All Comments on 'Hands on the Wheel Ch. 02'

ZZZZZZZZZZZ

I'm enjoying the story, but the droning descriptions of Ivan's work and the technical details caused me to skip over at least 2 full pages of the story.

characters make more sense at least. story is short but the immersion doesn't break.

about that last line, idk. i was cheated on by an ex. i didn't crawl into a bottle. i felt GREAT. she became a burden in the end. i ate better, slept better, set goals more, worked out. it hurt at first of course. she was like a tumor that i had unjustified nostalgia for if that makes sense. cutting it out sucked, but ultimately felt amazing.

By the bottom of page 2 I could tell he was going to forget Fumiko and marry Jean, and she was going to end up being some kind of cheating monster whore. So I just searched the succeeding pages for "fumiko" and it took me right to the end where Jean reviews all the cheating and slutting that apparently happened in pages 3, 4, and most of 5? Don't know, don't care. The details of her whoring is probably as boring as all the other pointless tedious details you just had to relate about some software virus in a beta version, or something like that? I was really hoping for a Loving Wives story, not a seminar on esoteric software development and launch and testing issues. Yeah, all that was really really interesting and exciting. Who needs any human interest when you've got that kind of emotionally stirring meat to chew on: you dissed my daddy so I fucked up your software. Oh, if I have missed or neglected any details its because there are Too Damn Many to keep track of. The only reason I kept reading was to find out what happened to Fumiko.

So thanks for providing a back door out of your House Of Marriage Horrors that was chapter 2. I don't care if there is a chapter 3. We all know in general what comes next. Reading the actual detailed account will be an alternative to sleeping pills. So thanks for that, I guess, if it ever gets written.

Wow, what a waste of time and energy. You have such potential, if you can just get over yourself.

I don't recognize the main characters of chapters 1 and 2 as being the same people.

So, after a sweet romantic interlude with Fumiko, the Ivan of Chapter Two doesn't bother trying to contact her or even think of her again?

Instead, he meets the queen of all sluts, and despite spending 10+ dates doing nothing but talking, apparently has only the slightest and most superficial understanding of who she is. Despite that, he marries her, and then continues doing fuck-all to really get to know who she is, and is then blindsided when it turns out that she's an unabashed and unapologetic slut, in part because he was such a timid nice-guy that he couldn't bring himself to get into her pants before he proposed (despite being suave enough to have that perfect interlude with Fumiko) and just assumed she was on the same sexual/moral page as he was.

Oh, and despite everyone around him knowing that she's the queen of all sluts and is actively cheating on him, no one gives enough of a rat's ass about Ivan to drop any hints, not when they had some sort of strange 'exclusive but sexless (at least as far as *he* goes)' relationship, not when they became engaged, not when they were married.

The Ivan of Chapter Two is a pathetic loser who seems to have earned his misery. He comes across as an autistic virgin on his first date, which meshes badly with the portrayal of him as a competent human being.

she was a real whore best to be rid of her would not bother to be a drunk for a year just go on with life

Wow! I look forward to the next installment!

Yes, your story is well written, but agree with another that the two chapters seem almost disconnected. I understand that he got caught up in the product crisis, but it is hard to accept that he completely forgot about his Japanese love and the intense attraction they had to each other. If he is unable to retain even some thoughts of her, he is way too much of a computer nerd to have the feelings you are trying to impart to his character.

Too much detail about his job and the technical aspects of how things work. You need a great editor. A good one won't do. And she's right. He was a coward. If he doesn't care about the slut and doesn't even want to talk to her, why would he stay drunk for a year? Horrible ending to a muddled story. Not good. Not good at all.

should have stopped at the first chapter ppl can actually skip the first 2 pages unless they liked computer science class. cant feel all that bad about ivan, marring a person u dont know, he probably should have lived with her for a bit. with friends like brian and viki who needs enemies, sitting there while ur friends wife is cuckolding a so called friend isnt a friend. the actual LW story in this story felt like an after thought to all that computer crap. but like other are say was well typed, just a bad story

Wow! I was wondering why you're score was so low, but now I know: they are voting against Zuckerberg, and you happen to be the most convient target. Onward Ambrose! Geek on... a lot of us enjoy it.

It does remind me of another story - maybe by ItMgr — about a tech company in the midst of an IPO when the founding geek discovers his wife is actually a gold digger who has been screwing around on him with the business guy, while they are trying to cut out the programmer out of the money.

