Older than your mom @wneleh - Tumblr Blog

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Silicon Valley (TV) Rating: General Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Characters: Richard Hendricks, Jared Dunn Summary:

“Don’t take this badly,” said Jared, “But you’d have been completely useless.”

Or, it's March 2020 and things are weird.

#silicon valley #silicon valley fanfic #richard hendricks #jared dunn #gen

To Do

Taxes first draft

Research for next Silicon Valley story

Write next Silicon Valley story. I am going to create/resurrect a gen fanfic fandom, I am!

De-poo the yard

Take G to Target - pillow for her, ice melt for us

Soccer tasks: B911 placement question, G56 girl issue, prek/k DOB and placement issues, start OOT waiver process, chase down unregistered rostered kids, EKS work, see what’s up with G911

Contact guy about dooring the gap in parsonage 1st floor unit

Paying Job task - new challenge

Hack out path to where the vent is going though now it’s snowing...

Depending on how taxes look, brainstorm spring break trip

Mail checks to musician, soccer written, will mail later today

Balance check books

Bills!

Church - maybe in person? Snowing, sigh

Superbowl

Munchies for SB

Pokemon community day is today, right? Maybe play a little downtown after returning G to her dorm went Tesla shopping instead, though did play a little at a mall

Make list of card recipients

Address cards

Get stamps

Mail cards

Submitted claim for C’s glasses

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Silicon Valley (TV) Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Characters: Bertram Gilfoyle, Dinesh Chugtai Summary:

Pied Piper is done. Tara wants a baby. Jared wants a passport. Dinesh just wants to be helpful.

Why was Gilfoyle trying to make this into an equation?

(As G as can be, but Gilfoyle has a potty mouth, sorry!)

#silicon valley #silicon valley fanfic #gen

To Do

Contact Summer Clinic girls not registered for fall soccer

Get coaches to register their kids

Email DC about coaching waiting for response

Text TC about coaching

Text unregistered kids on B78-1

PLUS loan paperwork

Church safe deposit box

Call city about French Drain water path

Get website info

Learn how COW is put together

G medical thing

Enneagram-inspired navel gazing

The summer I was 16 (before most of you were born), while at a university-sponsored summer science program, I took the official version of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator and came out on the INTP/ENTP (Logicain/Debator) line. I recognized it was just telling me back what I’d told the test, but it was fascinating to read about other types, and to realize that, even in that room of high-achieving nerds, there were lots of ways of looking at the world represented. But I was the nerdiest.

Go forward 40 years, and I’ve just come out an Enneagram 9 - The Peacemaker, who goes along to get along. What happened, and when???

My first go at the Enneagram was in 2008, and I scored about even in everything except types 2 (Helper) and 8 (Challenger), which were much lower. I found the results confusing and the test bizarre - it seemed (and still seems) all about how much one fears/craves/rebells against authority/rules; how smart or special one considers oneself; and how afraid one is of ones own shadow. Well, (1) rules are a tool and authority is just people; (2) WTF? More about this later, and (3) I’ve always hoped for the best and planned for the worst and mostly worn comfortable shoes. So I felt the Enneagram was mostly just reflecting back my relative privilege. And I was somewhat annoyed I hadn’t come out a Type 5 (Investigator). Because I was an INTP/ENTP, darn it! Except at about the same time my MBTI-ish scores started to go all over the place, depending on test. So I dropped the whole personality test thing.

OK, so what else was happening in 2008? I was working part-time as an engineer (still work the same place) and had just made a discovery that still influences my work today. And I’d just been told that we COULD NOT PUBLISH because oops it solved the problem too well. I was a bit crushed by this. I also had two grade-school daughters, going through what, to me, had been the most difficult years of childhood; I was finding their experiences illuminating. Also, my church was facing challenges that would result in selling our building and moving across town several years later; and I was leading the discernment process. I was also deep into fanfic-writing; and I was fighting a lot on parenting lists (I’m still on the same lists with the same people, but we don’t fight anymore (knock on wood)). Oh, and my heart was starting to increase in size due to mitral valve regurgitation - I wouldn’t know this for another year, and it would be corrected in 2010. In 2008, I was just finding that I wasn’t as peppy as I’d always been, and my blood pressure was starting to creep up.

