The PPC Posting Board - Latest posts

I'm slightly embarrassed that while I opened the fic the day you posted it, I didn't manage to actually finish it until today. But, better late than never, as they say.

It was really sweet! I very much enjoyed it. I haven't read much straight up feel-good fluff recently so that was nice, and the literary references were great fun (though I think one or two flew over my head; inevitable, really, when dealing with worlds like the PPC).

In any event, it was a good read! Thanks for sharing.

https://archiveofourown.org/series/369158 - my favorite goodfic of all time, the *you can only use your own* series.

(UNDERTALE SPOILERS FOLLOW, READ AT YOUR OWN DISCRETION)






This is the only true "everyone lives" Undertale AU I've ever read. It's poignant, by turns hilarious and heartbreaking, and it's how to do an AU right. (Warnings: The series gets very heavy at times, and has a very large number of characters with mental health issues, which the author is pulling no punches when depicting. It's very well-researched and respectful, but it's emotionally difficult to read as well. In short, HEED THE TAGS. The two side stories *live inside a green moment* and *seal our lips until we're found* are NSFW.)

The way that you phrased this gives the impression that you think that my emotions and opinions are invalid and wrong in this situation. I am fully aware that it was made for entertainment purposes only, and I don't/didn't want an apology about anything, but I couldn't help feeling when I initially read the story that it was a veiled way to put me down, and that I had been portrayed in a bad way in the story. I know that wasn't the intention, but it still made me feel that way, and the fact that it was meant to be funny doesn't invalidate my feelings about it. I don't have enough experience with the Board or hS to know what either are really like, so I didn't have any way to accurately interpret the situation. So I'm sorry that this happened, but it's not anybody's fault.

Neither is it a debate, so I won't argue with your various points of accusation.

Here's what I will do:

1. I will apologize for being condescending. I was, and I should have expressed myself better. I'm sorry.

2. I will take you out of the category "child" in my head and think of you instead as "teen or young adult."

3. I'll now take off the kid gloves and tell you in frank language what that means.

That means my patience for you treating Nazis, Hitler, the Holocaust, and other related concepts as fun playthings ends as of this post. I am not comfortable with it, and I don't want to see it in PPC spaces anymore.

It means I expect you to understand that trivializing things that have hurt and are hurting people to this day is not okay, and that no one here is obliged to tolerate it—not when Neo-Nazi and other white supremacist terrorism is a global problem and people are being killed in its name. Your feelings are not more important than those of the people being persecuted in the name of the discriminatory ideals espoused by the Nazi party and its leaders, and I will not apologize for saying so.

It means I expect you to exercise the ability of a teen or young adult to moderate your actions, and to stop bringing those things up in any way, shape, or form. That includes Wolfenstein and other media that features Hitler, Nazis, Holocaust, etc. You will keep your fascination with those things strictly to yourself from now on.

It means that if you don't stop, I will consider it a violation of Article 3 of the Constitution, and I will call upon the Board to make a decision about how to handle it.

I hope I have been sufficiently clear.

~Neshomeh

It's not really necessary though. I overreacted to your joke and was going to just let it slide, but Twistey thought it would be good to voice my concerns. I'm just not in a very good place emotionally currently, so I'm exaggerating everything that could possibly be seen as bad, which is why it made me feel bad. Just to clarify though, it wasn't that my stand-in was being intimidated, it was that I was portrayed as being a weak and socially incompetent child.

First, Harry Potter and the Natural 20. To use the author's description of it:

Milo, a genre-savvy D&D Wizard and Adventurer Extraordinaire is forced to attend Hogwarts, and soon finds himself plunged into a new adventure of magic, mad old Wizards, metagaming, misunderstandings, and munchkinry.

You can find it here:
https://www.fanfiction.net/s/8096183/1/Harry-Potter-and-the-Natural-20

For a more unorthodox recommendation I give you Auralnauts Star Wars:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WSCm8yAxBr8

It's a series of musical gag dubs of Star Wars I-VI which turns the Jedi into drugged-up party animals dance-fighting their way across the galaxy. Warning for sex, drugs, creepy droids, and a sick EDM soundtrack. It radiates cool like little else.

