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Dreammachine boutique, New York, early 90s?

Mutant — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 03:52:32 -0800

Did you use a dreammachine in New York, SOHO, early 90's? I'm trying to reconnect with some old friends, and have been racking my brain trying to come up with the name of a SOHO based boutique that allowed folks to use their dreammachines.

Their devices were mounted in IMAX like glasses with sound available from headphones. The boutique offered roughly a dozen reclining seats and beds for couples, with a variety of drinks available in a separate lounge area.

It was located on the east side of Broadway, just south of Houston but before Prince. In fact it was in either the first or second building south of Houston, not at street level but I can't recall what floor. The boutique sold time by the clock, or you could pay in advance for discounted blocks.

If you've used a dreammachine in the past, what are your feelings regarding the claims of persistent changes in brain function? Those claims caused a bit of a ruckus when the boutique was first opened, but I don't think anyone succeeded in closing it on those terms (business, of course, was something else).

The state achieved via these dreammachines was much, much more intense than results acquired by sitting in darkened a room with a cylinder spinning in the corner, so I'd especially be interested in hearing from anyone else who might have visited this boutique. I was a regular for perhaps one year.

Name That Model

ThePinkSuperhero — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 18:35:43 -0800

What's the name of the grey-haired lady who models in the Lands' End catalog? She wears her hair in a chin-length bob. I can scan a page of the catalog, if that will help.

To the (regexpmobile|globmobile) Robin!

idiopath — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 19:22:28 -0800

Can I use shell style globs or something like regexp to search for online content? I want to be able to search for '*mobile' or '.*mobile$' or something similar and get something like "bookmobile, popemobile, spacemobile, pimpmobile, weinermobile ..." as a result.

I am looking for a general way to search for things like this based on internet (particularly web) usage, not just a list of compound words that end in mobile.

Gandhi quotation attribution help

goethean — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 08:32:20 -0800

Widely attributed, unreferenced Gandhi quotation: "I like your Christ..." Authentic? According to many many people and several bumper stickers, Gandhi said: "I like your Christ. I do not like your Christians. They are so unlike your Christ."

Having been burned before with a plausible but bogus Goethe quotation, I want to be sure that Gandhi said it before attributing it to him. Any idea how to go about verifying it? I already tried Google, Google Books, and Google Scholar.

I'm looking for a good accountant for freelancers (and families) in the Philadelphia area

Deathalicious — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 07:06:58 -0800

I'm looking for a good accountant in the Philadelphia area. Ideally one that can help with both tax issues for a freelancer in the tech industry, as well as more general family accounting (I just got married and we just opened our joint account). Any recommendations? I reside within Philly city limits and I work from home, so I'd prefer someone familiar with Philadelphia tax issues (I have no idea what I owe the city) and with the particular needs of and deductions for freelancers in the tech industry.

I like building long term relationships, so I'd like to find someone who can help with all the other stuff that's going to come up in the next few years: children and raising a family, buying a house, saving for our potential kids' education, and retirement.

Also, if I want to figure out things like budgeting and getting on sound financial footing, is that something I would talk about with my accountant or is that someone else?

Help me remember something truly trivial

crush-onastick — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 08:58:42 -0800

Trying to remember a carbonated ginseng beverage sold between 1988 and 1994 at Whole Foods in Austin (and eventually sold at the incredibly fancy flagship HEB). I seem to recall that it came in a purple can and tasted vaguely like dirt. I haven't seen it since and it's driving me crazy that I can't remember what it was called. And no, it was not Ginseng Up.

Help me find this eerie rap video

qvtqht — Fri, 29 May 2009 23:30:38 -0800

In the 90s, I used to watch music videos on The Box. In particular, I remember this one video that was spooky, with a lot of echoes in the music, possibly black and white video, possibly with kids playing in the ghetto street. Sadly, I don't remember much more of it, though I think I'll know it when I see it. With that in mind, can you please recommend some spooky, eerie rap videos from the 90s? Hopefully, this one will be among them, but I'm definitely interested in others.

I've already googled around a bit, and have looked through all the videos in this list.

