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07 June 2008

Ask MeCha! Today only, three questions available for the price of one! (I'll start.) →[More:]

1. (Don't laugh at me you technical people.) I've always tried to keep my home mailing address private and off the web. I'm supposedly "unlisted." I recently found out that pipl.com has my home address. Is there any thing that can be done? Or is my address forever not-private? I usually shred mail that lists my name and home address -- is this silly?

2. Where can I buy really nice cardigan sweaters (NOT shrug-style) in San Francisco or on line? I wear business casual, and cardigans over nice tees or button up white shirts is perfect. Yet I find it really hard to find cardigans. I'm looking for: black; gray; dark purple; certain greens; certain reds (cranberry-ish).

3. For Pride 2008, our theme is Island Vacation. (Last year was Princess Pride.) So -- ideas??? Where to shop, what to get? Cheesy is fine -- plastic palm trees, coconut cups, leis, grass skirts, etc. Also -- what to serve for food and drink? I'm think margaritas, maybe white san gria (sp?), fruit salad, coconut shrimp, maybe some rum drinks (but it's a morning-brunch kind of event, seems a little heavy) -- what else? Anything tropical that is also brunch-y? Oooh, maybe banana pancakes.

post by: Claudia_SF at: 12:55 | 15 comments

I can only partly answer 1 question:

1. I shred anything that has my name or address on it, so I don't think it's silly.

My question, kinda long and technical, is this. So there's KDE and Gnome, desktops for Linux. There's also fluxbox, and perhaps others. Are most/all linux GUI apps able to use whichever desktop is in use? Then there's the GUI toolkits, like GTK (and I had the idea there are other competing ones). I imagine they all run on top of X, but I am confused by the multiplicity of desktops and window managers and widget toolkits. Is there a simple explanation for all this. When you build a linux GUI app, do you have to choose a desktop, or is it compatible with all of them?

posted by DarkForest 07 June | 13:18

ClaudiaSF:

2. Sorry if this is too obvious, but you could try JCrew. They might be a little expensive, and summer is a hard time to find sweaters in general, but they usually have some in stock. The GAP also has one non-cropped cardigan, and Banana Republic does as well.

3. A party supply store (a la Diddams, which I think might only be in Palo Alto/Cupertino/Sunnyvale and not reach as far as SF proper) would be my best guess. This place is supposed to be good, I think.

posted by unsurprising 07 June | 13:26

Regarding 1, yikes, I'd never seen that site before. In times like these, I thank my parents for their profound foresight, having blessed me with an extremely common name shared by a minor celebrity -- I'm pretty darn un-googlable.

Regarding DarkForest's question, I'm not going to be much help -- but I've found that most of the big apps (like open office) seem to work to fine on various distributions. Also, it seems to much easier to mix and match components -- each distribution, desktop, etc., is kind of different configuration of the same legos, so getting a certain app to run in an environment that isn't ideally suited for it is probably pretty doable in most cases.

posted by treepour 07 June | 13:31

2. I second J. Crew. Brooks Brothers, Ann Taylor, Ann Taylor Loft, Lands End, Nordstrom. Here are some at Dillards, for 9.50 each on sale! I don't know if you like the buttons on the sleeve.

3. Oriental Trading

PlumParty

Tropical muffins

Mimosas made with mango juice instead of orange. Or do both, or combine OJ and mango juice. Passionfruit juice would be great too.

posted by LoriFLA 07 June | 13:33

gtk stands for gnome toolkit, but I'm unsure if that means it won't run on kde desktops. I'm guessing that the gnome desktop just uses the gnome libraries, and as all apps run on x, then as long as the relavant libraries are installed you should be able to run apps on a different window manager / desktop. However, anything using calls specific to the desktop (system tray, etc) probably won't work correctly. That's a guess mind, so listen to other people before you listen to me.

posted by seanyboy 07 June | 14:05

All I have to say is Pipl is fucking scary.

posted by grouse 07 June | 14:40

Wow, pipl is scary. Do not like. At all. It doesn't have my address, but I'm anal about shredding things. Anything with my name+address on and all receipts and all receipts get shredded. Receipts for utilities get shredded when the next bill is paid, but day-to-day ones go when I get back home.

posted by TheDonF 07 June | 14:55

Pipl Improves Quality of Stalker Search

posted by BoringPostcards 07 June | 14:59

Only one question is bugging me today... how do you work with a boss who says things like (this is a quote from yesterday): "I'm not sure what it is I want, but this is definitely not it."
W?? T?? F??

posted by BoringPostcards 07 June | 15:05

I am very happy that a pipl search for my name bears no results, and nothing embarassing or identifying come up on google (I don't have any googlegangers). I shred everything too, even magazine address labels.

The corner shop near my last flat printed your full name, card number and card expiry date on receipts - that was when I became pretty anal about shredding everything.

posted by goo 07 June | 15:28

pipl is not only scaring but breaking the damn law. There are photos of me on there, marked with my name (by helpful friends I gather) that photographers took for some mag, and I know they did not give pipl the right to host/display them. This tells me that pipl is fundementally flawed. (well, either that or current copyright law is but I happen to like it the way it bloody is thankyouverymuch).

And I shred everything with my name and adress on it, but have actually long since given up on hiding my name/physical adress when domain buying. Which is so fucked up.

posted by dabitch 07 June | 16:56

for 3 - TIKI DRINKS! Please google that for a bit and you'll see what I mean.

posted by dabitch 07 June | 16:57

So ... if I double-check with all of my phone, utilities that I am listed, will my address & phone number ever drop off pipl? I guess it's probably there forever. That really sucks.

Also -- Tiki drinks is a great call!!

posted by Claudia_SF 07 June | 17:16

on the cardigan front, i must recommend L.L. Bean. Now, I haven't bought anything from them since, I don't know, a parka when I was in ninth grade or so. But they always always have cardigans. It's like one of their cardinal rules.

posted by brina 07 June | 18:08

Not found on pipl, thank goodness. But some very successful people share my names.

posted by rainbaby 07 June | 20:26

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