u/Serpenthrope

When my wife and I were getting ready for the birth of our daughter we either bought or were gifted lots of disposable diapers, but we also bought several packs of pocket diapers (I won't name the brand, I'm worried this is going to sound like an advertisement). I was honestly scared we were going to just get frustrated with them quickly, and that investment would go to waste, but...well...no.

I don't think we even used a quarter of the disposable newborn diapers we had (my mother keeps books for a church that runs a daycare, our daughter is already too big for the newborn size, so we just donated them for any families that needed them). Within a week or two the pocket diapers were just our standard, unless we were going out (the only reason we don't use them going out is that we have a limited supply of wet-dry bags, and more are currently on order).

I've always heard that cloth diapers are gross, but...I've now changed both. You have to deal with pee and poo either way, and I'd rather wash them than have a stinky trashcan overflowing with used butt garments.

I've also always heard that you need disposables for daycare. While my wife ended up staying home with our daughter (we're making it work), we did talk to two daycares (including the one mentioned above). Both said that if we wanted to use pocket diapers we just had to provide wet-dry bags and they'd stuff the used ones in the bag for us to take home at the end of the day.

On top of that, the pocket diapers are just more secure. I can struggle trying to get that adhesive strap to stick on a disposable, or I can just use the snaps on a pocket diaper. Early on we were having blow-outs every day with poop all over her clothes. We have never had a single blow-out when she was wearing a pocket diaper.

And on top of that, looking at used ones for sale on eBay, they don't even seem to lose that much value when you resell them! When we're done we can recoup a decent chunk of our initial investment (assuming they're still in usable condition, which they might not be if we have multiple kids, I admit).

Since we started, I've shown these things to parents, parents-to-be, and on a few occasions someone with a relative about to have a baby. Every single one of them was shocked at how good these things are. Apparently "cloth diapering" still evokes images of wrapping a handkerchief around the baby and securing it with a safety pin.

The only possible reason I can think of why pocket diapers aren't the standard is they aren't advertised. I just can't shake the feeling that disposable diapers are basically a scam on new parents to take as much of our money as possible.

Hey, I know whenever you ask about ideas for books the immediate response is “Have you actually written anything?”  So, before everyone starts judging me, the current draft of my first book (hope to self-publish next year) is 100k words, and I’m editing it.  But, while I do that, I’m jotting down tons of ideas for my second book in lots of different genres.

Last night I watched a romance film with my wife and I very much enjoyed it, but I felt a little like many of the subplots were so strong that they could have skipped the standard third-act breakup and used the time to develop the leads’ relationships with some of the (really likeable) side characters more.

This kind of gave me an idea, but since I’m not an expert in the romance genre I’m a bit worried that what seems like a clever idea to me is something romance readers have seen a million times, so I figured I’d check: What if I set up the standard “relationship built on a lie,” with the appearance of an impending third-act breakup, but then made the girl genre-savvy and cut that aspect short?

What I had in mind was that when the Black Moment seems to be imminent she says “Okay, you’re acting weird, and I’ve seen enough romances to know that there’s some dark secret that could torpedo our whole relationship.  Let’s make this simple: I’m giving you ONE free pass.  Spill it right now and I will forgive whatever it is.”

Is this something old hat?  Or is it so formula-breaking it would just make potential readers mad?

Hey, I'm currently facing a crisis, and need to make a decision about whether to change firms fast. We just had a baby, and if I change firms my wife will go back to work and our daughter will go to daycare, which neither of us want, but I'm terrified regarding job security.

Here's my situation:

The firm I was at after I graduated I worked at for about five years, but after I became a CPA they raised my pay, but a lot of my work stayed the same (tax returns in tax season, bookkeeping the rest of the time, very little feedback), and I wanted to learn more.

So, I went to another firm that paid more where they just wanted me to do tax, but they basically found that my work at the prior firm hadn't prepared me for that job and they didn't have time to train me and had to let me go.

Jump to firm #3. They also just wanted me to do taxes, but kind of at an intermediate level between the two (at least there was more feedback), but after tax season they told me I wasn't worth the money because I was bad at time management (I think the second firm rattled me and I didn't want to ask for help and just got stuck on stuff). But, I talked them into cutting my pay instead of firing me.