What films are used in Mastodon's video backdrop for their Crack the Skye tour?

sciurus — Sun, 03 May 2009 08:15:36 -0800

What films are used in Mastodon's video backdrop for their Crack the Skye tour? The only one I was able to identify was Sergei Eisenstein's Ivan the Terrible I and II.

The album itself owes a debt to the mysticism of Grigori Rasputin, which might be a clue to identifying some of the other films. Or it might not.

"No! Nein! Ningelschnook!"

dirtdirt — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 14:05:45 -0800

Ningelschnook? In a book I read as a child a character says, "No! Nein! Ningelschnook!"

My brother and I would say that phrase to each other fairly regularly to mean an emphatic no. Does the word 'ningelschnook', uh, exist? I mean outside of that book?

This would have been in the early '80s. There is a glimmer of Roald Dahl in my mind about this word/phrase, but I am not sure if that is just wishful thinking (Roald Dahl books being widely enough read to give good odds for recognition). Also no idea if I am spelling it correctly. I've Googled various spellings to no avail.

Also I guess it is possible that we pronounced it wrong then and so misremembered a completely different word.

Any leads?

What are the best resources for computer novices?

contraption — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 23:14:36 -0800

What are the best resources for computer novices? I often find myself in the position of helping friends and family figure out how to operate their computers (typically Windows XP or Vista, but OS X tips are welcome too.) While I realize there's no substitute for face-to-face instruction, my time is not infinite and I'd like to be able to set them up with some bookmarks or documents that will give them guidance when I'm not around. I'm especially interested in a well-structured, non-intimidating quick reference tool with general tips like locating a file in the filesystem, compressing/decompressing files, using the clipboard, and selecting which program is associated with a particular file type. It should not take any knowledge for granted, and wherever possible should offer detailed step-by-step instruction with explanations of any necessary jargon terms. Reliable, regularly updated lists of good free programs for various tasks would also be helpful.

Two Problems with Word 2008

interrobang — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 08:21:06 -0800

Two questions about Word 2008, on a Mac. 1. How do I get Word to skip, say, the first eight pages when creating page numbers? I want the page numbers to start on the eighth page; all I can find is a way to make Word call page one page eight.

2. I followed basically these instructions to make an index, but every time I get to the last step, Word puts the index on the very first page, instead of at the end, where I want it. Where did I go wrong?

Thank you very much for your time.

Remove duplicate phone numbers on a Nokia E71

qvtqht — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 13:07:54 -0800

My Nokia E71 ended up with a bunch of duplicate numbers for each contact. How do I remove them automagically? So I got a Nokia E71, and because I first imported my contacts from my SIM card (incomplete, since my old Blackberry Pearl doesn't support exporting to a SIM), I then used Google Sync to import them all again.

Now, I have a bunch of contacts that look like this:

First: Bob
Last: cell
Mobile: 212-555-1212
Work: 212-555-1212

This wouldn't bother me if the Nokia didn't annoyingly prompt me for which of the two numbers to use every time I want to call or SMS someone, even though they are the same.

How do I delete all of the mobile or work numbers where they are the same as the other field?

Also, maybe I could also merge first + middle + last into the first name field while I'm at it?

How can I automatically split GPS tracklogs?

komilnefopa — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 20:04:28 -0800

I have almost a year's worth of GPS track logs. I'd like to be able to automatically split them by trip type (walking, biking, car) and filter out some of the noise that gets generated when leaving the GPS on while stationary. Over the past several months I've been using my GPS to track where I go. The raw track logs I get are generally pretty accurate, but often while I'm out I'll switch back and forth between walking, biking, and the car/bus/train. My GPS unit (Garmin 60CSx) doesn't generally split tracks when I change modes of transportation. Also, sometimes I forget to turn the GPS off when I'm inside or standing still; because the GPS isn't 100% accurate, this creates a noisy track that looks like random wandering around the same point.

Given a list of tracks in GPX or some other standard format that's supported by gpsbabel, I'd like to be able to take each track and break it at each point where my average speed changes by a certain configurable threshold. I'd also like to be able to detect when I've stopped somewhere and remove all points that were generated while I was stopped.

