This is that day

You know when it’s the first day of school for your kid and you can’t find your keys so your spouse has to take the kid to school, then you tear the house apart looking for them, can’t find them, keep searching, nothing, call AAA to get your car unlocked because they MUST be in the trunk or something, then AAA tells you your membership dues are overdue so you need to pay $151, but wait! There’s more! Since your membership lapsed you will also have to pay a $30 same day charge?

Dropping my keys while retrieving stuff from my trunk officially cost us $181.00 plus I lost half a day to the fiasco. *headdesk*

Spending Slow-Down

I’m going to try to not spend money. I need to pick a start date and set some parameters but I’d really like to try to spend as little as possible in all areas. I feel like starting September 1st would be good, it’s the next good rollover point, and…

FOOD: I need to get back into planning our meals. I was doing fairly well at this for a while but it is weirdly exhausting to me after a while. I think a few new ideas would help and maybe I could designate a couple of days with themes like, pasta night, or soup & sandwiches, just to make a few less decisions. We’ll need to cut back on meat for sure, so expensive, and I’ll need to cook more from scratch, we’ll need to lean hard on the farmshare we already have and USE IT UP. Doable.

For items like clothing etc:

Try not to spend as a 1st step: mend what’s broken instead of replacing.
If something must be acquired or replaced get it free from “freecycle,” or “buy nothing.”
If those avenues are a bust try charity shops and thrift stores.
Borrow the item from friends if it’s only needed briefly.
Only buy new if all else fails.

There are some challenges, of course, there is back to school, but we already got the lad’s clothes, there’s just school supplies left and we have a lot in the house already so he may be covered. Then there are 3 birthdays coming up, my husband and both daughters, there will obviously be a few presents for that, and the winter holidays, there will be presents there too. In the past I have set a spending limit per person but we tend to weirdly “go big” on the holidays. My husband was raised that way but I wasn’t, I just embraced it because he was so happy that way. I’ve seen a little list to minimize spending that was something like: 1. something to wear, 2. something to read, 3. something they want, & 4. something they need. Maybe that would work. I’m going to look into what other ideas are out there. I make a lot of stuff too, gifts for people, I’ll have to work that into the plan and use what I already have to make those presents.

Good Taste

Ran the last Harry Potter craft of August. Had the teens making Monster Book’s of Monsters. It was fun, fairly easy and really cute. I made an extra one for my coworker who went nuts over them. She is very happy.

The girl my son likes was there. Her sister was sick with a fever and couldn’t come so she asked if she could make 2 so her sis could still have one. Of course I said yes, how sweet is that? What a good sister, what a thoughtful lass! My son have very good taste, she is kind and cute and awkward and sweet. What else could a lad want to see in a lass? My son wasn’t able to attend since the workshop was “full” too bad, he could have lent a hand with the second book. 🙂

Scammers

I’ve had to scam calls in 3 days. I used to never get any junk calls on my cellphone, none, now I get weird calls all the time, sales calls, some kind of robocalls in languages I don’t speak, and scams. Gods, I HATE the scams.

My sweet husband is and IT professional so I tend to know a scam when I hear it or read it in email. A really good one will earn a split second of doubt… “shit, what if this is REAL?” but before I complete the thought I’m already wearing my most cynical face and wishing for the scammers exactly what they deserve. Monday, while I was at work I got a robocall that said something along the lines of “this is the something office at visa-mastercard, we’ve been monitoring your credit activity for 6 months. CONGRATULATIONS! Due to your excellent payment record you qualify for ZERO percent interest! Simply….” *click* I hung up laughing that they thought they could get me with that and then I got angry because there are desperate people out there. There are people desperate enough to hear that and think that they have been paying on time even if they were minimum payments and FINALLY, someone noticed how hard they are trying and there IS a reward. They think they are finally getting a break, some light at the distant end of the tunnel and then they get utter screwed over by gutless thieves.

Today I got a call, another robocall, that informed me my social security number was involved in criminal activity and to avoid arrest I must immediately press one to speak with an administration investigative officer to straighten it out. The call literally threatened me with incarceration if I did not comply. Imagine some elderly person living alone, not keeping up with things too well, no one to rely on or bounce things off of getting this scary call. They would press one, they would, because they want to make sure they don’t get arrested. They are scared, someone must have stolen their identity and committed crimes and now they’re in trouble for it. They heard something about this, innocent people getting their lives ruined by this kind of thing. Oh no, oh no, oh no! So they’d press one and when the “investigator” on the other end says, “Of course I’ll help you, hopefully we can just straighten this out on the phone and you won’t have to go to COURT or be ARRESTED. To make sure it’s really you, I need some information, can you confirm your social security number, birthdate, etc?” And then they’re screwed.

