They put on a great live show and sound good in my car.
Jack Vance is a much more imaginative and skilled writer than JRR Tolkien. It’s not even close.
OK. I still prefer Bud, Rolling Rock and Natty Boh to any of them except Pilsner Urquell.
This shouldn’t even be controversial.
DING! I was just skimming through these, but you reminded me:
I really like institutional food. Hospital, school cafeteria, military mess halls, whatever…I like it. Give me one of those metal trays with sections and I’m happy.
Gotta agree. I’m on the outs with a lot of friends who quote YF endlessly. I also don’t care for The Big Lebowski, so I’m doubly screwed.
I am pro-death. At the risk of copyright infringement for Bill Maher’s “Be More Cynical” special from 1999 (which is really good, BTW), I am pro death penalty, pro suicide, pro ANYTHING that gets the freeway moving faster. As Bill eloquently puts it, death is not the worst thing to happen to you and we are one of the first societies to think so and try to prolong life beyond what nature calls for.
Favorite quote from his bit: “It’s not surprising that we have a hair pill and a boner pill before we have a cure for cancer. Cancer? We’ll get to it! What’s the point of having a corpse if we can’t get them rock-hard erections?”
To you, is there a difference between being “pro-abortion” and “pro-choice”? I think all these thing you mention are issues of choice, either having it or not. Who the hell would be pro-suicide or pro-abortion? Besides a comic book villian, that is.
I think JK Rowling is a very good writer. This may not make me a 10 percenter in most circumstances, but I’m fairly sure it does here. Not talking necessarily about quality of prose, which is something that rarely spoils my enjoyment of a book unless it’s hopelessly clunky (or pretentious), but her large-scale plotting is excellent. Thinking, for instance of things like the start of the Prisoner of Azkaban, where she pulls a beautifully-executed mystery-writer’s “I am now going to give you the key to the whole plot, in such a way that you’ll never realise you have it” or the long term bait-and-switch on James Potter’s childhood character. It’s no surprise to me that the next thing she went on to do were grown up 'tekky stories (which are also very enjoyable)
Hey, me too! I even look forward to my little airplane meals. 
There is certainly a genetic component to it, but it’s also a lot to do with exposure to it. My friends and I in the late 80s went to our first authentic Mexican restaurant and the house pico de gallo was just loaded with cilantro. None of us had experienced it before, and we all thought the place just didn’t rinse the soap off their dishes. After repeated exposures, though, we just got used to it and it’s become one of our favorite herbs. I can still taste the soapy component to it, but it doesn’t read as “soap” to my tastebuds anymore. I think it’s kind of how Europeans (and other folks) find root beer absolutely disgusting and medicinal, or hate the weird, soured milk undertone of Hershey’s milk chocolate, but we Americans are used to it because we grew up with those flavors.
I mean, for some people, it doesn’t matter and the aversions stays. (For example, my mother hates caraway, though caraway figures prominently in the Polish cuisine she grew up with.) But many cilantro lovers, at least in my experience, did detect that soap flavor initially.
Lynyrd Skynyrd is the worst band ever.
You should get out more.
The northern great plains are some of the most beautiful land in the world.
Potlucks are a terrible custom.
Dogs and cats bred to have deformed faces so that they look more like humans are an abomination.
As in: there are even worse bands out there? I love this plan! I’m excited to be a part of it! LET’S DO IT!
I love the smell of gasoline.
I prefer skim milk to any other kind.
Just about every steak is better with A-1 sauce on it.
The Rolling Stones in all these years have had only two or three really good songs, and one of them is “Gimme Shelter.”
Agreed. I’d say the same about Dark City’s opening voiceover.
Ditto.
Right you are!
Yes. Young Frankenstein, Grand Illusion, Bad Day at Black Rock, Touch of Evil, Rope, All the King’s Men, Mad Max: Fury Road, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Dogma and yes, Citizen Kane are all overrated IMHO. And the American remake of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is better than the Swedish original, dammit.
Me, too! With pepperoni, please.
Well, I like Jack Vance very much, but I wouldn’t go that far.
I really dislike hot/humid/non-noticeable-seasons/tropical-y places. I lived in San Diego for 18 years and hated it. I hated Puerto Vallarta, Mazatlan, and Florida. I have less than zero interest in going to Hawaii, Asia, Fiji, and the like. I hate stupid palm trees and jungle flora.
I wouldn’t go to any of these or similar places even if I won an all expenses paid trip . . . but I’d pay my own way to the Arctic Circle, Northern Europe, and other similar climes.
Surely I’m in the extreme minority here?
I believe you are, but I absolutely agree with you. Hate beachhead type places, hate weather much higher than 80; hate humidity; hate incessant sun. That said, Hawaii is quite lovely, despite my dislike of island tropics, beaches, and things of that nature. There’s just a whole lot of interesting geography, flora, and fauna there.
I have always said that if I were a woman, I would be a lesbian. Seriously.
Same here. And I adore Gene Wilder, too. But I couldn’t make it through that movie without literally falling asleep (in a theater, showing a revival version a couple years ago).
I also can’t stand The Princess Bride (another one I watch to fall asleep to), Seinfeld, or Friends.
And I’ll probably lose my geek card for admitting this, but I’m not overly fond of Monty Python. I can take them in small doses, but too much is…well…too much.
On the other hand, I love the movie Xanadu.
Thought I’d be in a real minority in disliking beer, wine, liquor, and coffee. Evidently not.
My default pizza order is pepperoni and pineapple; the acid of the fruit cuts through the greasiness of the cheese, and the sweetness complements the savoriness of the meat, cheese, and sauce.
I love the smells of gasoline, mothballs, fresh hot asphalt, and skunk, when it’s just far enough away that you sniff and say, “Is that a skunk?”
Don’t enjoy jazz music, and don’t understand aficionados who do.
Terry Gross is a horrible interviewer.
Black English Vernacular is oftentimes more euphonious than Standard American English.
Continuous-flow games like basketball, hockey, and above all, soccer, are boring. My city has a brand-new MLS franchise, and judging by all the jerseys, flag, and stickers I see in my neighborhood, I’m definitely in the minority in saying I’d much rather watch a tennis match or a baseball game, or even a golf tournament, than an MLS or English Premier League game.