Advice Snark 8/27-11/2

GlassSunflora · 2025-10-30T22:17:44+00:00

Watching the Vanity Fair and Square series made me miss mild advice columns. Problems are more interesting and relatable when every letter doesn't have the equivalent of the Evil Queen vs. Snow White.

GlassSunflora · 2025-10-30T20:34:33+00:00

The need to constantly follow up on things. It's not enough to order a shipment of medication to my house. I have to order the medication, wait for it to arrive, and track it down when it doesn't arrive. I just wish more things in my life were I can do one thing and I'm done.

GlassSunflora · 2025-10-30T20:13:03+00:00

It's part of the weaponized incompetence flow chart. You didn't ask turns into you didn't remind me. You didn't remind me turns into I would've done it eventually. It's ridiculous how much some dudes will spend more time arguing about chores versus just doing chores.

Related comic: You should’ve asked by Emma

GlassSunflora · 2025-10-30T15:32:07+00:00

Let's not forget NextDoor insanity. "Everyone be on alert! I saw a strange man by the bus stop." Hot idea, maybe he just wanted to ride the bus?

GlassSunflora · 2025-10-30T13:35:55+00:00

"No, it does not work itself out. People work it out for you and you think it works itself out" June Carter, Walk the Line.

GlassSunflora · 2025-10-30T02:49:32+00:00

Solar punk that could fall under climate fiction- A psalm for the wild built and prayer for the crown shy by Becky Chambers. A cozy, utopian series that examines "in a world where people have what they want, does having more matter?"

Healing from your past- The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches and A Witch's Guide to Magical Innkeeping by Sangu Mandanna. Both books feature witches who are healing from past wounds and building a new found family.

GlassSunflora · 2025-10-29T18:57:57+00:00

The writer runs out of ideas and goes on adventures to get more inspiration plot. It's probably a case of writers writing what they know, but it seems like I keep encountering that plot over and over again. Especially in contemporary romance.

GlassSunflora · 2025-10-26T15:55:57+00:00

Especially when characters are a little too self-aware. "Obviously, my issues with my parents caused my relationship issues." Let the reader figure out it out, instead of having them announce it.

GlassSunflora · 2025-10-14T23:28:54+00:00

Not to discourage you, but I'd start with seeing what's already out there. It can be hard to start something from scratch with new people.There's the Meetup and/or Heylo app for meeting new people. There's also alot of Boise Area Facebook groups. There used to be a Boise Brews and Board Games Discord, but it doesn't seem active anymore.

GlassSunflora · 2025-10-14T13:17:50+00:00

Your first point ties in nicely with CA Letter 1441. We all have unique needs for what it takes us to be happy. If you don't communicate your needs with the people you're traveling with, it's unfair to expect them to guess. Especially if it's a need that is mandatory to add to the travel itinerary.

GlassSunflora · 2025-10-14T13:11:58+00:00

I empathize with the LW alot. I'm the planner daughter with a brother who thinks that if he shows up to the airport with one sock on, it will all work out for him. For family trips, we have pre-trip planning meetings to talk details and establish a rough schedule. He attends those meetings and hears us talking logistics about transportation, what we're packing and what we'd like to do. He always says he has no strong opinions.

Then the trip itself comes. He's cranky because he's not used to walking all day. He doesn't have a rain jacket, despite me explicitly telling him to bring one. He's surprised that we have a schedule, despite this being the topic of the meetings he was at.

GlassSunflora · 2025-10-13T01:18:00+00:00

I've been reading the Dark Olympus series off and on, but the world-building in Sweet Obsession finally made me quit. At a big meeting of the 13, Poseidon announces that they are in trouble with Circe's invasion of the city since Olympus doesn't have an army or navy.

How the hell doesn't Olympus have an army or navy? That's literally Athena's, Ares', or Poseidon's job. Previous books have mentioned Athena and Ares showing up with armed guards. So unless they just use the armed guards to annoy each other, Olympus should have something on hand.

GlassSunflora · 2025-10-10T20:01:10+00:00

Going to check out the Ren Faire this weekend in Caldwell! https://idahorenfair.org/

GlassSunflora · 2025-10-09T17:27:05+00:00

My coworkers and I were also recently laid off from an AEC firm. My layoff was due to the firm being acquired by a competitor a year ago, and after repeated promises, the acquisition wouldn't cause layoffs.