There are a million scams out there casting wide nets to catch the unwary, beating the trees to gather ripe fruit, and mostly they snare the most vulnerable among us. They catch the desperate with promises of a prize or a break at last, they catch others by making them fear arrest, audit, or civil actions, some even fall prey to scams claiming a family member is in grave trouble and needs money immediately or, shockingly, that some wealthy someone needs their help for some mysterious reason to access their own funds. And some lonely people get catfished by someone pretending to be a friend who scams them out of money, gifts and giftcards. And those who already can’t afford to pay their bills lose money, have their credit destroyed etc, those who are fearful have lose money and have their fragile trust in further smashed, and some lose money and their faith in humanity, their faith in themselves. Lonely people hoping for love get nothing but broken hearts and betrayal.

I report these calls to the police, they tell me thanks for calling but they already knew about this latest scam, they posted on FB warning people about it, what else can they do? Scams are everywhere. The dispatcher told me they get those call there, in the barracks, wow. I wish for the scammers to get what they deserve, I wish for those scammed to learn from their mistakes and also to have their funds and reputations restored. Make sure your parents, friends, kids, neighbors know never to give out their information. Make sure you know the signs that something is likely a scam. Here are a few links: https://www.nextadvisor.com/7-signs-youre-being-scammed/ https://www.thebalance.com/warning-signs-of-money-scams-315824 https://www.consumerfinance.gov/ask-cfpb/what-are-some-classic-warning-signs-of-possible-fraud-and-scams-en-2094/

Be careful there are some awful people in the world.

a very blah day

Went to bed with a headache, woke up with a headache, didn’t sleep well. The overcast and rain seem to fit my drained-feeling mood. I’ve been trying to rally but today’s tasks aren’t helping much.

Had to fill out school forms for the lad, they seem needlessly invasive to me but I guess in some kind of emergency his dad and I, who both work within 30 minutes of his school, might be unreachable. He starts next week and they just emailed me the summer reading list. I feel like maybe I should have gotten that a while ago. Actually, they sent a big email about how they are all about communication, effective communication, and keeping parents informed and there was a note about summer reading lists and school supply lists with a link to the website and instructions on where to find these lists and neither was there or anywhere I could find. I emailed the secretary asking where I should look and she emailed back 2 documents without so much as a single word like, “hello,” “oops!” or “Sorry, here you go!” Excellent communication. There are 2 books the kid is supposed to read by next week and he’s at work with his dad so I have no idea if this is something he’s already on top of or if I should be trying to scare up these books for him. So, I filled out forms and signed permissions etc. and found that one form has to go to the Dr.’s office. Oops, that one is on me, I didn’t check it thoroughly when I opened the packet.

I was also supposed to be making a monster book of monsters notebook to proof the process we’ll be using, that’s a great, fun task, but I can’t find all the materials I had to make it with… I’ve looked everywhere I can think of but all I found is the fake fur. So that’s on hold till I find everything. Or I skip it and take a chance on Friday that it will just work out ok. Not my preferred method but it might be the one I have to go with.

I got an email from my ex-boss last night asking me to work next Wednesday with my favorite coworker for the day, I said I’d see if I could and get back to her ASAP. This morning I get a follow up email saying how she’s supposed to be on vacation but had to work today due to lack of coverage, I think that’s a passive sort of jab because I quit. I gave notice on June 26th, my last day was July 10th, it is not my fault she didn’t hire anyone. The email also said she was then planning to be on vacation next week but now that’s collapsed and if I work next Wednesday I’d be working with her. I do not want to work with her, she likes to keep me “busy.” She’ll send me to weed out books that haven’t circulated in 6 years or more and when I lug them downstairs she then goes through them to decide book by book if she really wants to get rid of them, which I understand, BUT then I get to put the one’s she’s not ready to let go back upstairs, and come down and delete the others. Honestly, if she needs to weigh the worth of each book she could delete them herself and save time. I wouldn’t even mind just being the book sherpa who has to run up and down the stairs for her. It’s that she pretends I’m involved in the decision and then shatters that illusion. That’s her pattern and a main reason I was glad I don’t have to work there anymore.

