u/banana99bread

Regardless of pairing or premise, who are the fan fiction authors who you always know will have something great, are incredible writers and storytellers.

For example: I don’t always love the pairings but I love the storytelling and world building of ObsidianPen. I’m not a harry/voldemort person at all but her fics are just so well written.

Doesn’t have to be “I don’t like the pairings but…” this is just an example. Who are your best of the best?

I just realized I have clothes moths in my upstairs where most of our clothes live (makes sense). I'm going to do a big cleanout/wash/get cedar/freeze things as needed but I feel I need to be emotionally prepared: am I about to find a big pile of worms eating some sweater in a dresser or box somewhere? Do we think there will be any worms at all? Is this more a there might be a grub or two scattered about and more likely just signs of them? I live in fear of the thing where you pull up the corner of the sheet at the hotel and it's crawling w bedbugs.

Worms and wormy things really send me through the roof on ick factor so I know I need to do this no matter what but I would love any warning/emotional support and maybe err on the side of encouragement if you don't mind!

TYSM please be nice.

ETA: this is in the PNW

I am intimidated to can - but I can freeze! I have a TON of tomatoes, cherry, sungold, and two big heirloom types (my neighbor gave me, I want to say moscovich? does that sound right?).

What is your favorite way to save? Just parboil to remove skin and blend/cook with salt?

I know there are quite a few posts in this sub about custom cards...of course! I am looking at getting custom cards for a gift for my wedding (I come from a game-loving family). I would love either the back or the box to be somewhat specific to us, but don't need the faces to be. The only thing is, I would love the faces to not be the standard - to be fun or designed in some way. I just don't need them to be unique to us, if that makes sense! I have found companies where I can either customize the whole thing or just the front/just the back, but whatever isn't custom is standard. Are there any companies that have some options/alternates for the face side that we could have the back (or even just the box) be custom?

Basically - don't want to go down a rabbit hole of designing a whole deck, but would love them to feel fun.

I am looking to have my wedding just south of Albany near the Berkshire botanical gardens. Do you think October is risky with the cold, or is probably ok? I live in the city and I feel like it’s ok in October here but might not be further north. I don’t think I’ve ever been in that area in October. Things are obviously warmer than they’ve been, so maybe fine?

The other option is mid July….

I am planning my wedding and I would consider our budget to be way higher than I ever thought it would be ($70k). That said, I am struggling to find places that I like that offer what I’m looking for that aren’t in the high 80s when I put everything together. I would love insight on whether I’m totally mis-estimating some of these things or if you had similar “wants” and found a different solution.

My main “want” is for everyone to be together (walking distance), at the very least our friends and immediate family (around 45 people) if not the whole guest list (around 75-85). Otherwise, I am wide open on location bc it will be a destination wedding for most guests no matter what (everyone lives far from each other), and not particular about decor, what the food situation is, what the plates are, etc.

Geographic: bc it will be a destination for most guests we are focusing around big airports near where most of our guests live (admittedly expensive areas). Looking in CA, OR, WA, NY, primarily.

I have been looking mostly at hotels where we could have the ceremony on-site. For example: La madrona, camptown in ny, callicoon hills ny, captain whidbey, casa Cody in Palm Springs, trailborn in Mendocino (decided this was too far from the airport). Most of these have come in closer to $90k+. I’m open to places that are less “fancy” but I’m kind of struggling. I do ideally want some nature and for things to feel kind of backyard wedding. I would literally do a backyard wedding but there aren’t a lot of places to stay near my parents house.

This is the baseline budget I have for the non venue items, with the caveat that I don’t feel like I want to be in the above average range on most of these things. I’ve mostly been looking at vintage dresses and don’t want any crazy floral installations, just things for my bridesmaids and me and for the tables. I do want great pictures. I might even have a friend do my makeup and just get hair? I had these lower but raised them bc I was afraid to underestimate if we did ca or upstate ny and it was more expensive.
Photographer (no engagement shoot): 5k
Video camera rental: $700
Florals: $5k
Hair and Makeup: $2k
Dress and alterations: $5k
Suit: $1k
Rings: 1500
Printed things: 800
Wedding coordinator:$5k
(This is what I have down as “baseline” in my budget )

We’d be looking for a casual Friday welcome something since people are flying in and then Saturday ceremony. The places close to our budget can’t fit everyone and the places that can fit everyone are either abroad or outside our budget. My fiancee is worried we will lose a lot of people if we do abroad.

I attached a breakdown I made for one of the places we are looking at and considering. Sorry for the bad excel sheet organization but it makes sense to me. Things I’m including in the total: the three site fees, f&b total (sum of the items below it), rentals, service fee, av, gratuity, our room (this seemed insane pricing to me). I will say I’ve tried to look for places that felt less “fancy” than the places on our list and they gave me numbers just as high.

