I will always treasure the video my dad sent my sisters and me when my parents went to Harry Potter World-- he wanted us to see the dragon breathe fire, so he stood there for EIGHT MINUTES waiting for it to go off, and then sent us the full eight minute video because he didn't know how to edit it. DADS.

Here you go!
http://archiveofourown.org/works/609865

Has everyone here read the novel-length Les Miserables fanfic where everyone argues about Chretien de Troyes and Romantic literature and makes terrible bilingual puns and like 70% fewer people die than in the original text? I feel like it's up The Toast's collective alley.

Baking chocolate might have some sugar but it is not the amount of sugar you're used to, as 4-year-old me learned when my mom left off baking something to answer the phone in the next room. When she came back in I was crying and spitting chocolate bits into the sink, aghast that my perfect crime had lead to betrayal by the one foodstuff I thought I could always trust.

SAME.

Holy shit, I just realized that I have NO IDEA if I have any queer cousins. Since I have a jillion cousins (Mom has 14 first cousins, most of whom have kids close in age to me who still live in the area, not to mention innumerable shirt-tail relatives), this seems statistically unlikely. But, of course, We Don't Talk About That.

It was enough of a shock at my (first) cousin's wedding shower, last summer, when my (first, once removed) cousin casually mentioned her daughter's ADHD and anxiety treatment. When I noted that I have the same issues she said that both run rampant in our family (I had guessed this) and named a dozen relatives she knew of who had them, including my grandfather (I had NOT guessed this).

And of course, the last time I saw my parents they asked after my high school best friend, who is currently living with her boyfriend of several years. "I thought she was a lesbian?" my mom asked, as she has every time in the last few years I have reported back on this friend. As I have every time in the last few years, I said, "No. She's bisexual. She was bisexual when she was dating a woman, and she is bisexual now. She has been bisexual the entire time." We will doubtless have this conversation again in a few months.

Oh man, a former housemate of mine came home with a tiny kitten because her coworker brought the poor wee thing in a shoebox and housemate didn't trust any of her coworkers with a kitten. She ended up naming the kitten Nike, for the shoebox.

I kind of want to post some of these to craigslist and see what happens, now.

I spent five and a half years working in after-school programs, a year as a classroom aide, and I've been the regular, four-days-a-week after-school sitter for a pair of sisters for the last two years.

Weirdly, this has cemented my lack of interest in biological children of my own, because there are SO MANY great kids that already exist. Pretty sure I'm signing up to foster parent when I'm 35, though.

When the family I currently sit for hired me, their mom had late-stage cancer, and she died about two months later. I sometimes feel weird about how often I get mistaken for their mom (they're tweens, so I'm only 14 years older than the oldest one!) but I don't want to make a big deal out of it or make it weird for them, you know? I don't think I'm really a mom figure to them, anyway-- I suspect that the closest analogue is the interesting but sometimes embarrassing aunt who wants to lend you books and talk to you about feminism.

The other nice thing about working in childcare is that I get to do all the activities that, as an adult, I am not supposed to want to do anymore, like plan elaborately themed birthday parties and make Halloween costumes and have long, involved conversations about cartoon characters.

Actually, a few weeks ago I got to run a week-long Harry Potter-themed day camp where the kids made head-to-toe wizarding costumes and played Quidditch every day. Not gonna lie, y'all, it was PRETTY GREAT.

Oh god, my dad DOES have a bobblehead of himself.