Checking in on everyone.

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The part I do miss is the not cooking and cleaning. Doing that for six people for every meal for a year s getting old. Especially since everyone is a critic. It's not healthy enough in the wife's opinion. It's not W,X,Y or Z for the kids. No shit. I didn't plan on being the chef.
feel your pain there. it does get old. the hello fresh has helped there somewhat - no decision fatigue about what you are going to have. You still have to prep, and it is a bit dishes heavy. My wife has complained about the amount of butter (how dare she), but my 10 year old and my live-in-niece-daughter have both been asking when the next batch is showing up regularly.

also, my wife put the kibosh on the son and I making shepard's pie with a mashed potato top that contained one whole stick of butter. she's a god forsaken heathen and a burden that I take on for humanity. You're welcome
 
My parents (ages 82 and 77) contracted mild cases; in fact they didn't even know they had it until I suggested they get antibodies tests. Me, the First Mate, and the Cabin Kids all quarantined at one time or another but none of us contracted the 'rona.

Both the First Mate and I continued to work throughout, so we our income never took a hit. On-line teaching has taken it's toll - the First Mate's so frustrated that she said for the first time in her life that she hates teaching, and the Cabin Boy's grades plummeted the first semester of high school, but he's back on track again.

Friends of friends died, and I consider us the luckiest people in the world, grateful our hardships have been few and mild by comparison.
 
feel your pain there. it does get old. the hello fresh has helped there somewhat - no decision fatigue about what you are going to have. You still have to prep, and it is a bit dishes heavy. My wife has complained about the amount of butter (how dare she), but my 10 year old and my live-in-niece-daughter have both been asking when the next batch is showing up regularly.

also, my wife put the kibosh on the son and I making shepard's pie with a mashed potato top that contained one whole stick of butter. she's a god forsaken heathen and a burden that I take on for humanity. You're welcome
I mean there's almost no way I'm going to please a 40+ year old woman trying to lose weight and 3 small boys and a small girl trying to gain weight. Hmm what do both a six year old and a 40 year old gal want? Chocolate. In vastly different amounts.
 
I mean there's almost no way I'm going to please a 40+ we don't discuss that year old woman trying to lose weight and 3 1 small medium boys and a small girl trying to gain weight. Hmm what do both a six 19 year old and a 40we don't discuss that year old gal want? Chocolate. In vastly different amounts.

that's my house above
 
The part I do miss is the not cooking and cleaning. Doing that for six people for every meal for a year s getting old.
I do most of that anyway, but up till the plague hit we did have a housekeeper coming over who would do my father's end of the laundry, make his bed, sort his mess. So that's mine now as well.
As for food. I'm a vegetarian but I'll cook the man anything he wants... liver, lamb, BLTs... and he is freaking picky, even though most of his meals over the past couple decades were at casino buffets. Maybe I'm trying too hard? Maybe I need to leave his food under the heat lamp for a few hours before serving it...
 
I miss being outdoors, doing tours, dancing and just mixing with people at events in general. So at times it's quite boring. On the positive end I've basically cleared my Steam and GOG backlog and read a ton of books. I'm looking forward to taking the kids cool places when it's a bit more settled down.
 
Yeah, the occasional used bookstore foray has been one of the things that's helped me keep what remains of my sanity
Last week I had to take my car in for a service, and when I went to get it back, I went thru a drive-through and got A COFFEE MADE BY SOMEBODY ELSE for the first time in months. A tiny luxury, but a luxury nonetheless.
 
Last week I had to take my car in for a service, and when I went to get it back, I went thru a drive-through and got A COFFEE MADE BY SOMEBODY ELSE for the first time in months. A tiny luxury, but a luxury nonetheless.
Funnily enough I have the opposite experience with coffee. I think I prefer a cup of Taylor's or some other supermarket brand of coffee made with a plunger to a flat white made by the hipster outfits in London. At some point I might get a jug that will heat water to 90 degrees, although I can make it work by putting a bit of cold water in the plunger to get the water from the jug down cool enough that it doesn't make the coffee go bitter.

However, I fully appreciate the sentiment of enjoying something you haven't had for a while.

I do have to get stuff done to my car, though. It's got a slow leak that's survived two new tires and refurbing the wheel. It went flat when I went to Indonesia so I need to get somebody in to inflate it as driving it to the garage will ruin the tire. Now, I think It's time to bite the bullet and replace the wheel. Not sure what the part wlll cost from Vauxhall but I can get one off Ebay for about £50.
 
feel your pain there. it does get old. the hello fresh has helped there somewhat - no decision fatigue about what you are going to have. You still have to prep, and it is a bit dishes heavy. My wife has complained about the amount of butter (how dare she), but my 10 year old and my live-in-niece-daughter have both been asking when the next batch is showing up regularly.

also, my wife put the kibosh on the son and I making shepard's pie with a mashed potato top that contained one whole stick of butter. she's a god forsaken heathen and a burden that I take on for humanity. You're welcome

I am sure that I have tucked away somewhere a French recipe for mashed potatoes that calls for equal amounts of potatoes and butter...
 