AWS charges actual hours, not compute.

It’s not because you asked. It’s because of how you asked. You didn’t really so much ask as demand, in a way that came across very strongly as “I know hS didn’t mean to, but it’s still his fault and you’d better make it right or else, and then went on to insinuate you’d be doing a mass callout of other people with a similarly entitled demand for apology.

You’d hardly be the first to do something similar, and that’s why Nesh—and myself—are fed up.

Asking for an apology is fine. Being snide about it is not.

Did I hear a "let's get this over with" come out of your mouth? About an apology? After you were done lecturing me about how I was trying to get an apology over with so that I could feel better?

I get a sense from this that you know the right thing to do, you just don't always live by your own rules. Hey, that's better than if you didn't know the right thing.

-Twistey

However, I'd like a few things to be cleared up before I get started:

- Neither I nor Willis misinterpreted what hS did. We got that it was a joke. That does not change how it felt. And while Willis sort of assumed the worst from hS, I didn't. That's why I put this out in the open, because I believed it would help, whereas he thought that he'd just be mass-targeted in reply. By all the Boarders. I was not kidding about the bad taste in his mouth.

- Speaking of assuming, very bold of you to predict what I am going to do next! What if your prediction had not been correct? You would be the one assuming worse!

Now that we have that out of the way, first things first.

When I am emotionally vulnerable after having done something pretty wrong, and have made myself even more vulnerable by apologizing for my actions instead of running and hiding, I do not appreciate my apology being outright dismissed for being less than perfect. It makes me feel like I am not forgiven for my actions and like I have lost others' trust. Which is a terrible feeling.

When I am concerned, confused, or bothered by something and I voice my feelings, I do not appreciate having them dismissed as me needing to lighten up or stop questioning things. Let me remind you that "questioning things" is also how we try to do things, as you yourself said in response to my comment about the Star Wars prequels. Being dismissed makes me feel like I and my opinions and feelings don't matter. Which is also a terrible feeling.

And I definitely don't appreciate my age being guessed incorrectly. I'll have you know that when I was thirteen, I was worse. What you basically did was personally attack me and call me immature. Perhaps you should make fewer bold assumptions about your opponents in general, and let them have their say first.

I get that I need to change. I really do, especially if I ever want to visit Germany. But it will take time. I cannot just "drop it". And that is why I will be merciful to you, because I know you cannot simply "drop" a behavior either. If you would like to, you and I may in fact join together as compatriots in breaking bad habits - a tried-and-true method.

I would like an apology and I would like evidence that you understand what I am saying and where I am coming from. And then I would like you to work towards being more compassionate and, dare I say, peaceful. Don't take it personally, no matter how attacked this no doubt makes you feel. I see where you're coming from with these things and I believe in your ability to get better.

Thanks,
-Twistey

My intention was to encapsulate a factcheck-of-sorts in a story, and to find a way to include Willis in a 'shipfic' without shipping him with anyone other than you (it being the Shipfest and all). However, I can see that I failed spectacularly at conveying that, and can understand how you (both) saw it differently. So: sorry.

If it helps to settle Willis' mind, I'll note that the only reason I wrote him being a bit intimidated is that, well, 7-foot strangers standing over you is intimidating, and not acknowledging that would be planting a huge elephant in the room. I wrote him as being as unintimidating as he could (like I said before, he's socially inept), but clearly failed in my goal, so again: sorry.

I hope this public callout-and-apology will help set Willis' mind at ease.

hS

Intentions aside, hS did something that ended up making Willis uncomfortable. That's the simple facts. Whether this was intentional or not is a question for later - Willis is well within his rights to feel he's owed an apology.

