as their fundraiser. The cards cost us $10 each, which we are happy to donate to the sports league. There is no cash value to the user of the card unless or until it's used.

We would obviously follow up with another token of appreciation at a more appropriate point later in the year, but we wondered about the ethics of this. Personally I feel they have enough demands on their time, and a token like this would be appropriate. But, the thought "in advance" of the recommendation brings pause. The "B" word, to wit.

Of course, we never do see the recommendations. What does everyone else think?

Best ecard websites?

abdulf — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 16:15:07 -0800

What are some of the best e-card websites out there now? I googled ecards and landed at 123 greetings. The site seems a little to cluttered and the cards feel like they are designed in the 1990s.

I use Hallmark and someecards, depending on the occasion, but there must be some other pretty good websites that have original and well designed greetings? Hallmark has started charging for some of their better cards, so I would like to find a free replacement.

Once in a while I'll stumble across a website that doesn't strictly do electronic greeting cards, but it has this link to send an e-postcard or greeting card and its usually made pretty well. I forget to bookmark when I see them and now my mind draws a blank.

Your suggestions please!

Identify this odd, seemingly antiquated children's card game?

adamkempa — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 18:53:49 -0800

Identify this odd, seemingly antiquated children's card game? I have been steadily digging through the boxes of junk that have survived my last two moves un-dug through. In a box full of childhood toys I unearthed a deck of cards featuring a very dapper duck on the back. On the face of each card there are printed four descriptions of objects.

While I do recall being aware of these cards in my youth, I have no recollection of where they came from. I'm assuming they're a part of a game of some sort. For some reason, I am now obsessed with figuring out their origin. So...anyone have any idea?

I've posted an image of the cards here.

Here are some examples of the text for those who don't feel like clicking through:

Example Card #1: "a plate of beans / a knife and fork / an old hen / a teacher's strap"

Example Card #2: "a broken umbrella / a can of milk / an old maid / a dozen eggs"

Where to play M:TG in NYC?

cyrusdogstar — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 15:56:08 -0800

Where can I find folks to play Magic: the Gathering with in NYC? Haven't touched the game in well over a decade, got on a serious nostalgia trip this past weekend, and am considering seeking out some games -- provided I can find people to play with who aren't random 14 year olds.

Here's the skinny:

* I'm aware of the online version, but prefer the physical cards.
* I know there used to be a big store/gaming area in Manhattan called Neutral Grounds which closed recently and seems to have splintered things a bit.
* Jim Hanley's on 33rd hosts the official Friday night events (will likely stop by there sometime.)
* The Compleat Strategist, also in the mid 30s, may also host games at times (ditto.)
* There's another one or two spots in the outer boroughs (Queens, Staten) that are too far out for me, given I live in Jersey.

Are there any decent groups or locations other than these? Has anyone participated in events at Jim Hanley's or the Strategist and can tell me if it's worthwhile?

Finally, while this is sort of MetaTalky - are there any other Mefites in the region who would be willing to get together sometime?

Credit rejection... identity theft?

lily_bart — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 13:37:19 -0800

Surprise credit denial... of 4 cited reasons, two do not seem possible. Trying to rule out possibilities before I conclude there has been identity theft. So: can anything else be termed "mortgage" besides a home loan? What about "current credit card accounts?" So my boyfriend applied for a credit card to use on our vacation abroad (wanted Capital One so there would be no foreign transaction fees). He was turned down, and the letter cited 4 reasons, two of which were understandable (relatively short length of credit history, and I forget the other one) and two not so much: it said that he had been delinquent on current credit accounts (he only has one account, and he has not been late ever), and delinquent on mortgage payments. He does not own a house. So, good people of Metafilter, what should we do?

Help me design my perfect computer workstation setup!

pbh — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 19:59:17 -0800

Help me design a computer workstation setup for home that incorporates a 30" screen, a Linux compatible video card, a possibly height adjustable desk, and a silent or very quiet desktop machine. For my job, I can work at home, and I'm about to start a project which will likely involve a lot of programming there. Until now, I've gotten by with an 8 year old desktop machine with a relatively small screen. It seems like it's time to upgrade, and I've got a fairly reasonable budget to do it, but I can't figure out how the components fit together or what the best way to do what I want is.