Also, the last shift I worked was very, very awkward. Her friend came in as we were putting some materials together for the kids and pulled up a chair with us. I was practically sitting right between the two of them and my boss starts talking about her ex. She was talking about such wildly uncomfortable things… I just can’t. Not graphic, not like that, just… she’s pining over this guy who moved on years ago, is with someone else, has kids with the new person, I think they are married, and she’s just talking about all the possibilities or whatever and I almost cringed so hard I became a singularity. Her friend was clearly uncomfortable too and didn’t know what to say. I wanted to sink into the floor, run from the room, fly away. I was so happy when that shift ended, I haven’t been back there since. That would have been awkward no matter who it was but it was my BOSS. She also made assumptions about my schedule in the second email, saying if I left at 2:30 I could get my kid from school… he gets out at 1:30 and I would have to leave by 1:00 to get him. Something about that just bothers me.

On the plus side, I’ve spent the day at home so far, doing laundry, changing the sheets, thawing stuff for dinner, getting the forms out of the way, stitching a comforter back together that was starting to fall apart. I haven’t popped out to spend money or shopped online. It’s way to easy for me to spend money when my mood is tanking or I’m stressed. I’ve been trying to resist, and doing fairly well for some months now, but I slip a little now and then. I try to be really deliberate about what I buy, to plan ahead, to get excellent deals and spend as little as possible, every once in a while I suddenly find myself buying a bunch of yarn because it’s pretty, or picking up something else I don’t need, but I keep trying. I posted this morning on a sharing site about needing some stuff to fix up the shed. People just give away things they don’t need, I do it too, give stuff away there. There’s no cost to anything, no profit made, it’s all just to clear things out and get them to people who will actually use them, and keep things from ending up in a landfill. The phrase “There is no ‘away.” motivates me. When we decide something is useless, is trash, and some things actually are of course, but when we toss things “away” they don’t really go away. All that stuff, and it’s a MASSIVE amount of stuff, goes somewhere on this planet and begins to degrade, to pollute often, and there is so, so, much of it. It’s another great reason to avoid buying new things besides saving money.

Creating Space

I’ve finished 15 paintings in 3 days. I am feeling much less stressed than I was. I know that will wear off if I stop creating but it feels great right now.

While I haven’t painted much in a long time, I have been crafting right along, crochet, knitting, sewing, DIY Harry Potter stuff and so on, and there is just no space for me to create in. All the painting I’m doing? I’m doing it in my kitchen, I pretty much stole the kid’s study spot which everyone is about to need again. I also had to stop sewing because there is no place I can set up my machine since my eldest moved home. Most of my supplies are crammed inaccessibly in bins in closets right now too. So I’ve been dreaming of a space of my own, cruising ads for used RVs, looking at new sheds, etc. We have a shed, half of which is full of crap we don’t need, so why not use that?

It needs work. After deciding even used RVs are way too expensive, and after looking at new sheds and the extra windows I’d want and all that, I went out an looked at the old shed again. It’s filthy, but I know how to clean, I can pull out all the nails someone pounded in, it needs new windows, some flooring, insulation, interior walls etc etc. Anyway, I emailed the person who does all our handy-work to see if she’ll give me an estimate. I might have to get it done in stages or something, but the space could definitely work. Get rid of the junk, pull the nails, scrub it up a bit and then Anita can work her magic and I will have a studio. I could have my own studio. With a little loft to read and nap in. (Hopefully) That’s the dream!

To get what I want new would be around $6,000… way out of the budget. I’m afraid to get the quote from Anita but it will have to lower, right? Further updates as event warrant.

A Good Day

A day that begins, ends, or middles with me spattered with paint is a good day. I’m not saying I’m any good but I love to paint. Painting calms me, smooths out my jagged edges, orders my mind and my moods. I feel deeply peaceful when I manage to get some painting into my day.

I’m spattered with paint right now. It feels wonderful and strange because I haven’t been able to paint much for some time, years. Last winter I made a painting of Hogwarts more or less as a decoration for Christmas because I put together a Harry Potter Christmas each year now. The year before I did one of the Forbidden Forest. My friends and family like them but I think of them more as props or decorations than art. Maybe that’s silly of me I don’t know. Anyway, today I made 5 paintings that are not decorations, that mean something to me. They range from a little abstract to completely abstract.

