Yyyyeah.
Writing an essay, sure, whatever. Seems a little much, but I can see it from the other angle laid out here and respect it.
Requiring not only an essay but specifically for it to occur on camera in a GM'd scene that said GM may or may not ever actually run and any particular player might not have a chance to participate in for any of a million reasons is just someone being a control freak, imho.
After months of my son begging and begging and bEGGING I finally gave in and adopted two kittens, a brother and sister.
The kiddo named this one Oreo and she's as sweet and cute as the name implies.
I named this one Alucard and HE'S A DEMON FROM THE FOULEST PITS OF HELL but I love him.
Why do we not all have jetpacks yet, WE WERE PROMISED JETPACKS IN THE FUTURE.
Really sorry friend. 
Car troubles are one of the most stressful and bullshitty things to deal with, and to confirm: yes, not being able to see your kid is THE worst.
@buttercup said in Health and Wealth and GrownUp Stuff:
Seems like it should be an uncommon situation even if overblown or more frequent. I just (no judgment) in my world wouldn't aggressively seek to change or push that natural emotional reaction out the door. Their minds are still young and fragile.
If it was uncommon, I'd just deal with it, but he has a pretty low pain tolerance is the issue. It's at least a couple times a day if not more. It's like, he'll be running around (which he almost always is, as a very active kid) and stub his toe a little, or bang his arm against a wall, and once I hear either of those things I know I only have a split second to brace myself or have one of my ear drums blown out.
Admittedly, my own tolerance for it is probably lower than average as well, as I have PTSD and screaming sets me on edge in any context anyway, so every time it happens in addition to the pain my nerves are just fried, thus the anxiety about it.
I get that it's how he's dealing with the pain and that it's not deliberate, but boy would I give anything to make him express that in just about any other way.
That said, please don't feel like a jerk. It does actually help to hear someone else is going through it; unfortunately a lot of family in proximity to us treat it like it's bizarre and being really tired of the judgement is another big part of the frustration for me.
My son will be ten next month, and every time he's in more pain than produced by like a simple scratch he releases the loudest, most ear-piercing shriek he physically can. It is fucking awful, it hurts like hell if you're remotely near him, and it takes everything in me not to yell or get upset when he does it. He is not neurotypical, but he's ten, and after years of trying to explain to him in every way I can think of how not appropriate it is to scream like that, trying positive reinforcement, trying consequences, trying everything under the sun, my patience with it is just gone. I don't know what to do anymore.
I have always been extremely empathetic whenever he gets hurt and have never tried to tell him it's not ok just to be upset or cry or anything like that when he's in pain, and I am as attentive as he lets me be when something happens (usually he wants space immediately after he gets hurt), but the screaming is so over the top. It doesn't help that it seems like an overreaction to me, but I just don't get it and am feeling really frustrated and anxious.
I had ZERO faith or expectations going in, but holy shit is Aquaman King of Atlantis on HBOMax worth a watch. It's almost painfully funny, and I'm looking forward to the next episodes a lot.
Speaking of painfully funny animated shows, the kiddo and I are really enjoying Mao Mao, Heroes of Pure Heart as well. It's another one I didn't initially expect to like, but it's really clever and the art is cute as heck.
@cobalt said in Health and Wealth and GrownUp Stuff:
Also fuck you for not tipping. If you don't want to tip then lobby to make it so we get paid better and don't have to rely on tips to make money.
Doordash recently did this big promotion where they removed the "delivery charges" and apparently everyone thinks that means they should opt out of a driver tip as well. It's infuriating when you're obligated to take those orders or risk losing the job because of the mandatory acceptance rate, but essentially wind up paying for the trip yourself because the base pay is so insultingly low.
So to sum up, @GreenFlashlight arbitrarily picked the wrong name to represent her otherwise valid and independently observable peeve, and because she made the choice to try and laugh it off instead of apologize, y'all are going to be passive aggressive and mean and take potshots for the next seven pages or so.
Just checking, carry on MSBing MSB.
Now I am dying to see someone write a story around a high fantasy world's small claims court.
@roz said in Talking 'Bout Ares:
Newer codebases removing command prefixes is literally the best thing to happen to this hobby in like 20 years.
If I had a nickel for every time I typed out a command back in the day and then slammed my head against my desk because I forgot it was @blah instead of +blah, and/or spent fifteen minutes of frustration searching "help" and then "+help" for the command I wanted but couldn't quite remember, I'd have enough nickel to melt down and recast into a giant statue of a hand extending the middle finger to the entire system.
I just wondered if I'm the only one. And I am. And I'm okay with that, too.
You're not the only one, but before the Great Ares War starts again can we just not, everybody? Every single time this subject gets brought up the same extremely bitter and extremely vocal sides get involved and it's pretty tiresome, y'all.
It's OK To Not Like Things. (Just, as we all know the song goes, don't be a dick about it.)
Midnight Mass on Netflix was...something.
It's very reminiscent of Salem's Lot, in that it's about a spooky vampire and a small town. The atmosphere of dread is palpable and there are some very creepy and eerie moments in it that make it worth the watch I think.
Sorta comes apart on the last episode, and the ending is...eh, but still. Some great character moments, and I really appreciated it overall.
That one is just going back to Star Wars' roots in Akira Kurosawa's films! I thought it was a cool little nod.
It starts out really strong! The animation remains pretty fantastic throughout. Most of the stories themselves are a little samey, and the English voice acting ranges from mediocre to hilariously bad, but overall it's worth watching IMO.
GOAL REACHED.
I just...I am stunned and humbled that came together so quickly, hardly even a day later.
I'm full of so much hope and positive feels and it is a HUGE weight off my shoulders, holy shit.
Thank you, everybody who gave or even thought about it. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
I hope I have the chance to pass this amazing kindness on soon. 
@clarity
Even if I don't hit what I asked for exactly, what has been given is so much more than what I had to work with and I have options now!! Thank you. 
I have been conditioned my whole life never to ask for help like this and honestly suffered because of it like a big dope. I am so grateful, seriously...it's like already half way to what I asked for, my mind is fucking blown and I feel SO MANY FEELS. Thanks y'all. 
Hey! So as I mentioned in the RL disgruntlement thread, my laptop is super dead, and unfortunately we are on a super tight budget that makes getting a new one not workable right now. My son and I need a machine with a little versatility for remote schoolwork, and I am planning on using it to learn some programming languages and database management.
I started a GoFundMe here, anything any of y'all could give towards it would be so, so appreciated.