I've hacked together something in Python that works on a rudimentary level (the geolocator library has been especially helpful), but it's not perfect. I also haven't implemented anything that gets rid of the random wandering. I could probably figure out how to do this, but it occurred to me that this is probably a solved problem and that I could save time by not re-inventing the wheel.

Does anyone know of any software with intelligent track splitting and noise removal? Previous questions have mentioned GPS TrackMaker, but it doesn't seem to meet these requirements. Failing that, algorithms or pseudocode would be helpful as well.

A complete MAT acceptance list eludes me.

parmanparman — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 22:46:12 -0800

Where can I find a complete list of college and university graduate programs in the USA that accept the Miller Analogies Test for admission?

Can you identify the painting?

PY — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 16:41:58 -0800

I'm curious about the artwork in the background during an episode of The Game. (It's the piece on the wall with a baby or doll in a white ruffled dress and dislocated legs.) I used a generic feedback form on the website where I viewed the episode, but I thought I might get a faster response to my question here. Who's the artist/and or title of the work, and where can I get a closer look?

Whose Gaza is it anyway?

parmanparman — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 09:37:46 -0800

Is Gaza considered a separate nation-state from the Palestinian Authority by the Israeli government? Israel is at war with Hamas, the militant group/political party that won elections in the Palestinian Authority a few years ago and then recently took control of Gaza in a military coup that routed Fatah militias and the Palestinian Authority's police. If both of those groups are not present in Gaza, doesn't that mean that Hamas has instituted a wholly separately Palestinian nation with a different political structure?

The West Bank is run by the Palestinian Authority and the Fatah Party. If Hamas runs Gaza, is it still a part of the Palestinian Authority? Or, is it considered by Israel to be a second Palestinian nation-state that is entirely separated from West Bank/Palestinian Authority? If Hamas is decimated in Gaza, who is the de facto head of state?

How can I stop feeling resentment toward my ex?

Anonymous — Fri, 26 Dec 2008 06:22:41 -0800

I'm troubled by unresolved ex issues. How can I move on from these feelings of resentment? My ex and I broke up over a year ago, and I still feel angry because of things I never got to say. I put up with a lot in the relationship and got very little, and the breakup was sudden when I woke up and realized I was wasting my time. It was liberating for me, but maybe traumatic for my ex. I hardly grieved over the relationship, but my ex clung to what was for a long time, to the point where I felt I was being harassed and cut off all communication.

Now that I have had all this time to think about the situation, I realize I'm still resentful and angry because I never got to express to my ex exactly what I had been unhappy about for so long: my ex's serious faults, and how neglected and lonely I felt in the relationship.

I want to pour this all out to my ex in an attempt to share what my perspective was at the time. But I also remember how hard it seemed to be for my ex to let go, and the great effort I went to in breaking all communication between us. I feel that re-establishing contact might set my ex off again, and create the impression that I want to talk it out, start up a friendship again, etc.

I really just want to tell my ex off like I never had the chance to do. But, this doesn't seem wise. I would like to resolve some of the feelings I am having... how can I do this?

Help find a short story I remember

parmanparman — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 12:34:37 -0800

HELP! middle school/high school short story bookfilter *for Christmas! When I was 14 or 15, I went sleep-away camp at Mosquito Lake in the Trinity Alps of California (I bet you went there, too,) and I read this short fictional story in a journal I found there (title was probably not "Witness", and it definitely was not "Sisters". It was certainly Marxist-feminist but not at all a feminist-lesbian fiction journal).

I would love to find it again to give to a graduate student colleague as a Christmas present.

The story was about a battalion of women dispatched to Vietnam whose weapon was a machine in their vaginal canal that, during intercourse, would perform a crude penectomy.
The story was interesting in that the lead character was a general's daughter, and this general had approved of the mission. Ultimately, the battalion saw that the men they were "modifying" were not VC but ordinary peasants and turned against the male soldiers who had put them in the middle of a rain forest, they were wiped out in an ensuing firefight but their dignity was restored.

