Haven't any of these people been around children?
Or been pregnant?
Well, since a lot of these writers are teenage girls, I'm hoping they've never been the latter. It does seem that most of them get all their information from sitcoms and soap operas. While I wouldn't want them to get too realistic ("Buffy's episiotomy" is a phrase I hope never to encounter"), it'd be nice if there was some grip on reality.

I saw "Lost Boys" for the first time when I was very young, and only remembered the comic book store guys, so seeing it again recently was a bit of a revelation.

I actually tried to watch it last year and couldn't sit through it. Don't really know why.

I don't know if I'm just seeing the world through slash-colored glasses, but I watched Boomtown tonight and Ray said to his younger partner Tom (who was looking at Joel, aka Donny Wahlberg) and said, "What, you in love with him or something?" and I almost spit out my coke.

Becuase now I think he is, and now I wanna write some slash.

And more of them than I care to think of are functional adults.

Now, I've never given birth (I've been pregnant, but never with much success, although granted, that does give me a head-start in the ability to write that particular condition), but, let's face it, if you want to research it, there are so many misc.parenting.birthstories type groups on google, that even if you don't know anyone who has ever had a kid, you can quickly find out all the gruesome details you'd ever want to know. Plus, the pregnancy groups are always nattering about the tests, so even five minutes of research should have been able to get the facts and..

...again, why am I ranting about it when the premise is so flawed?

Argh. I guess I just like research. A lot. It's fun, it's easy, and it makes life better.

It is one of the easiest things to research, and I know several parentings boards that regularly get writers of fanfic and indiefic asking questions and getting great answers. In fact, one of my favorites put together a list of non-cliché but frequent pregnancy symptoms for writers to use. That is one of the things that bothers me as much as writers who don't bother to match the slang to the characters - it's a minor irk to have Willow say "clean your teeth", but a major one to have Xander say "bathing costume."

In fact, one of my favorites put together a list of non-cliché but frequent pregnancy symptoms for writers to use.

I find any pregnancy story that doens't contain frequent urination an offense against g-d.

Not that I've got some sort of pee fetish, it's just that damn it, that one's so close to universal (much more so than nausea), that leaving it out seems criminal.

Gotta say, next time I'm pregnant (if there is one)? Bathroom on the same fucking floor.

I find any pregnancy story that doens't contain frequent urination an offense against g-d.

I'd just like to share that I parsed this sentence

I find [any pregnancy story that doens't contain {frequent urination an offense against g-d}].

and was sitting around thinking "there is no indirect statement for that verb!" until it occured to me that that's a pretty weird thing to say.

I was a teenager when I saw The Lost Boys. It was all about Keifer Sutherland and Jason Patric. And all I remember is a few random scenes and the fact that the sex scene was totally gratuitous and I didn't give a shit.

PMM, you couldn't pay me enough to read bad preg fic. I don't if I should say "more power to you" or stage an intervention.

I'm pretty sure that The Lost Boys is where my interested in Vampires solidified.

Oooh, Keifer....

Carry on with the urination talk.

(note: These are two separate and completely unconnected thoughts. Thank you.)

PMM, you couldn't pay me enough to read bad preg fic. I don't if I should say "more power to you" or stage an intervention.

I think intervention is the only cure. Though I seem to have closed it in disgust after about 7 chapters.