We're surviving OK. My wife might have had COVID back last March (in which case we probably all had it). I shifted my grocery shopping to weekday mornings to avoid crowds, and we try and cut back on the number of trips. The kids went to summer camp (they are now 5 and 7) run under emergency child care rules. The 5 year old goes to emergency child care preschool. That gives us a bit of a break from her. Unfortunately the 7 year old's distance learning takes over my wife's office and occupies her with constant requests for help. I've been working remotely since 2009 so from a work perspective nothing much changed... We get takeout once or twice a week. It is draining on the psyche, but I've been Roll20 gaming for several years and have a couple good groups so that helps. And the forums I follow help (especially after dropping out of a certain forum where the political talk was too stressful).
 
The part I do miss is the not cooking and cleaning. Doing that for six people for every meal for a year s getting old. Especially since everyone is a critic. It's not healthy enough in the wife's opinion. It's not W,X,Y or Z for the kids. No shit. I didn't plan on being the chef.
That sounds familiar.
 
I'm doing well. I haven't done any gaming in awhile; Two co-workers got Covid within 2 weeks of each other. One was hospitalized, the other wasn't. As we're a razor thin staff, that meant working one of my normal days off It threw my body clock off a bit, so I was too tired to run anything. One of the people I play with has been having some major health issues, but appears to be on the mend. I'm hoping once the new supervisor settles in (one got fired over some bogus stuff that really irks me), I can sit down and plan some one shots with some of the new stuff I got.

As I don't go out much to begin with, staying home doesn't bother me. My only real outlets were going to the movies sometimes, or seeing live bands. I've had 2 concerts cancelled and refunds given, but one concert and a comic performance have not been cancelled as of yet (though I doubt either will happen this year). I also missed going to the HP Lovecraft film festival live. The online version was no different than watching Netflix for me, though I got to see more of the films than I have in previous years. Going out to eat once in awhile hasn't bothered me much, and I usually rely on Amazon for food shopping, with small trips to the growers market 2 blocks from me or Albertsons every 2-3 weeks (and dollar tree once a month).

None of my family has gotten sick thankfully. A close friend got Covid last year, and while he got lucky and spent only a few days on a ventilator, his heart might have been damaged as a side effect of the virus. That was a major bummer.

So all things considered, I'm doing well
 
All good here, almost to the point we feel guilty.

COVID numbers are pretty low, the economy has slowed in some areas but is overall okay at present, and we can't even complain about the weather either.

Fine here in Queensland :thumbsup:




(Our offerings to the Flame Gods last year must of paid off :grin:)
 
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Plumbing is repaired. Insurance agent has advised us not to turn the water back on until the furnace is back on (at least), so we need an electrician to verify that's safe... then "mitigators" to remove the excess water from inside our walls, and then we can replace the furnace.
 
Physical health is good. Been slowly & gradually losing a bit of weight, which is a goal.

Mental health.... well, I have two regular online RPGs, one occasional online RPG, and another occasional online gathering. So that's good.

But being unable to hang out with folks in-person is getting REEEEEAAAAAALLLLYYYYY old, and I'm a person that normally doesn't mind spending a lot of time alone. But a year-ish is too much, especially when the endpoint is unknown.

I haven't seen any of my immediate family in-person in more than a year. Didn't get to help my parents move into their new house. Didn't get to be there for my brother when he had heart surgery.
 
I still have yet to play online.

Am getting jabbed tomorrow. Wasn't expecting to be asked, but not going to refuse obviously!

Britain has done exceedingly well to reduce it's horrendous infection rate, but there are concerns it is now levelling off.
Yeah - now is not the time to reopen everything, what we're seeing is a sign that we're doing something right (Finally). We need to stay on this track to prevent another spike.
 
Yeah - now is not the time to reopen everything, what we're seeing is a sign that we're doing something right (Finally). We need to stay on this track to prevent another spike.
I agree, but that doesn't look like it's going to happen as schools are, iirc, set to re open in a couple of weeks. We'll be lucky if infections fall to at least 5k by then
 
Plumbing is not repaired, but the plumber's coming back today or tomorrow to finish the job. Hopefully.

We've turned all of the breakers back on, and as long as we're not trying to flood the basement... the electricity is stable. The furnace is on, doing its best (bless its little heart) and room temperature in my office is now in the high forties. We need to finish repairing the broken pipes, get the mitigation crew to clean up the excess water and prevent water damage, and then replace the furnace.

Insurance covers most/all of it.
 
And I actually just got back!

It was very refreshing being out and about. I got a chance to head West and collect some folklore and took it just to get out of the house.

I didn't originally plan on having no net, but I knew I was scuppered when I saw the mobile signal plummet as I got closer and then the houses themselves having no connection. So I spent the while having access to an old set of hand written notes on folklore from the 40s stored in a local museum (which needed to be edited and obscure words figured out) and then going on long walks along the sea.
 
Séadna Séadna , that sounds awesome!
Yeah it was very nice. I got to talking to some of the old lads in the area as part of it. Them outside their door and myself on the edge of the property for COVID reasons. It can be a bit sad as they are sometimes reluctant to speak Gaelic due to being made fun of when they were young, so I often have to start in English and find a reason to randomly insert a few Gaelic words so they can tell I'm a native speaker before they'll open up and start discussing old words and stories.

Was worthwhile though as I learned about a few new folklore monsters and confirmed a few grammatical ideas I had. There's a set of standing stones in the area that the kids got great use out of for games.

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