Is what I’m looking for just expensive? Sorry for the long long post.

Maybe I just need to hire a planner now? But I feel like I need to pick a region first at least.

Example budget I built for one venue we’re considering:
Site fee Sat $10,500
Site fee Friday 1,000
Site fee Sunday 250
F&B min $15,000
F&B TOTAL $30,185
Welcome drinks
$4,000
Paella
$5,065
Reception
$7,840
Passed apps
$1,465
Late night
$540
Breakfast
$1,400
Bar (7 hours)
$9,525
Kids (25pp)
350
Rentals $1,240
Event Service fee $1,844
Gratuity $5,024
AV 125
Our room: $3,094.69

Guest count for this budget: 80
Subtotal: $53,262
Baseline: $29,500
Total:$82,762

ETA: this is not including the cost to guests for their rooms, which is a lot!

This does slightly feel like “read anything good?” Maybe there’s a better way to say it. What are Your favorite HP fics that are well written, have a juicy little plot, but also spicy. What can I say!

Fics I’ve loved:
Choices (mauraders)
All the young dudes (mauraders)
Blood and gold (this is Hermione/tom which otherwise I’d say is a bit too dark for me but in this fic I love it)
DMATMOOBIL
Stowaway Malfoy (dramione cozy)
Beyond recall or desire (!)
Adrift (dramione - Draco finds Hermione in the muggle world with no memory of being a witch! Very rom com)
The trouble with wanting (fremione!) devastating truly but soooooooo incredible

Among many others! I don’t have a strong pairing loyalty, love a classic and love a rare pair. Don’t always love Voldemort//anyone (same goes for Bellatrix, dolohov, etc) but I suppose it depends on context!

Has anyone who gets PEM or has pots like symptoms had one or something similar? Any tips to keep it from totally knocking you out or to recover from it?

Or if you’ve had something similar and have thoughts that’s great too!

My wife is getting one. She is going to continue her antihistamines but they had her go off her other supplements.

She has dysautonomia, and has since she got Covid in September. She was really stuck to bed at first but now can do a lot more and go out in the world and she’s worried that she’s going to be setback.

ETA: I don’t think I’m using the right terms here I’m a little out of my depth but feel free to correct me! Maybe I mean any strategies for nervous system support??

Original post:

Has anyone found anything/therapies/strategies that help specifically with nervous system regulation and/or autonomic nervous system reregulation? My partner has been having long covid symptoms for a while and I think approaching this piece of it would help her.

Her symptoms:
Extreme fatigue has lessened a lot with time and lots of rest, but still gets very tired very easily.
Has been having some vision symptoms, eye fatigue?
If she watches a show with lots of drama/violence/suspense etc it makes it hard for her to bring her body back down to normal
Same with any kind of visual/social/auditory stimulation
She gets really, really hot and needs ice packs at night to fall asleep (she doesn’t feel that hot to me, but she feels hot to her)
When she’s having symptoms she’s extremely thirsty all day

She occasionally (less and less but a few times recently) has these episodes at night which were very frequent at the beginning. When she has a night episode:
Feeling hot like above
feels like she’s amped, heart racing, buzzy feeling, fight or flight
Sense of impending doom
Even when she falls asleep she is not really in deep sleep, it’s a light restless sleep where symptoms continue
Sleep paralysis

She’s been to a cardiologist who wasn’t concerned about her heart even though she has an occasional extra beat. He gave her meds for if her heart is racing but she’s nervous to take them. She’s taking supplements (coQ10, alpha lipoic acid, vitamin d, Zyrtec, fish oil). She also drinks electrolytes during the day. She’s also occasionally going to physical therapy but hasn’t been much. They did do a test (not tilt table) and told her she likely has pots. She stopped taking all stimulants and drinking caffeine and alcohol.

I’m just wondering if there are things other people have found helpful for the episodes specifically to help calm down your nervous system and allow it to rest. I think part of what’s keeping her from improving more is that even when she’s sitting or laying or sleeping she isn’t always really at rest. Not a fix all but anything that’s beneficial?

I’m pretty small (5’7”) for most office chairs (made for men) and I struggle with the whole I’m either cutting off my knees or have no back support or I’m shrimping or slouching. I’m trying to make my office more comfortable so I actually use it instead of curling up on a couch or worse, my bed. Have you guys found anything good? Ideally under $200 but if not I would look for something secondhand!

I tried to post what I thought was a super inocuos question in a hair Reddit asking about a product rec and I got immediately banned - the message I got said “blocking hive” but I’m not sure what that means?