To figure out how I’d gotten into this state in the late 2000′s, I need to go back to - um - early childhood? My parents are intellectuals who had me way before they’d planned to start a family. We were poor (dad was in grad school, mom was at home with us and doing whatever she could for cash) but my mom, who finished her BA in Early Childhood Education just months before my birth, wanted to put that education to use. And she did.

I was a sponge - hyperlexic, and also fascinated with numbers and patters from a very young age. Adults and older kids picked up on this, and I got a lot of positive reinforcement. Not, as I got older, from teachers, and especially not from same-age peers (see the bit about having a hard time in grade school) but yk school is only 6 hours a day for 180 days a year and you really don’t have to go to many of those days, not if your stomach is on your side. I had a fabulous friend across the street who was two years ahead of me in school, and parents I got on well with, and a church that suited me (and church friends)... and eventually fandom (Mr. Spock!) and two years of private school for 7th/8th where I learned to fake normal, and a high school for math/science kids where I was challenged and appreciated and GUESS WHAT I turned out tall and blond and skinny and a whole lot less damaged than a lot of kids, see above about having done well in the parent lottery. So peer-induced damage pretty much ended by the time I was 12.

But deep in me was an understanding that I was (1) very, very smart, (2) almost as weird as I was smart, and (3) destined for greatness in some academic pursuit. In the 1970s/1980s, this wasn’t a bad frame of mind for a girl to have, and was definitely encouraged by my parents, because there were pressures otherwise (though I never really felt them). Forward momentum!

So I put a lot of energy into Smart things. Some of them I liked - Jane Austen, Math Team, getting strong-but-not-perfect grades - and some I just faked my way through - chess, classical music, more advanced math and physics, all of biology - and some things I completely failed at - essentially, anything that required a decent memory + good phonemic skills. I.e., any language other than English. Anyway, on the whole this all worked spectacularly.

But all along there were things that didn’t quite fit. I have always loved sports - watching and doing - though I’ve mostly been really bad (okay, I was the best race walker in my state the summer between 7th and 8th grade :-) ). I’ve always liked SF. I can’t quite quote Tolkien - see above about memory incompetence - but I can tell you exactly where any quote you shoot me comes from (um, don’t test me) (like anyone is reading this!!!). Nothing about the lives of my professors, especially my grad school professors, appealed. I’ve ALWAY loved babies, in fact calming crying babies is my superpower (I talk to them about math or Tony Stark). I’m deeply religious. I like being part of community organizations, and NOBODY in these groups knows a thing about my math or my papers or patents. I’m coaching a grade 3/4 boys soccer team this season for no particular reason...

Anyway looking at me in 2008 - stressed, sick, self-righteous, and worried - and me in 2021, I can really see a hard left towards 9-dom. Not that I'm never stressed or self-righteous or worried! But seeing my kids THROUGH those years helped me put a lot of my childhood issues to bed (I was going to really delve into this, but I’ve already written plenty). Seeing the state of the world - and realizing my OTHER superpower is White Privilege and I can use this for good (again, skipping details) - and realizing that, if I’m going to live authentically, then I’m not going to do what you need to do to really succeed in science/math/engineering - and struggling for some causes and having things work out well, and having other things fail, and on the whole just enjoying the trip - well, that kind of drops me into Enneagram 9.

Now to catch some Pokemon and lose a soccer game :-)

#ear biscuits 291 #ennea 9 #navel gazing

To do today

A list!

Starbucks run with G

Write emails to soccer team (I’m coaching a team of 3rd/4th grade most-new-to-soccer boys): Practice times, COVID rules, getting ready for the season (what to buy, what to watch, general philosophy)

Contact CA about ref stuff I think we’re doing this wrong...

Send lists of coaches to intown coordinators

E’s taxes with E postponing - it’s too nice a day for taxes

Nail down travel coaches done?