That a geek could be distracted by a woman for a couple of years would hardly be a surprise. His friends should have pulled him aside, of course, and filled him in on their concerns regarding 'his' woman... I had a friend in high school who made the same mistake — married the first woman who would give him sex, even though she had been the village bike. And none of us wanted to spoil his chance for happiness — after all, maybe his girlfriend/wife would become monogamous after marriage in a way that she couldn't/wouldn't before. (BTW — the answer is: no! LOL)

So take heart — the philistines who complain are, in a word, WRONG! 5Stars

Looked up the other story to which I had referred: Initial Public Offering, by FD45

Further thinking on his messing with her pills: His "revenge" was as half-assed and shallow as the rest of his thinking. She's right that he probably committed a felony, so why confess to her about it? More importantly, if you're going to do something as fucked-up as replacing morning after pills with a placebo, confessing while it's still early enough that she could get an abortion makes the whole thing pretty meaningless.

Of course, the fact that she's getting bulk supplies of Plan B is almost as nonsensical as his behavior. She might as well just be taking a normal contraceptive pill; she could hide the latter just as easily as the former, she's obviously not really interested in getting pregnant, and either would show up in any bloodwork.

"Does the faith of your family mean so little to you, even though you don't share it?" -> This is a statement I cannot conceive of being uttered by an actual human being. The answer is so blindingly obvious that, no, an actual human adult woman who explicitly does not personally follow her parents' faith is not going to choose to have a baby simply because of her parents' religious beliefs, and if such a woman did exist, a woman who's chugging morning after pills like candy is not it.

"When the divorce was final a few months later, Ivan responded the way any red-blooded American male would: he got drunk and stayed drunk for almost a year." -> No, that's how an immature child would respond, but I guess that fits. If he had spent half the time getting to actually know the girl before he married her (or half the time actually trying to build a married relationship that first year, before she cheated) that he apparently did wallowing in misery after the fact, he'd have been much better off.

So, basically, he had this great potential relationship with a Japanese girl that he blew off to go back to work, then he spent over a year barely interacting with his fiance/wife so that he could spend time at work, and then, after his personal life deservedly turns to shit, he crawls into the bottle, presumably destroying the career that he had sacrificed everything else for. This is a guy who has earned every ounce of misery he gets.

I agree with the comment about getting lost in the words

When you choose to include a lot of technical writing about a subject most people don't know about there are two choices:

1/ Skip it all and ignore it missing a good part of the story (I did)

2/ If you know the subject you have to follow line by line to see if the author knows it and be ready to call bullshit.

Both impact enjoyment of the story. 3* (would have been 4 otherwise)

I've read and appreciated A_Bierce before, the muse isn't in synch this time out. He's done better before and I'm sure will do better in future.

Your work is usually much better than this.

I hope to see a last chapter offering better

closure. Once Ivan stops picking his liver...

not quite 5* for me but close. The detail re the software not working got tedious, even though I am technically oriented and curious, but just got a little too inside for me.

Jean is a true narcissist, bending & breaking time tested most of the 10 Commandments to suite her libido and reptilian urges. What a disaster for a woman and spouse!

The part where Ivan flipped the scrip and turned the tables on her was brilliant.

Thx and looking forward to your next installment.

Way to much computer jargon. What happened to the budding love story in chapter one?

Just about old home week for your description... Been through way too many of those places in the last 50 years.

Not smart enough to understand the technical jargon, but enjoyed the cheating wife gets what she deserves part.

Both the company and Jean should've lost their shirt BEFORE he gets drunk post divorce. Should've burned them both.

41/2 pages of lead up and 1/2 page of actual story. You lost me on the airplane and data mining as if i actually cared and the ever so suspenseful emergency that compelled the team into whatever scenario you concocted was enough to put me to sleep.

Ch 1; Romance in Japan. Ch 2(a) Computer problems. Ch2(b) Dump slut wife. Will there be chapter 3 to connect these parts together?

What the hell is all the bullshit at the start of this chapter? Who cares what a problem is with the program and, I guess, how they solved it. I might be interested if I understood anything you wrote. Couod have said all this in one paragraph with enough space for sex.

Even forgot what the story was meant to be about. The guy isnt even married, so where is the loving wife to get the btb?

Could not get far enough to find the sex. Got a good nights sleep though with story in front of me.