It would have been around 1993-1994. I remember the journal was chapbook sized, had a deep-red/burgundy cover and the cover had on it a vintage black and white picture of a young Chinese woman with bare bound feet. There was also a fictional story inside about that.

Thanks for any help!

Recurring appointments vs Outlook 2007 vs Handhelds

schnee — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 10:53:09 -0800

How do I stop the discrepancy in recurring appointment times between handhelds and Outlook 2007? They do not seem to be syncing correctly. At our office, we have four different types handhelds (Treo, Palm Pilot, and Blackberry Curve and Pearl).

All recurring appointments seem to be adjusted by six hours - if a meeting is scheduled for 10:00 AM, Outlook 2007 shows it is at 10:00 AM, but all the handhelds show it at 5:00 AM, and people get cranky when their phones do a reminder at 4:45 AM for a meeting that isn't until 10:00 AM.

I found this discussion on a Microsoft forum about this, with no solution.

I've spent about two hours on the phone with our cell phone provider, with no solution found.

Is there a fix? If not, what is your work-around for the recurring appointments?

Mystery book mystery

cashman — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 07:56:38 -0800

I'm looking for a short mystery stories book I read in a library. One of the stories is where a character comes up a flight of stairs and thinks he sees something (a murder?) in someone's apartment, but it's actually some kind of mirrored reflection of a mirrored reflection of someone through a window across the street. The book/collection was published before 1996 and if I remember correctly, was all short story mysteries of 5 to 20 pages.

Get rid of Picasa floating tab.

signal — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 15:11:59 -0800

Using picasa 3 to make a movie (as per this). The rendering will take over 1 hour. How to get rid of the useless "Making Movie" tab. It floats on top of any other application, and if I try to close it it asks if I want to abort the movie making process. The right hand side is where most 3d and graphics applications' panels are, so it's very, very annoying to have to constantly shift around the pointless Picasa floating tab.
How to turn this off or, if this is essentially impossible, move it to the left side? Using Vista, if that makes a difference.

Where does mac store thumbnails of photos and videos?

guptaxpn — Sun, 23 Nov 2008 09:33:01 -0800

Where does mac store thumbnails of photos and videos? e.g. Finder thumbnails an SD disk I have plugged in that I pulled out of my digital camera. (where are those thumbnails?) e.g. A folder of movies are thumbnailed.

Looking for a dark circular puzzle

cashman — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 10:57:15 -0800

Looking for image of circular puzzle of a dark ocean/sea illustration from the 80's. I'm looking for an image of a circular puzzle I owned from the 70's or 80's. It is an illustration. I've previously looked on ebay and I've also contacted springbok in case it was them. I used to do it and redo it when I was at home sick, so it is possible some of the details could be slightly off, but I love this puzzle. I really want to see the image again.

Circular puzzle
Ocean/Sea scene
Mostly black/dark
Small seahorse on it?
Tiny house/cove in the middle/bottom of the image
May have magic/fantasy theme elements

I also looked here. It is not "Undersea Enchantment". I'm almost completely certain it was indeed a circular puzzle.

Aspie Doctors in Brisbane?

mjao — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 05:32:03 -0800

Know of any psychiatrists or psychologists in the Brisbane, Qld area who specialise in--or at least have some knowledge of--Aspergers Syndrome? My partner already knows about Minds and Hearts--he was diagnosed there--but there are really long waiting lists.

I'm asking for personal recommendations mostly, but if you've heard of someone or found someone on the web, that's okay too.

PS - Even Gold Coast would be okay but it's certainly not first preference.

How to get a thumb drive to mount

jazon — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 12:09:54 -0800

Help me get a Memorex USB TravelDrive to work once again with my Dell Laptop! I received a 4gb Memorex USB TravelDrive thumb drive as a gift. I attached it to my Dell Inspiron 6400 laptop (windows XP), and the computer froze before the drive would mount.

I rebooted, but now the drive won't do anything at all except lock the computer up. The drive works on other XP computers and in my Macintosh at home.

Running device manager shows the device is working properly, but it never fully mounts and ends up taking the OS down instead. I have tried wiping the thumb drive and starting over, but it never works with my laptop.

How can I "reset" things to make the drive work again?