Email teen coaches about their requirements/choices

Harass all coaches about getting through state requirements

Contact CI about sending check to Medford

Start out-of-town waiver process

Start a load of laundry

Balance joint account

Maybe pay some bills?

Dog park!

Hiya Tumblr

My account was behaving oddly, so I’ve changed the password; and I might as well write something while I’m here.

OK life. Life is good. Work is good. Actually, work is really good. Papers and patents and stuff.

Kids good too. G’s a sophomore in college, psychology major, living here because covid but enjoying remote classes and local friends. Having a college student as a quarantine buddy is great because they’ve always got something new to talk about. E graduated from college in May and, after living localish last summer, is back up in her college town, working and sewing and generally being 22. I’ve been missing her tremendously the past few days, but can’t go visit without throwing her into two weeks of lockdown.

Church is puttering along. The revolution seems to be on hold.

I’m still not writing.

The Expanse!

So I seem to be writing The Expanse fanfic. Two really short, really G gen character pieces today, maybe something more shippy once I get caught up (almost at the end of Season 3 now). I’ve no clue how the community is organized, or where fanfic is posted, but I’m old, I put everything on AO3.

Postcard From the Edge (198 words) by wneleh Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: The Expanse (TV) Rating: General Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Characters: Elise Holden Additional Tags: Missing Scene, Circa 3x03 "Assured Destruction" Summary:

"He's fine."

Dancing With John Wesley (418 words) by wneleh Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: The Expanse (TV) Rating: General Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Characters: Annushka "Anna" Volovodov Additional Tags: Missing Scene, 3x11 "Fallen World" Summary:

Pray without ceasing, John Wesley had said. God was getting the good with the bad with the somewhat deranged today.

#the expanse fanfic #gen gen so very gen #the expanse

rhinkipoo

Link has said before that their company is the basis for their friendship. Unpopular opinion that they work on their friendship to maintain what they've built together, but if they met today having not known each other before, I don't think their personalities would jive.

That might be true, but who cares? They’re besties and love and care for each other deeply and that’s what matters.

wneleh

Thinking of the places they might meet (from my prospective as a someone about 10 years older than they are) - if they were neighbors, I think they’d crack each other up, and be on the same side of neighborhood issues. If their kids were into the same thing, I think their wives would have bonded and then they’d have connected. If they were coworkers, I think they’d have appreciated each others’ intelligence, integrity, and prospective. Ditto for meeting in church as adults. Do I think they’d have become BFFs? Actually, depending on who else was in their lives, maybe. Especially if they were still in North Carolina.

To Do, kinda

Hey there tumblr, doing okay? No? Yeah, well...

We’re good here. I think. Who knows?

When I look back at this time (and a lot of what goes through my head is, how the heck will I ever describe this? No clue who I’m describing it to) what I’ll remember most is just the NOT KNOWING. Not just not knowing what will happen to me personally, but to the world, to society, to people I care about and people I will never meet.

Anyhow, when I said we’re good here, I meant it. We’re all well; C and I are both still employed, in fact I’ve had a really good couple of months, and C has been involved in https://project-manus.mit.edu/fs, which has been fulfilling. E was awarded her BA last Sunday, hurrah, and G has finished her first year of college; both of my daughters pulled straight As this past semester, which just astounds me.

The end of E’s undergraduate career means she’s giving up her college apartment; she’s putting a bunch of furniture and such into storage, and then she and her SO are going to spend the summer on the coast trying to figure out what to do next, but in between she’s going to be here for a week, so we need to make room for another adult in our messy little bungalow. We’re CLEANING and DECLUTTERING and ORGANIZING. It’s going well, but I’ve reached the point where I need a list, so here goes:

Send email to all cash calendar winners to date, asking for name and mailing address

Eat something; I’m hungry again

Get liquor bottles off the counter. Funny story - a few weeks ago, we learned that G had NO IDEA we have a pretty extensive liquor supply in the cabinet above the refrigerator. Some 18-year-old she is! Anyway, about a quarter of what should be in that cabinet, isn’t.

