Apr 2017 Archive, part b

It's good to see you, too. After I posted, I was looking back through the Board, and saw you have 75+ missions now? Whoa! That is seriously impressive.

I'm pretty good. I joined a community orchestra and have been learning to play the viola, although I am on a break this semester. I started writing fanfics on AO3 under Miah_Arthur. They are all in Haven for now. It's a tiny fandom, but was good for a new fanfic author. I have just about finished one in Star Trek Voyager, so branching out. I've played a lot of Fallout, and some Dragon Age, and the new PS4 import of Skyrim. We're up to 6 cats now (8 if you count the two that show up occasionally), so I think I have cemented my status as Crazy Cat Lady.

Warcabbage is good. He's thinking about opening a food truck. How crazy is that? Still has the same job he did before. Still makes amazing beer, but now also makes his own sausage, smoked meats, and roasts his own coffee. He'd be hipster material if his job didn't demand he keep clean shaven, so the gas mask can seal properly.

You're not going to believe this, but my oldest is now 17! He's a junior in high school. He plans to go to college to study microbiology and genetics. He's particularly interested in defeating antibiotic resistant bacteria. His science classes are doing things that 20 years ago were practically science fiction! They genetically engineered glowing bacteria this week, and he has a project he is planning for microbiology next year to combine bacteria from hot springs with strep to see if it will make them more susceptible to antibiotics. It kind of blows my mind. When I was in high school, the school couldn't even get enough money for us to dissect worms, forget pigs, and he's altering the genomes of bacteria. He'd probably get annoyed if I didn't mention that he is in Quizbowl and his team won state last year, and is about to play for state again this year.

The middle kid (15, sophmore) has put us all through some truly awful times (himself included). He's living with my mother permanently now, but it seems to be good for him. He's happy up there, and that school has a better art program. He is a seriously amazing artist. I think he could make a living at it, he's so good.

The little one is 8 (9 soon). He's in 2nd grade. He keeps me busy. I homeschool him, and ferry him around to OT, PT, Speech (on horseback for that), Vision Therapy, counseling. He also plays violin in orchestra, does musical theater (they do the middle school level scripts, Pinocchio this spring), and a special needs, no scores kept baseball program, which has promised to let him work in the concession stand after his games. He's really, really into concession stands and playing shop right now.

He's doing amazing though. You'll like this one. He is reading A Series of Unfortunate Events for fun right now. Even more amazing is that last May he couldn't identify the entire alphabet, but with the help of Vision Therapy he's reading Lemony Snicket. That's about a 6.8 AR reading level!

What have you been up to? It's great to see familiar faces. I was kind of afraid that I'd get here and everyone I knew would be gone.

Sorry, the link says it is expired.

How have you been?

But I don’t call it fear; I’m just overly shy. I might never have posted on this board if there hadn’t been this outsider hauling inaccurate accusations around to explain why they didn’t like the PPC, so I just had to step forward to show another outsiders view, before I made a proper introductory post.

Also, I don’t think of it as crippling. Over the years, I persuaded myself that I like to be the nerd in the ivory tower, and that I don’t want lots of friends or to be considered a valuable member of a community (and then the PPC happened). That’s probably not an advisable way to follow, although it worked for me, with lots of luck.

Fortunately, I don’t have that nightmare. I don’t care whether I’m remembered and recognized. (But then, why do I use the same name all over the internet, unless the site insists that I can’t have a space in my name, and it’s too many letters anyway?)

My greatest fear is that I unintentionally say something that offends people I want to like me. Not talking in my native tongue here doesn’t help with that. So, far too often I prefer to say nothing at all. Which probably causes that people do not know me well enough to actually like me. Yeah, I’m aware of my shortcomings; I’m working on them since nineteen-fiftythree.

HG

I have some problems with anxiety -- not in those exact circumstances, but the general topic is familiar to me.

But of course, you need to specify which ones...

We have the Natural History and Science Museums side by side, which is always my #1 default, but if you prefer stuff that's a) made by people and b) not made of metal, you might want to consider the British Museum instead (we went there in '14, we've never taken a Gathering to the others). Or if for some reason you like... I dunno, art? Fashion? Whatever's in there, there's the Victoria and Albert museum too.