I double checked that I didn’t break any of the subreddits rules so is this some kind of automated thing and is there anything I can do? I guess I don’t really need to be in that subreddit I was just hoping for some hair advice…

Has anyone used this? I’ve been using it for almost 7 years and it’s been so great for cleansing my hair without drying it out or making it too dry/poofy and keeping the shape/wave in it. But sadly it’s been discontinued (has for a while, I just stocked up). I found it through looking for curly girl method shampoos, it’s kind of a 2-in-1//co-wash type cleanser. I can use it as a shampoo (it lathers) if I want to wash my hair a little early but don’t want it to get too dry, or use it as a conditioner with regular shampoo and it works great. Low key heartbroken to lose it bc before I found it my hair was either massive and fluffy on day 1 or greasy on day 2.

If you’ve used it in the past, have you found anything similar that you liked? Or if you haven’t - do you have any products that you feel like could be similar that you like?

My hair is more wavy on the bottom/back and straight in the front which is a separate issue but it’s not super consistently wavy. Also thick/lots of it.

I’ve also been using the ouai leave in conditioner recently that I’ve been liking a lot. But I’m open to suggestions if you have similar hair and have anything that helps you have more even/consistent waves! My other thing is my waves look great the first day but then day two they’re so uneven that I usually end up blow drying my hair so it looks more purposeful.

I usually do either JVN hydrating shampoo, this mask as conditioner, and then leave in conditioner after I comb my hair in the shower or I do just the mask if I’m feeling low maintenance/washing my hair close together.

I commute a LONG way and I’d love some pod fics to listen to! What are your favorites?

I don’t have strong feelings about pairings but prefer no student/snape or trio/voldy kind of pairs. And a magical universe even if an AU!

I have listened to almost none, except blood and gold. So I’m open!

(Or woman)

Looking for a story about an epic journey or journeys, ideally with FMC or if multiple POVs then primarily FMCs. If she’s a prickly orphan with a bad attitude, all the better. Neutral on romance or no. Neutral on the level of fantasy. Can be adult or YA. Can be a literal physical journey or more of a Bildungsroman life journey. Or both!

Ideally easy to get into but not a must!

ETA: I have shameless and transparent bias towards women writers.

Because I am an anthro nerd at heart I’ve been thinking a lot about the themes I notice through the HP fanfics I read (so, so many fics). I feel like there are a lot of things that weren’t really canon from the books, but because they showed up in popular fics that then got replicated into smaller fics and have slowly saturated to the point of being “canon” (In this case I’m using the word to mean people treat it as such across a large portion of fics) even though they aren’t canon in the source material. I’m not talking about tropes, more like specific details or background info about characters that has become widely accepted even though it isn’t from canon.

Of course, now I can’t think of any, but I’m curious what the things are you notice as being sort of fic-culture canon from the hp universe?

What are the fics you’ve read that weren’t necessarily pairings or plot lines you expected to love, but the writing or world-building or storytelling was so incredible you couldn’t help but love it? Should be a book of their own fics that you could take the HP language out of and still readily enjoy.

I have read some mauraders fics like this, also fics like Blood&Gold and The Turning Wheel (still WIP). Not to mention an incredible mafia Draco fic and a truly horrifying post apocalyptic sci fi hp fic the name of which I cannot remember right now.

I’ve read lots of amazing fics that I loved for how they told a specific story about a character I loved or pairing I was looking for, but I’m talking about those could-have-been-a-novel fics.

I am agnostic on characters or pairings!

I love a good Hermione Draco but some of my favorite fics have been Hermione/fred (or George) or pansy Neville (a dress with pockets!!). I love a slightly mean or actually mean or pretend mean FMC (deadly education, anyone?). I recently saw a Draco Ginny fic that I thought could be an interesting combo as well!

I would love any and all recs for fics with fun pairings! Only request is no snape/student or Voldemort/anyone or dumbledore/anyone. Those don’t call to me, but otherwise I’m open! The Trouble With Wanting is one of my FAVES (Fred Hermione)

I don’t think I have any other pieces to the request. Maybe prefer magical fics to muggle AUs. Love some great plot, long fics and world building. A turning wheel (maybe it’s The turning wheel) is one of my recent faves because it has such a cool magical setup! And I also read a fic I can’t remember or find that was sooo good where Draco was a mobster.

AO3 is my usual for downloading ease but open to being led elsewhere!! I’m also somewhat open to crossovers although I think I’m not super familiar with most of the fandoms on AO3 outside HP unless they’re relatively widely popular. I have basic fandom interests. 🤷🏻‍♀️ I realize this is the hp fanfiction Reddit…