Gorgeous parody letter

[gingicat]

Ask A Manager: Help, I’m Being Transferred to My Mother’s Work Unit! (2240 words) by SouthernContinentSkies
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Vorkosigan Saga - Lois McMaster Bujold
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Alys Vorpatril & Ivan Vorpatril
Characters: Ivan Vorpatril, Alison Green (Ask a Manager)
Additional Tags: Advice Column, Book: A Civil Campaign, Time Period: Reign of Gregor Vorbarra
Summary:

A reader writes:

So, I’m not experiencing any problems yet, but I’m about to enter a very professionally (and personally!) awkward position at work, and I’d really like your advance on how to handle it. Long story short, my mother is about to become my direct supervisor. For a year. And there’s literally nothing I can do about it. Help??

It's an amazingly good parody of a Missing Reasons letter, and now I need to reread that particular book.

Comments

[fred_mouse]

oooh.

[julian]

Noice.

My slightly inept searching can't find the Captain Awkward Answers Aral Vorkosigan one, though. Sadness.

Edit: Found it. Not by the same author, and not about Aral and Cordelia, which was *my* assumption and therefore not, in and of itself, a problem. https://archiveofourown.org/works/8924812/chapters/20443798

[gingicat]

"I think you feel like you can fix Darth because you might be seeing it as a parallel to your grandmother fixing you. But you did the work in fixing yourself. You took the tools that your grandmother gave you and you did the hard work. You can't fix Darth for him. You're a regular reader, so you know that you can't set yourself on fire to keep someone warm, but I want to remind you that that applies to you as well. You can't set yourself on fire for Darth, and no one set themselves on fire for you. People gave you a lifeline and you took it."

Good general-purpose advice!

[goljerp]

But, note, that people will set fires for him. And go shopping for him.

:-)

("Him" = The letter writer, that is, not Darth)

[minoanmiss]

*grins*

[greenygal]

Lord, the letters that either Aral or Cordelia might have written about their situation at various time periods after she came to Barrayar. I envision Captain Awkward requiring a stiff drink before she responded.

[fred_mouse]

Thank you for finding this - I didn't have the oomph. And now I have something to read tonight :)

[ashbet]

I splutter-laughed the whole way through this, because it is PITCH-PERFECT Allison, and Ivan is SO SCREWED — hahahahah!!!

(Longtime Vorkosiverse fan since the first books came out, so this is particularly choice!)