I did a search on "soak seed" (without the quotes) and found several threads that looked like they might be what you remember.

You could soak seedlings with liquid Seaweed. Gibberellins & Cytokines found in seaweed both promote and speed up germination.

Soak overnight, then after planting, water with same solution.

I think the thread you seek is here.

I used to grow salad sprouts in my kitchen. I would soak the seed in water for 24 hours and then pour the water out. Let the damp seed sit in the sunshine for 24 hours and then rinse the seed and drain. Repeat the rinsing and draining every day and the seed would usually be sprouting by the third day.

I realize grass seed is not the same a alfalfa or bean sprouts, but the idea is the same.

Thanks for the help guys. Those don't sound as quick or easy as I thought I recalled... so much for THAT idea. ;)

A year or two ago somebody germinatd a ziplock bag full of seeds in their fridge. I was trying to remember who is was the other day. It looked like coleslaw

I didn't reread all the threads I found, but I just remembered that somebody who tried pre-germinating by keeping seeds wet for some time said that they found the overall time to be about the same, but that they shortened the amount of time they had to keep watering the lawn. That might be helpful in reducing water bills, since it would take a lot less water to keep a bag of seed moist than a lawn of seed moist.

I tried the stratification approach of freezing the seeds for a while, but didn't really see that it helped me much (but since I was planting native grasses, my results may not apply).

Seems like it involved soaking and newspaper. But, I can't remember the details.

Your absolutely right. I missed that part when I first read it. Its very easy/simple. I use to do it when I was growing wheat grass indoors. The newspaper acts as a topcoat, and thats about it.

1. Pour seeds in a large bowl, rinsing several times. Let soak in water for about 12 hours. The timing is not a hard fast rule.

2. Drain grass seed and rinse well. You can cover your bowl with a cheesecloth and rubberband for draining, or use a colander. Let drain for 12 hours or overnight.

3. The next morning, Spray soil with water to dampen. Then spread grass seed on top of damp soil.

4. Finally, cover the seeds with several layers of newspaper and spray with water to dampen newspaper.

5. Continue to water daily to keep the paper and soil moist.

6. When the young seedlings reach a height of 1" remove the newspaper. Thats it.