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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

What effects - noticeable by everyday people - has cannabis legalisation had? Interested both in effects noticeable to people who consume it as well as people who have nothing to do it.
posted by iamsuper at 1:49 AM - 31 answers

I want to do a DNA test via Ancestry. My sister and I might have an unknown niece/nephew in Britain, and it's not impossible that we have an another half-sibling or two in Australia. My sister does not want to know of any additions to the family and has expressed concern about having identified family DNA in the ownership of a data company. [more inside]
posted by anonymous at 12:46 AM - 13 answers

My wife's father's ancestry was always kind of vaguely handwaved as "Austria-Hungary," but I know Austria-Hungary was more of a political union than any kind of overriding cultural identity. Her paternal grandfather emigrated from Slovenia, and his cultural identity seems pretty clearly aligned with that from his immigration paperwork. OTOH … [more inside]
posted by fedward at 10:22 AM - 20 answers

I have a bunch of plate and sterling silver from various ancestors that I'd like to sell, locally around Cambridge, MA, if possible. [more inside]
posted by ldthomps at 11:51 AM - 5 answers

Watching The Gentlemen (TV series on Netflix), where the plot involves huge amounts of money being made from marijuana growing in UK, I started to wonder about states in the US where recreational weed has been decriminalized, and how the dynamic of buying and dealing may have changed. [more inside]
posted by BibiRose at 5:35 AM - 12 answers

I’m looking for an article from two or three years ago about a group of single, retired women sharing a large home, more like a big lodge, and kitchen. They had a cook, or maybe two and it might have been a faith-based community. I think it was somewhere on the east coast. [more inside]
posted by Gusaroo at 3:53 PM - 10 answers

Does anyone recognize this anecdote about Western activists coming to the Middle East and wanting to argue about theory? [more inside]
posted by davidstandaford at 3:49 PM - 2 answers

For a story: I'm looking for examples of something a Chicagoan living in London for the first time might find surprising/strange -- but which is considered an unremarkable part of daily life in London. Challenge: needs to be a clear visual, not an intangible concept. [more inside]
posted by egeanin at 8:56 PM - 75 answers