Here's what I'm looking to do:

I would like to have a 30 inch LCD. I've been eyeing something like the Dell 2007wfp or the Samsung 305T, but I'm not sure whether it matters what I choose. I don't need a high refresh rate for gaming or anything, and I'm not particularly concerned about color reproduction accuracy or anything like that.
I would like to have a video card that can drive the 30 inch (I think this means it needs to have dual link DVI, but are there also other requirements, like some amount of video RAM?). It doesn't need to be particularly high powered, though it does need to be Linux compatible, and specifically I would like it to work with Ubuntu. (Ideally, the video card should be from some vendor that has had consistently good support in the past.)
I would like to have the machine be very quiet, since it is probably going to go in my living room, and I don't want it to be a huge distraction when I'm doing other things. I seem oddly attuned to fan noise, for some reason. This seems like it might affect both the desktop and the video card choice. Some fairly average specifications (maybe 4 gigs of RAM, a few cores) would be fine so long as it is quiet, drives the screen, and the hardware has Linux support.
I also need a height adjustable desk for the machine and screen, ideally one that I can adjust easily for standing or sitting (inspired by this, but I'm worried those specific ones are way outside of my budget).

I'm in the US, and my budget for all of this is maybe three thousand dollars (do let me know if any particular requirement seems like it will make things much more expensive). I'm happy to build it myself or use some generic option, so long as it vaguely fits these requirements. A previous askme looked at a similar question, but in a much different price range. That thread also suggested the Ars Technica System Guide, but that guide seems to be orthogonal to the question of quiet and the monitor size that can be driven.

Suggestions on any or all of these components would be great!

Need 3X5 cards printed.

banished — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 09:53:46 -0800

Need help printing 3X5 cards on a laser printer. Hoping a fellow Mefite can help me out. I need roughly 600 3 X 5 cards printed on a laser printer (double sided). Staples and Kinkos won't do it for me, and I don't have access to a laser printer that will do it. The text should be the same direction on both sides, meaning the cards are intended to be flipped horizontally, if that makes sense.

I will ship you the 600 blank cards so you won't have to purchase them.

E-mail me at johndoemefi [at] gmail [dot] com with your address and a quote if you are interested.

Or alternatively, if you know any commercial places that will do printing of this sort, please let me know. Most places I called said that 3X5 was just too small.

Where to order a small run of customized greeting cards?

exogenous — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 09:41:02 -0800

Looking for an online source to have about 50 to 75 custom greeting cards printed. I would like to upload a least one photo and possibly bitmap graphics. Also desired: matching envelopes, and might consider a vendor's design template if it is reasonably clean and elegant (these will be "Thank You" cards). I can handle doing some light bitmap graphics work but am not by any means a graphic designer and, as nice as it would be, am not in a position to pay much for a professional designer.

Some vendors suggested previously have a minimum order of 250. I could maybe stretch my order to 100 cards but not interested in any more than that.

Right now I'm considering vistaprint.com; they have 50 cards for about $40. Any experience with them or others? I could spend more for good quality paper and printing.

Looking for informational note cards

phrakture — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 10:33:53 -0800

Help me find printable informational note cards I'm looking for something like a DIY Planner, Hipster PDA, or PocketMod that contains informational listings.

I'd really like to create my own little reference guide for different things to carry around with me. I don't have specific information in mind, but I'd like it to be open ended - first aid, log tables, periodic tables, graphs of average penis size per country, you name it.

And no, I'm not all typesetting-cool, so I don't think I'd be able to make something to do this properly with Word/InDesign/Scribus/whatever. I'm really looking for something I can just snag and print.

Any help appreciated.

Custom Playing Cards

NotMyselfRightNow — Fri, 22 May 2009 05:53:16 -0800

I'm looking to make a couple couple custom decks of playing cards. Google returns a ton of companies that do this. Does anyone have any personal experience and recommendations? And, any idea on what I can expect to pay?

Too lazy to make my own hand-made cards

gakiko — Tue, 12 May 2009 01:05:32 -0800

I'd like to buy a bunch of hand-made birthday cards so I'd have a stash of them at home and wouldn't have panicky last-minute card shopping trips to the mall/stationery shop. I've browsed Etsy, but it's so... big, and their search engine is not the best and I give up after scrolling 10 pages of search results. Please give me recommendations for your favorite Etsy card-makers/sellers! Bonus points:
- located in or close to Slovenia and/or Croatia
- located in EU or having a low shipping fee for sending to EU
- accepting credit cards without Paypal (is that even possible on Etsy?)
- having a large stock (I'd prefer buying cards from only a few different sellers rather than buying one card from each of a zillion sellers)
- non-Etsy shops are also welcome, as long as they accept some form of credit card payment and ship to EU!
- my friends and family range from the old (80yrs) to the young (4yrs), from technical (IT geeks) to girly (think Sex & the city fans), so all kinds of cards are ok

Thanks in advance!

