Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with pic

I'm a lot better looking in person. No, seriously!

Anonymous — Wed, 17 Oct 2007 12:41:01 -0800

I don't take good pictures and I think it's putting a crimp in my style online-personal-wise. What can I do to get guys to meet me in person? I'm female. I want to date. I write great personal ads and let my witty & winsome self shine through online communications (and phone). I'm an introvert and date guys outside my race --- online personals seem to be a good choice. Problem: I am not photogenic. I don't look like elephant woman but I don't look like me either -- someone who's pretty/sometimes hot.

Lately, great email communication stops dead once I share my pic. Is it my pic? I'm honest about my description before hand, whether it's an ad I placed or one that caught my eye. I've had friends read my prior correspondence to see if I was lying/dissembling/dreaming. I'm being truthful according to them.

I get anxious at the thought of talking to someone I don't know or flirting with someone who didn't already see me as a potential romantic partner, so approaching guys I meet IRL would be awful, painful, and amusing in a twisted way at best. I understand where the guys are coming from: people lie online. The last few guys I dated (two long-term) said they met with me in spite of my pic or didn't see my pic (and didn't share theirs). Upon meeting me they were rather pleasantly surprised. Some people will still reject me nonetheless -- fine. But I'd like a chance with the guys who'd flirt with me in person but are turned off my pics.

Do I give up on dating online? Use someone else's pics? Refuse to share a pic? Give references? There's a part of me that thinks okay, I'm not attractive -- assuming that part is off its rocker, what do you suggest?

What is this?

2bucksplus — Tue, 10 Jul 2007 07:40:03 -0800

Please, please tell me what's happening in this picture, so the nightmares will end (SFW)

Help Nuts and Volts make sense!

ph00dz — Mon, 16 Apr 2007 06:52:46 -0800

How to get started PIC programming? I'm interested in learning how to program little things using microchips... and it would appear that there are a ton of options out there.

Here's the thing -- I'm a beginner.

I know how to program (although assembly terrifies me), so I'm looking for something where I can write in basic or some similarly abstract language. I guess I need a kit or something -- something with a set of projects built in, so I can find my way without too much trouble.

My only technical requirement is that the programmer has to have a USB interface.

Any suggestions? Also, any suggestions for little projects I can build would be helpful...

What's it like to get a needle in the eyeball?

phearlez — Mon, 09 Apr 2007 06:58:01 -0800

What's it like to get a needle in the eyeball? What, you need more than that?

My darling girlfriend has been diagnosed with punctate inner choroidopathy, or PIC, one of a number of what seem to be known as white dot syndromes. So far they're finding non-invasive ways to deal with it but it's not beyond the realm of possibility that at some point they'll have to meddle about in her eye, either with a laser or, more likely, a needle.

She is, understandably, a little freaked by this concept.

Her eye-phobic issues are... complicated. As a contacts wearer she touches her eye on a regular basis so any contact isn't a screaming-meemie occasion, but she's protective of her eyes. I don't think any more so than any rational human being, but she believes herself to be more protective and more likely to blink and pull away from the doc than average, so that's her mindset on the matter. Her docs have been great about being reassuring, but she'd like to know a little more about what it's going to be like from the perspective of the recipient of the needle rather than the wielder.

So - have you, for whatever reason, ever had to have eye surgery or an injection in your eye? Was the experience better, worse, or about the same as you expected?

PIC + rs232 Woes

IronLizard — Sun, 07 May 2006 01:21:18 -0800

My JDM PIC programmer and the serial routines I've got stuffed in the little chip were working just fine.... Until I put it down for a couple of weeks. Now the serial input from the PIC is garbled ASCII nonsense and the JDM refuses to re-program the chip. No settings were changed in IC-prog and the only thing I've installed is a usb mouse (There was one of the same brand installed before). I get -12 volts on the TX/RX pins of the rs-232 cable and an old serial mouse seems to work fine on the port(for an old serial mouse). The port settings are all the same (9600N8-1) and I've reebooted, fiddled, checked/reset the BIOS in vain. I did once have a problem similar to this, but don't remember how I fixed it (not quite the same, IIRC). I've tried winpic with the same results. I have a modem on COM3, but this hasn't been an issue before. Serial is being driven by a MAX232 with charge pump caps. I've been writing a C# program that talks to it, and it also worked previously. What gives?

LED Array and Sign Howto?

yellowbkpk — Sat, 25 Mar 2006 22:34:01 -0800

How do I make an computer-controlled (and PIC-controlled) LED matrix? I've been looking for some hints on how to start making a parallel port-controlled LED matrix with the possibility of moving on to using a PIC and some flash memory to make a standalone sign. Can any MeFites out there help push me in the right direction?

I've pretty much exhausted the usual search methods and have come up with a few decent websites, but they're either in German (http://www.jalcds.de/blinkenleds/), already completed without much of a description on how to do it (http://www.armory.com/~spcecdt/electronics/LED_matrix/) or really old.

What I'm aiming for here is two things: 1) a nifty 16x16 or 32x32 (or something) array of LEDs that I can hang on my dorm wall and control from my computer so that I'm cool and 2) to eventually create a self-contained/programmable LED sign similar to this (http://www.betabrite.com/Media/collage.jpg).

Maxim makes some nifty 5x7 LED array controllers, but interfacing them is just barely out of my electronics experience.

For bonus brownie points, it'd be cool to be able to do RGB color, too.

topless pic found online

6550 — Wed, 21 Dec 2005 16:31:17 -0800

I found a topless picture of someone I know on a site. The woman in question, "Sally", is my cousin's wife. The site is a collection of amateur type pics. They look to be the type of pics a guy would submit of his girlfriend, etc., but on the particular site there is no (obvious) way one would submit a pic.

I emailed a copy of the pic to my brother to see if he thinks it is of Sally but if it's not her, it's her secret twin. Do I tell Sally or just never say anything? To complicate matters my cousin "Pete" and Sally are having serious marital problems. As in I think they are headed for a divorce and things are pretty tense between them.

My instinct is to not say anything but I would appreciate feedback from other people.