Clean behind the stand mixer (it’s scary back there)

Finish cleaning out what we call the Dog Closet

Put recycling boxes into the bottom of the Dog Closet

Mop kitchen floor (C does this)

Vacuum living room (another C thing)

Work our way to E’s closet, see if we can put anything into it

Put G’s first, unused, prom dress into our closet

De-G the surfaces of E’s room

Clean bathroom

Move Bag of Plastic Mugs And Such up to the attic

Get everything non-E out of E’s room, stack next to dining table.

Deposit checks

Find E’s refund check(s)

Do taxes (finally)

Finish getting junk out of the minivan (mostly done Saturday)

wilwheaton

adaswordlace

every abusive asshole genius rockstar you’ve heard of has one thing in common: they’ve driven more talent out of their industry than they will ever be able to make up for.

and what’s worse is every shithead stan out there has works they can point to like “but look at all this ART we would have missed out on if he had been held accountable from the beginning”

how do you quantify all the cinema that could have been? How do you account for the careers abandoned because giving up on your dream was better than putting up with Roger Ailes or Harvey Weinstein or Louis CK or any number of other power players/geniuses/auteurs/rock stars/what the fuck ever?

You can’t.

Fuck your favorite oeuvre, give me back the artists that fucker stole from the world.

wneleh

And the writers, and the scientists...

catchymemes

celtic-pyro-deactivated20230725

Now I want to get married just so I can do this.

baneismydragon

If I were a billionaire I would absolutely tell my secretary to send wedding gifts to anyone who sent me an invite regardless of if I knew them, because- A. I know how expensive that nonsense is. B. I would be a billionaire and when else am I gonna do with that much money? Honestly… and C. I would totally make showing up at random weddings with crazy awesome gifts my new stress relief hobby. “Congratulations random strangers! I admire your daring and stratigic planning. Here’s that 700$ tea set you wanted but assumed no one would ever buy.”

wneleh

E’s boyfriend’s family isn’t rich, but his father and mother both run cultural institutions, and this brings them in close, continuing contact with some A-list celebs of all sorts. If they marry, I’ve no clue how you handle these sorts of contacts.

aro-allo-positivity

Are you serious about having people send you pics of their legal documents just to prove their age on a discord server? Sorry, friend, that creeps me out too much

They can censor as much information as they want, all I need to know is the DOB, additionally verification is fully optional. We do this because we don’t want MINORS in the NSFW chat. I don’t care that it creeps you out. Keeping minors out of NSFW spaces is more important to me than the feelings of an anonymous rando that’s not even in the server.

wetwareproblem

If they can censor out everything but the DOB, then it’s pointless - I can show you ID from the Canadian or US jurisdiction of your choice right now, but clearly it wouldn’t be mine. Of course, you’d have absolutely no way to know that.

If they cannot censor out everything but the DOB, then you’re asking for things with a lot of personally identifiable information and have no policy in place for how to manage that information.

Either way, this is a very invasive ask that… doesn’t actually accomplish its stated purpose in any way.

Speaking as someone who runs a decently-busy Discord server that has complex age-screening requirements and has a background in security and penetration, about the only tools you have that will actually let you verify ID without putting vulnerable people at risk in this environment are a web of trust (ie, who can vouch for this person) and observation of their behaviour (ie, what’s their past public record? How do they interact with others in the server?).

It’s a complex and time-consuming process - if someone doesn’t have a strong track record or well-trusted vouches, it can take up to a month before I’m satisfied that a new member isn’t there to mess with things they shouldn’t and can respect boundaries - but it’s the only thing that will actually work.

wneleh

This is actually relevant to my life, in that I handle financial aid requests for the town soccer league, and also do ID verification for our background check system. When I need to see a document, and can’t do it in person, I ask for ID numbers to be covered. Sure, someone can cheat any system, but wcyd? My goal is participation anyway. (Actually for the background checks I always see the ID in person, but I’d never be able to spot a forgery.)

bewilderedscarlet

This is a photo taken by George Steinmetz for the National Geographic. It is from straight above - the things that look like camels are their shadows.