Mounted Cards under Glass

SansPoint — Sat, 02 May 2009 12:52:51 -0800

How can I mount a set of playing card like things in a frame without damaging or discoloring them? I have a deck of picture cards that I would like to mount in a frame. The cards are basically standard modern playing cards, shellacked or whatever they do to them. I want to mount them on something, put them in a frame, and put them on my wall to show off, but I have no idea what solution I could use to a) mount them successfully, and b) have the option to de-mount them and put them in their/a box without having something discolor or otherwise damage the cards. I don't want anything permanent.

Any suggestions?

How do I cancel credit cards?

Londonita — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 19:05:15 -0800

What is the best way to cancel a bunch of credit cards? Do I have to write a letter to each and every card provider?

Card games for three?

Bulgaroktonos — Sat, 18 Apr 2009 10:36:41 -0800

My wife and a friend of ours like to play cards, but we don't know many good three person card games. Does anyone have any suggestions for good card games for three people?

The Easter Bunny is risen

wherever, whatever — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 17:35:45 -0800

Does anyone know where to find the 2002 Easter cards from The Onion? You might remember there were three funny little cards that were awesomely sacrilegious. One pictured a crucified rabbit another showed Jesus with an Easter basket. The third I do not recall. I've scoured the internet. There are plenty of references to said cards, but I haven't been able to find any posts which display them. The Onion apparently chose not to republish them after the redesign as they cannot be found in the archives. I know someone out there remembers. It would be a shame if the cards were lost forever.

Cards for Dummies

lobstah — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 11:31:23 -0800

Can you help a guy make a folding 5x7 card with Photoshop and a Canon printer? I got a deal on some 5x7 ( 5.25 x 7.25 ) folding cards, and I can't center the image. It runs off the page on the right, and I cant seem to move it to the left enough. The cards are actually 7.25 x 10.5 ". I can get the image in the right area generally, but it seems to want to align right. I'm using Photoshop Elements, but I have CS2 on another machine, if that will help me. When I try to change the borders on the printer settings, they revert back...I'm going nuts.
Thanks in advance.

What is a reputable, low-cost, non-PayPal merchant account to accept credit cards online?

roxie110 — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 12:19:28 -0800

What are some reputable, low-cost, non-PayPal merchant accounts that enable you to accept credit cards online? Extra credit question: what are the best designed and lowest cost Web store options? I've been using PayPal for years to sell on Ebay, but want to open up a standalone web store and accept credit cards directly.

So my question is a two-parter:

1) Who out there has a good, reputable, low-cost merchant account to directly accept credit cards online? My business volume will probably be a couple thousand dollars a month to start, but hopefully as I move sales from Ebay to my Web store, it will be several times that. I'm tired of shoveling money into Ebay/Paypal's pockets, so I'm open to any suggestions. My biggest concern, besides cost, is protection against fraud. PayPal does have certain protections for the seller against unauthorized credit card payments, and I'm terrified of losing hundreds of dollars to bad apples if I go to a non-PayPal merchant account. Any insight on that?

2) Can anyone recommend a Web store that's easy to set up, allows for a certain level of customization, and has sophisticated inventory management? I've spent some time trying to set up a ProStore Business-Level account but refuse to open it because their inventory management is a joke if you have more than 10 or 20 items (I generally have 150-200). The entire interfaice is utterly slow and counterintuitive--though maybe I'd need to upgrade to Advanced to get more functionality. The upside is that it synchs inventory with your Ebay store, and it would be hard to let that go, as I'm constantly adding new items to the store. Any suggestions?

MANY THANKS for your help!!

What to consider when starting a Meetup.com group?

cranberrymonger — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 00:12:00 -0800

What should I know before starting a Meetup.com group for Hearts? I am considering starting a social group for Hearts (the card game) on Meetup.com.

Is Hearts too unusual to find enough players (minimum of 4) in Toronto?

I have nowhere to host the game - is playing cards in restaurants, cafes or bars allowed?

What are your experiences with this website?

Any safety tips? General advice?

Ideas needed for back side of business cards

bleucube — Sun, 08 Mar 2009 10:12:31 -0800

What neat ideas could I print on the back of business card for a Technology Consulting company? My customers are small to medium business that have little or no onsite tech support. What neat ideas could I print on the back of business card for a Technology Consulting company? My customers are small to medium businesses that have little or no onsite tech support.

I started a new business and it's thriving through word of mouth. Hooray. I have the front of my business card all set, but need some ideas for something that will be useful on the back that potential customers might use regardless if they purchase my services. I like my cards to be functional.

Some examples:

* Subnet mask chart
* TCP/IP stack chart
* CAT wiring diagram
* Some sort of password encrypted chart so customers can write passwords down