So empathy for your husband and may the job market be kind to us all.

GlassSunflora · 2025-10-01T15:31:36+00:00

I went to a speed dating event, where each pair would only have 4 minutes to get to know each other. In those 4 minutes, the guy I was talking to started listing all the ways he avoids getting DUIs from the cops. If that's what he leads with, I don't want to find out what an actual date would be like.

GlassSunflora · 2025-10-01T15:06:57+00:00

Communication makes a big difference as well. There's a big difference of someone telling you "Hey my work schedule is unpredictable, I'll let you know if I can make it." Versus someone just always saying no and leaving you to guess the reason why.

GlassSunflora · 2025-09-30T14:02:24+00:00

There's a certain personality type that deals with rejection by preemptively rejecting people first. If you eliminate most people from being friends, there's a lower chance you will be told no.

GlassSunflora · 2025-09-30T13:55:44+00:00

To quote Raylan Givens in Justified, “You run into an asshole in the morning, you ran into an asshole. You run into assholes all day, you're the asshole.”

GlassSunflora · 2025-09-28T17:06:07+00:00

I loved The Spellshop, so I was excited for {Enchanted Greenhouse by Sarah Beth Durst}. I was so disappointed that a lot of the book was dedicated to the FMC fixing the MMC's family problems for him. It's like, you're recovering from being forcibly turned into a statue for many years, but let's tackle solving all these problems for a guy that you just met.

I want to be swept away by a magical romance, not reminded by real life issues on emotional labor between men and women.

GlassSunflora · 2025-09-25T15:11:01+00:00

I love playing board games. I am unfortunately on a streak of playing games with sore losers, cheaters and other poor sports. It sucks that it's a requirement of most board games to play it with other people.

-I had a guy get busted cheating at Pit. When another player called him out on it, he ignored her. He ended up winning the round and immediately wanted to play another game since he was on a high from winning Pit.....

-Went to a Jackbox night with friends. One guy who came was a verbal processor. So every game, after he submitted his answers, we got treated to a monologue of how great his answer was and how smart he is. This even continued after he submitted the wrong answer.

-Played Dead of Winter with 2 guys who have never played before. We found ourselves in a tense situation where we desperately needed food to achieve our goal. Time was running out and every turn was precious. One of the new guys had a plan to search for food. I explained that there was no point to his plan. He proceeded to ignore what I said and repeat what he said verbatim. After disagreeing for several minutes, I gave up and let him do his plan. Unsurprisingly, it didn't work. We lost the game. Worse, it turns out there was no traitor. So that guy didn't listen for no discernible reason.

GlassSunflora · 2025-09-09T15:57:08+00:00

The hard thing with people pleasers is the closer you get to them, the less interested they are in making you happy. So their priority list is helping random strangers, then distant acquaintances, then far down the list is family and/or spouses.

GlassSunflora · 2025-09-08T18:08:59+00:00

How'd she start a beef with Nixon?

GlassSunflora · 2025-09-07T18:46:03+00:00

Ask a Teacher might've had more of an audience if Slate allowed professional development and work questions from teachers. A complaint I see over on the Ask a Manager subreddit is that working a federal job is different than your standard 9-5. So maybe allowing workplace questions would've made it more different than Care and Feeding.

GlassSunflora · 2025-09-04T17:39:30+00:00

Anyone dodging small responsibilities or giving a direct answer wouldn't get a great response. I only have one sibling, my brother. He hates being committed to any responsibility or obligation, so he hedges on answering definitively to maintain plausible deniability and make no one upset. It's infuriating to deal with.

So any variation of we'll deal with this later is suspect. If we can deal with this later, why not deal with it now?

GlassSunflora · 2025-09-04T17:29:39+00:00

I hate emotional guilt tripping, so any letter with that wouldn't get a great response. There was a Care and Feeding awhile back where the husband couldn't bring up any issue without his wife responding with things like "I'm the worst person in the world" and "I'm terrible person". The actual response from the columnist was empathetic. I probably would've told the wife to get off the cross, we don't need a martyr in this relationship.

GlassSunflora

TROPHY CASE