My usual is pretty representational impressionism so these are a departure for me. My son inspired me. He makes the wildest stuff. Not always abstract but he uses bold, dream-like imagery, often disjointed. It’s eye-catching work and the artist in me thinks some of it is quite good. The mom part of me thinks it’s all fantastic. So, I took something of a page from his book and all of a sudden I can paint again, no more artist’s block or white canvas paralysis, paint made it onto canvas. I’m sure they’re rubbish but it still feels good.

Tomorrow I’ll be making Harry Potter wands with the teens and tweens. The mug workshop went really well so I’m hopeful this one will too. The kids did some good work and I hope they went home and baked them so their designs will last a long, long time. I still haven’t made a test wand for tomorrow, I hope that doesn’t sink me entirely. Procrastination is all on me but I’m tired and I’ve had very little extra energy for a long time now so I’m going to let it go. I will need to make sure I work all the bogs out of the monster book craft before Saturday though, that is non-optional. I feel insanely lucky that my job involves so much creativity and that I have so much control over that creativity. I can’t say I’m used to it yet, or feel I should be left unsupervised, but I love it.

Serenity Now

My kid’s school drives me buggy. He used to go to this tiny little school of about 12 kids, total. It was 2 rooms and was very supportive and amazing. I credit the teachers and the school atmosphere with helping our lad come out of his shell. I miss it so much. The new place is a small high school, maybe a couple hundred kids I think, and I kind of hate it.

The new school has its good points, it really does, I know being with more kids is helping my son find his confidence, he’s making more friends, he’s getting more involved in activities, he’s figuring some important stuff out, but the people running it drive me crazy. The teachers I’ve met with seem like fine teachers, I’ve no problem with any of them so far, it’s the administrators and the secretary.

So, the minor stuff, the annoying stuff, the school sends emails, TONS of emails, most of which have nothing to do with my kid, his grade, or anything I need to concern myself with at all. The school said when we signed him up “make sure you read our emails.” Yeah, no problem, how many could they send? More than one a day! Usually 2-3 a day, most of which are long with multiple sections, loads of repetition, and are poorly organized. I started out, the first few days, reading these emails as my eyes glazed over. Yes, I get it, there’s lots of sports going on. You couldn’t get my lad to participate in or even watch a sporting event so the endless notes about this or that team are Zzzzzzz. By the end of a week I was skimming looking for “10th grade” or “All School” by the end of the first month I was skipping emails with headings I didn’t think were likely to concern my son. When I got a second job I sometimes didn’t check my email for a few days.

Anyone reading this knows I have a lot on my plate, with 2 jobs I was going a little crazy, things were slipping. It’s a little on me that I was skipping emails but when only 1 in 5 or so has any relevance it’s a little hard to force myself to read them all. With all those emails you would think parents would get plenty of notice about important, upcoming events. Sadly no. This school, that prides itself on its communication, mistakes quantity for quality. While I might know months in advance that irrelevant sports are going to sports it up, if there is a multiple over-night trip happening the school will fail to mention it until a week or 2 before and then, when parents don’t respond to those emails IMMEDIATELY because, say, it’s summer and they are away on vacation, the school sends 17 emails, in increasingly haranguing tones, over the course of 4 or 5 days. Dude, I just checked my email for the first time this week, CALM DOWN. So, I end up rushing about getting things all set, paperwork, money I’m obligated to fork over for the trip, doctors notes so my kid can have his meds on the trip, etc. and when I say ‘sorry, I don’t check my email daily, I have a lot going on in my offline life’ the secretary, who writes and sends these endless, badly written emails says, “You really need to read all the emails. Your child’s school is important.”

That’s when I go to my happy place. https://youtu.be/92i5m3tV5XY while I think to myself: “yes, his schooling is important that’s why I must not open my mouth at this moment. Breathe Tempest, just breathe. That’s it…” and I smile and nod and get out of there before I start yelling. Seriously, with all the damn emails, would it be too much to ask that they create lists for each grade at least??? Each grade, All School, just a little sorting, and anything that’s important and time sensitive could be labeled “Important” or “Overnight Trip!” My kid has some overnight, team-building, trip the second day of school and they gave us so little notice that the physical I scheduled less than a week ago for my kid has to be rescheduled. For once, I actually saw the first email the day or day after it came because I’ve been checking more since I cut back to one job and I’ve been actually using my email for work stuff, so it wasn’t me at all this time.