As you guys know, I got Permission very recently, and since I'm just itching to start my career as a PPCer, I've got my first mission mostly planned out and written. I've already had someone look at it, but before I post, I'd like to have a second opinion.

I just want to make sure that everyone understands that neither Agent nor Boarder hS was actually doing anything to deliberately intimidate anyone else. The point of the ficlet was simply that Willis had his facts about elves misplaced, so an elf agent came along to set him straight. It wasn't about messing with anyone, it was about conveying information in a more entertaining way than simply going "well, actually" and spelling it out. It's the PPC; "entertaining" is generally how we try to do things.

If y'all still want an apology for hS accidentally freaking Willis out while actively trying not to, that's fair, but let's be clear about what actually happened. I'm sick to death of people misreading something hS did and assuming the worst of him, and I'm not going to stand for it.

I expect I'm next on the list for calling out. If so, could we please get it over with? I have to go to work in two hours.

~Neshomeh

Willis... has a grievance that, like all his grievances, he doesn't want to air to anyone except me. So I decided to air it myself, as it's left him with a bad taste in his mouth about the PPC in general, or at least "the influential Boarders" (aka oldbies), and therefore it really needs to be put out into the open.

This concerns the "Elves Aren't Supposed To Be Buff" spinoff. Willis mentioned to me that he found it a bit creepy that you were writing a one-shot of "a stand-in for [you] intimidating a stand-in for me." He said he also felt personally attacked, at least initially. And while he told me that he recognized that you were just messing with him and that he was over it, he is most certainly not over it.

I get what was going on. From your perspective, you were messing with him in a friendly way because of the running joke that you'll do anything to defend elves. I'd just like an apology so that he knows you respect him. Show him the Huinesoron I knew when I recruited him. Okay?

Thank you!
-Twistey

Since we don't have one, and this oneshot came up in the Discord a few days ago (and I just got reminded of it), I figured I'd post it.

All The Good Love [rated Explicit, though it could be Mature IMO] is a Guardians of the Galaxy Peter Quill/Rocket Raccoon fic where Peter gets turned into a raccoon by the power of crackfic soulmate artifact. Lots of joking (much of it rather inappropriate, but hey, it's funny) ensues, followed by off-screen good times (if you know what I mean).

- Tomash

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyFQVZ2h0V8

...and this is the best news I could have gotten.
Thank you so much, Neshomeh!

You would know, so that means a lot. Yay. ^_^

~Neshomeh

This was so very sweet. It captures perfectly that first minute of holding your new baby. My eyes got more than a little misty reading it.

I thought it was in Origins, but I can't back that up with just a quick scan. However, it is mentioned in this story: "Minor Gods" by Huinesoron.

~Neshomeh

Try beets. You can cook them in the microwave, just like potatoes (and probably all the root vegetables). Poke some holes in them, put them in a dish with a little water drizzled on, nuke for about ten minutes depending on number and size, with a rotation in the middle. Once you peel them, they're bright red or yellow (golden beets are a thing if you want to stick to the yellow-orange spectrum), and they have cool rings when you slice into them. {= D

Lately, I've been doing a once-a-week pot of kitchari, which apparently is a traditional Ayurvedic healing dish, but I like it because it's got Indian spices, but isn't really hot-spicy, and I can take it to work and eat it cold without it making me feel cold. I've been making it with lentils and split peas, rice, beets, carrots, and turnips, plus the spices and a bit of ghee for toasting the seed ones. Way better nutrition than peanut butter and jelly. It's kind of changed my life.

~Neshomeh

I could easily see the Nursery being a department, if more of us starting writing about the kids our agents adopt instead of side characters that pop up occasionally. Not sure there's much need to change it at the moment, though.

—doctorlit, neglecting his writing

Unfortunately, corn cobs have to be cooked, and I don't have the time or patience for heating things in a non-microwavey way, barring my once-a-week pot of breakfast spaghetti.

Aside from carrots and corn, all other vegetables are gross-looking.

—doctorlit, pickiest of eaters