So, I've been at this job for two tax seasons, and now make less than I did at the first firm. I feel like they hate me (could be my irrational brain), and if there isn't a tax return to be done I'm bored as hell and miss the bookkeeping just to keep me busy. I've checked and the first firm isn't hiring right now.

Part of me REALLY wants to jump ship, but that means my wife has to keep working until we're confident in the new position, and I feel like if I get fired again I've let my family down. But, if I don't go now and my wife stops working, I don't know when I'll be able to risk leaving again. Also, I don't want to run out of firms.

This is a weird post.  I’m finishing up a draft of the final chapter of my novel (I had to rewrite the last chapter so extensively I’m not sure if it counts as a second draft, or a second first draft).  In the past when I’ve tried to write more than a short story I’ve gotten tangled up in World Building, never grew attached to the characters, and it all fell apart.

But, with this novel I did come to like the characters.  And I still ended up doing a lot of world building.  But, somehow, it stayed focused on what I needed for the story (...mostly, there were a few times when I couldn’t stop my self-indulgence, but I put it in the context of a guy who was massively knowledgeable, but kind of anti-social, lecturing…).

I feel like the difference this time is I started from something that already existed.  That may sound weird, but here’s my situation:

I realized the 1931 Dracula and Frankenstein films are about to enter the public domain.  So, I decided I wanted to write a novel following up on those.  However, I didn’t want to contradict the later films that I wouldn’t have the rights to, so that limited how much I could use the main characters from those films.  While they both show up in some form, my main characters ended up being a mixture of OCs, and supporting characters from those two films who don’t show up in the sequels.

From there, since I was actually getting the PoV of people living in this universe, I started trying to indirectly set up room for the sequels when they enter the public domain, as well as answer some questions about how this world functions that always seemed weird to me in the classic films (ie “The Mummy shows that spellcasting is something humans can do, so why hasn’t a technologically advanced civilization realized that and implemented it on an industrial scale?”).

And from all of that not only did I somehow complete a draft of this novel (technically I have a few more paragraphs to write wrapping things up), but I also now have outlines for multiple other stories in the same universe.  I know my novel is far from perfect, I’m not a professional writer, but it’s a story I actually like.

So, my question, weird as it is: why was it so much easier expanding on a few stories that already existed than starting from scratch, even when I was mostly using my own characters?

I just wanted to get some feedback on this.  I know different parents can have their own Santa lore, but I’ve kind of wanted to incorporate Krampus into things when my daughter gets old enough.  But, I also don’t want to scare the crap out of her with the idea that one year of being bad could get her taken away forever, to say nothing of beating her with a stick!  So, I had a plan to make Krampus a bit more proportional.  Several people I’ve told this to think the story I came up with is hilarious, while my wife thinks it’s way too complicated and would inevitably lead to our daughter realizing I was making stuff up.

My story: In the 1970s there was more and more controversy about Krampus hitting other people’s kids, and taking them away forever getting in the way of their education.  So, Nixon signed the Krampus Reform Act into law, and Krampus begrudgingly agreed to abide by it.

Basically, he can still take bad kids away, but he can’t hit them, and has to have them back in time for school.  So, Krampus began taking the bad kids to large retail establishments, where they had to spend their New Years helping to process all the post-Christmas returns while all their friends got to enjoy the rest of their Winter Break.

Do you think kids would believe this?

I know I’d be preaching to the choir here if I complained about mother’s getting so much more maternity leave than men.  My wife is taking twelve weeks, but I had to take one week out of my vacation time, and every day I can’t be with my daughter kills me, and every single thing I can contribute to her care makes me feel so much better.

Yesterday, my wife started testing out songs to see which could calm the baby down when she was crying.  My wife is the big music fan, so of course most of the playlist was her songs.  But, one song came up that I’d introduced her to, “Red Dragon Tattoo” by Fountains of Wayne.

…and, well, the baby liked it.  It was one of her Dad’s songs, and it calmed her right down.

This morning, while getting ready for work, I played it for her two or three times when she started crying, and just ended up dancing around my kitchen singing it to my daughter.

I know my children won’t like everything I like, and most likely many of their interests will be things that are totally incomprehensible to me.  And I hope I can always support their interests, whatever they are.

That said, I always hope my children will have a few things in common with their Dad.  And, even typing this, it makes me tear up to think my daughter likes that song.

To my mother: "I think we got the best baby. You most have gotten ripped off."