And that assumes you want to get in for free! If you're prepared to pay, you can see the crown jewels and a bunch of weapons in the Tower of London, or... uh... probably lots of other things, I dunno, I don't like spending money. ^_^

Though if you want a chance of finding an actual (stuffed and/or skeletal) seal, the Natural History Museum is the place to go. (It's also far and away the prettiest of the buildings, having been created as a 'cathedral of science', because Victorian scientists were awesome.)

hS

No, were it up to me I'd drag you all seal-watching, but it isn't. =]

PUB CRAWL!

Seriously though, I don't mind.

I'm examining especially people who are relatively new to fandom, as the age and experience caps on the demographics section indicate, in comparison to people who were at least there around the downfall of LJ as fandom hub. So yeah send it out! Just as a heads-up -- I will be closing the form Sunday at noon Eastern Standard Time because I've gotten an overwhelming response and I don't want to get overwhelmed with data you feel :'D

So yeah!

'which social media platforms have you moved between' or something. Especially if it's at a text entry box.

Though, cosnidering I'm not a native speaker (I've never even heard the word "discourse" before, I'm afraid), my answers might not be really indicative...

But this is exactly the kind of thing I'm interested in, so hey!

And no, unfortunately not. I'm really having a good time enjoying goodfic in the Yuri on Ice fandom and I'd hate to touch badfic again lolol

I've never heard of that department. Could someone please explain?

That's awesome! Kudos for having great luck and the sense and/or courage to try it!

I sent you that other stuff from the DMFF at some point, too, right? Lemme see... "Sue Phrases" and the "Tolkien Encyclopedia of Canonical Flora" and "Tolkien Encyclopedia of Canonical Fauna"? We could have pretty much the whole department, I think!

~Neshomeh

For those who now want to read the full exploits of the DMFF, the rest are archived here (and I've tucked the new link in to go with them). ... except for the last one, which for some reason I never did? I'll get right on that.

Thank you!

(And yes, it's well over a decade - I did my archival in 2008, and remember that they'd been gone for ages by then. Also I archived the rest of these nine years ago sweet mercy.)

hS

Happy Easter to you too, Alleb!

The Smoot was originally a joke too.
https://youtu.be/-scs_yF59YE

The way I understand it, tenure means you have a contract that says you can't be fired from your job for a certain period of time. Not sure how that concept applies to a community where we all hang out voluntarily and don't get paid for what we do here. I find the implication that I or anyone else who's been around "long enough" should be up for "firing" from the Board disturbing and a bit hurtful, so if that's not what you meant, please clarify.

~Neshomeh

As a newbie, I love how welcoming the PPC has been to me and I would hate to do anything to ruin that atmosphere.
That said, it might be possible, if reworked with care, for a list like this to instead enhance this welcoming atmosphere.

The easiest (though probably least effective) way to do this is by making sure this list is always preceded and/or proceeded by a disclaimer saying that none of these categories are more important than any other.
That way, if someone tries to use the list to prove that their opinion is more important, you can point them back to the same source they used to counterpoint them.
It is very effective to be refuted by one of your own sources. I probably know this from experience.
However, I wouldn't recommend this method, as it's very easy to just leave off the disclaimer (on purpose or on accident) and newbies might have a hard time calling them out on it.

Another way might be to take each of the sentences and add nice descriptions to them that both act as a disclaimer and as entertainment.
Very rough example: Newbies are replaceme... I mean invaluable additions to the PCC. Even though they have only been here less than 6 months, we value these people's opinions as much as any other PPCer.
While that is only a rough example, I hope you can see how this might work.
If the sentence is enjoyable enough, someone trying to use their status to win an argument might look up the quote just for fun.
Also, with the time frame tied to the disclaimer, it will be harder the leave it off.

So, what do you all think?
Do you think this is a good idea?
Is it a terrible idea?
Do you like the method but don't think it works here?
Or do you just want to talk about our general approach to newer members in general?

Leave a comment. Your opinion is just as valid and wanted as any PPCer.

PS: I would really like to hear people discuss about our approach to newbies. While I believe it is already amazing, there is always ways to make it better.