Also minor, the school “language.” *sigh* I hate this because it’s like some fool took a psych course once and now they are creating a bond between everyone by renaming normal things so they sound idiotic. They don’t have homerooms, they don’t have clubs, or teams or anything, they have things like squads, tributaries, branches, and so on. Last years advisor asked my kid and I in a meeting what “Stream” he wanted to be in for the spring. I can’t keep all their terms straight and I thought “fucked if I know!” and looked at the lad and said “It’s up to you, what do you want to do?” He asked her what his options were and she was shocked he didn’t know he told her he couldn’t keep the terms straight because most of them have to do with flowing water and don’t really have anything to do with the words they’re replacing. I think my face was blank, I think I managed that, but I was so proud of him in that moment. Why hadn’t I said that??? It’s true!

More seriously, the administrators have got issues, I’m not entirely sure they should be running a school. They seem confused by basic concepts and are probably the reason we get tons of useless emails a day yet fail to be informed about upcoming trips and such. The principal looks like an old, ex-hippie, which is cool, I don’t think he was though because he has no idea what protest actually involves. After another school shooting last year, not at this school but somewhere in the US, protests were being planned by kids across the country to try to get us adults off our asses and get up and demand that the government at least make it more difficult for people to slaughter them while they attend classes. Loads of kids from this school decided they wanted to be part of that, obviously, not getting killed is JOB ONE for a living organism, so they started organizing a walk out to the nearby town where they would then stand for an hour or two on the town common with signs like “My parents shouldn’t have to use my college fund to BURY ME.” and “I just want to go to school not Die.” When the principal heard about this he sent out an email the gist of which was ‘Your kids want to protest gun violence and our school totally supports that, but we can’t have school disrupted by it so we’re offering to let them protest in the school parking lot for 15 minutes tomorrow morning instead of doing the walk out they’ve planned. Students participating in the parking lot protest will receive a 1 day, in school suspension and students who walk out will receive a 2 day off-campus suspension.” ??? WTF? First, none of that is “totally supports”, second protest needs to disrupt or it is nothing but sign waving, Getting shot and maybe dying is very disruptive to one’s education so I think a few hours protest is damned bargain. And third, what the hell? Punishing the kids who take part in the alternative protest YOU SUGGEST, really??? And what kid in their right mind is going to choose in school suspension over off campus. Get it together.

School starts in a week and a half and I’m already kind of ticked off. Back to my meditation!

retail shock-therapy

Took our lad school shopping yesterday, 17, a junior this fall. Getting the kid to try on clothes is usually a trial but I had back-up. My husband was there, which helped, but it was the salesperson that made things go so well. She was enthusiastic about the clothes, naturally, and wasn’t US, I think he allowed that she might have some expertise in proper fitting, cut, color and the like. We ended up with 2 pairs of slacks, 2 pairs of jeans, and a handful of nice shirts to supplement the T-shirt collection he’s been working on the past few years. The lad is going to be stylin’ this year but the prices…

Shockingly it was the second time in 2 days I bought new clothes, actual new, not secondhand, new clothes. I need to upgrade my wardrobe a bit for work, my job is way more professional than anything I’ve had before. So Thursday I bought myself a shirt, a sweater, and a pair of pants from Old Navy, on clearance except for the pants. OMG, I paid full price for a pair of pants… it’s been years and years since I did that for myself. I enjoy thrift shopping almost like a sport. The less I pay, the better, it’s like scoring points or something. It’s a challenge outfitting a family secondhand. Finding things that fit, are decent quality, hopefully flattering, etc. is tough. It used to be sheer necessity, back some years ago, we had so little money. I spent about 15 years of my adult life living below the poverty line, sometimes way, way below, and it was an education. I made sure we always got what we needed, there might not have been any extra, nothing fancy, sometimes bargains turned out to be sub-par but I kept us all clothed.