I thoroughly enjoyed the entire story, the emotional and sexual aspects woven into an interesting view of one aspect of our society. Particularly timely given the Facebook, Cambridge Analytica stories in the news.

Congratulations, looking forward to the next chapter.

The first chapter ended with him romancing the Japanese girl, then this one went off on some weird tangent about boring IT troubleshooting. The two chapters felt totally disconnected. Then he falls for the slut and marries her as fast as possible... Honestly, it felt like you got him married just so she could cheat on him!

What are the odds he knocked up the Japanese girl? Guess I'll see next chapter!

If your critics go over this story carefully they will find that you covered a lot of territory in these five pages. I was disappointed that he did not focalize on getting on to the next stages of recovery and went swimming in alcohol.instead.

great friends, letting him marry a cheating slut. With friends like this, who needs enemies. TK

First chapter was great, this not so much. I enjoyed the search for the computer error, but why did he do nothing to trace the Japanese girl. And removing the day after pills was not nice to the unborn fetus.

Why confess do it all but let her find out when her parents contact her.

This story is several confusing stories in one, I gave a low rating.

Seemed to get good star ratings, so I returned to read this chapter. Fairly well written, at least the techno junk reduced. He was a real idiot. Why show her the recording? Why the heck did he start drinking after the divorce, bit late then to be sorry for himself. In fact it was all lame as far as loving wives category. You even skipped over any problems she might have had with her family, so I guess they were lame ducks as well and ignored all of it.

The only bright light was his changing the tablets, but that is like a poisoner, real real pathetic and weak character.

Hopefully next chapter he actually grows some and ruins the slut.

And for the most part they are not unfounded. You write very well and intoduced me to some things I only have cursory knowledge of. The random number generator is one of those things I find very cool but it did not do anything to advance the plot. Ivan seems pretty two dimensional. Lots of commentors point to his flaws and again, they are not wrong. The plot is diverse enough to compel me to finish. I guess my suggestion is to leave us wanting more. We knew all about Ivan from stealing beer to getting into bed in Japan. All this backstory on characters doesn't have to occur in a single data dump. Mine the most significant parts and then show how past events define who they are now. Did we really need a tour of Airforce bases south of the Mason-Dixon line?

I look forward to future chapters. Thanks.

Professes love for a girl he meets in Japan, then treats her like another one night stand in the rear view mirror. It is pretty obvious that he will wind his way back to her, but does he deserve another chance?

What Tangle said. Whole chapter was a big WTF? Still enjoying it

... when you had his phone app give him a satellite x-ray picture showing where her car was parked in the parking structure.

@anonymous ... no, he knew it was in the structure because the tracking was in the building (sheesh) which he could see on the satellite view.

@A_Bierce, good story. You create richer scenes than many (most?) authors and it makes the story enjoyable. Thanks for all the work.

Sorry, this morphed into an essay about IT project management. Although close to the real world, the arch was way too long. And then it went into the LW traditional ways. I'm sorely disappointed?

Positive. First time I've seen the German word for worldview in a story here. You made it work.

Negative. Your guy was too busy to remember Fumiko and search for her? For years? I like 98% of what you've done here, but that seems like it might have been worked out somehow a bit more smoothly.

Author, have you lost the plot completely?? I worked in IT for more than 20 years. I'd like to let you in on a little secret - nobody in the whole wide world cares, they are not in the slightest bit interested in what IT people do at work. They want their hardware and software to work and that's all

Either you've never been to a party in your life, or you are bereft of the gift of empathy, otherwise you would have noticed people's eyes glazing over when you told them an exciting story of how you debugged an app.

I'm vaguely interested in IT and you didn't bore me rigid...you bored me CONCRETE.

What were you thinking?

Take some advice, next time you're at a party and someone asks what you do for a living, answer them thus:

"I work in IT, so let's talk about you"

And never, NEVER mix IT and sex in a story. If you'd ever had sex, you'd know that.

What friends Brian and Vicki were... they knew about Jean and let Ivan marry her without warning him, then let it go on and on without telling him... I would be able to live forever without friends like that.

This was a big let down from the first part, which I gave 5 stars.

I mean, yeah, I get that Ivan was totally inundated from the moment his return flight from Japan landed, but seriously? He has this amazing emotional connection with a woman, and he never even bothers on trying to follow through to find her? Not even once, even just out of curiosity?