I miss being skinny, for many reasons, but the free clothes… oh, I miss the bags and bags of free clothes! I used the be the dumping ground for all my friend’s unwanted clothes, my sisters, too, would give me garbage bags full of clothes they didn’t wear anymore. I went years without buying any clothes for myself at all. If someone put on weight they’d think, “Tempest could fit into these…” and I’d get a whole bunch of cool stuff to go through. What I couldn’t use I’d pass along or drop off at a charity shop. Now I’m not 115 pounds anymore. Not a size, 5 or 7, having 3 kids will do that, aging will do that, plus, I love food. How great is food? So great. Yeah, so not skinny anymore, no free clothes.

So yesterday, and Thursday, were filled with sticker-shock for me. Even clearance prices are more than I usually pay. When I shop thrift and charity shops I’m still scouting for their half-price items so I routinely pay about $2-$3 or less for shirts, less than $5 for skirts or pants, and less than $8 for dresses. The full price pants I picked up for myself the other day were $20, I thought that was bad, all the pants we got our son were much more. One pair was nearly $50. Ouch. I’m quite used to getting about 10 pairs for that kind of money. But we can do it now, when we need to, we can afford, at least sometimes, to get our boy brand new clothes and a heaping helping of good customer service. It’s a good feeling but old habits die hard. I know how to build the bulk of a wardrobe out of $50 and yesterday we spent that on one pair of slacks.

The Dam

My husband and son are out running. My husband says he is realizing his delusional thinking now. He thought: “We’ll start running in the mornings before work and we’ll do it all year!” It is now, in mid-ish August, just the littlest bit cooler and darker in the mornings and this morning he just groaned at the thought of dragging himself from our warm bed and out into the world for exercise. His new plan may be Tae Kwan Do or joining a gym but, whatever, they need to continue to exercise. My son is losing weight or maybe just changing shape a little. He looks a little fitter, stands a wee bit taller, most importantly he says that he feels much better on days that they run.

My middle daughter completely failed to find a job this summer. She hasn’t been able to get one, ever, except for through work-study at her community college. I think people take one look at her and just…. pass. She’s quite eccentric and won’t take any advice on appearance, which I understand, but job hunting is its own thing and you don’t get to Be You while you do it. I don’t know what to do. Is there a place for her in this world? Is there somewhere she can belong? Will anyone ever hire her? Can she ever support herself? I fight hard, daily, to keep it together, to NOT despair, if I let one crack show the dam will burst and I will spiral out. My oldest daughter is still working part time at the pharmacy chain, still plugging away at learning whatever computery thing my husband set her up to learn in the hopes that it could lead to some real employment. She’s still so sad, her eyes sometimes just about break me.

I must have done something, or some things, very wrong as a parent to have all three kids struggling SO HARD in various ways. I chew on that all the time until it hurts too much and I have to put it away again for a bit. I worked so hard at not making the mistakes my parents made. I made sure they were loved and looked after, that they had what they needed and KNEW they were loved. Maybe I should have pushed harder for better grades? I always wished we could have let them all try out more things like lessons, let them find their talents and passions, but we never had a lot of money. I threw them cool parties crafted with my own hands, I made the holidays as wonderful as I could, still do. We always had pets, always plenty of food, always kept them warm and safe.

I know the older two suffered when they were at their father’s. He’s a piece of work. Very big into punishments that included time-outs lasting hours, breaking their favorite toys, and what he called “gross jobs” like scrubbing garbage cans and toilets. He did a lot of damage to them, I know that, I wish I could have prevented it. He spent their childhood trying to get them brainwashed into his cult and they fought it, hard. That didn’t help much either. But our son was with us, he never had to deal with such petty tyrannies and traumas, and yet something has gone wrong for him too. He was much younger when I went through a prolonged depression and that must have been awful for him. Poor little lamb, and it’s down to me, somehow I fucked this up.

So, anyway, walking quickly on from that dam breaker. Fixing things. Yes, oldest is working, studying, and in therapy, middle is taking summer classes and is all signed up for fall and will get work study again, she’s got maybe 2 semesters left for her Associates at the rate she’s going, gets together with friends pretty regularly, also in therapy. Youngest, interning and earning money while gaining confidence and experience, set to go back to school in the fall, is learning to make and maintain friendships, has a gaming group, is in therapy, exercising… I think one more thing I might be able to do now that summer reading isn’t taking up so much of me is start a family night. We could play games or read together or something. We all need something.