I am doing a half day at the office today. It’s my only time working this week. It’s not too bad, hardly anybody is here.
I feel like a surly teenager at the family’s holiday dinner table who is copping an attitude like they are doing some big huge favor to the universe for showing up.
Yes, I know you pay me and all … omg, leave me alone.
waverly I know! It is sooo dreary! I lived here for four years and January and February is the reason BFF will never drag me back permanently lol. DS isn't even out of bed yet. There are a million places to go ice skating so I can maybe talk him into that or the Christmas market at Wrigley (he is a Cardinal's fan but the Cubs are his second favorite - a rare combo 😂).
I have another random that is more of a huge vent.
DH is notoriously awful at responding to text messages. I always joke that he's not my emergency contact because I know he'll never answer the call or see the text. In the last 3 days, I have had 6 (!!!) people reach out to me asking if he is ok because they texted him xx hours/days ago and he hasn't responded. My dude. ANSWER THE MOTHER F'ING PHONE. It is not that hard. And I am not your goddamned personal assistant so I will not be screening your messages for you. Christ.
I just woke up. I’m usually up by 6, sleeping in for me is 7:30 at the latest. I’ve been sleeping so late and have been exhausted. Even though I was barely sick with Covid I’m wondering if this residual.
I just got over Covid and have been sleeping so much. I definitely think it’s related!
Post by lolalolalola on Dec 29, 2023 10:32:21 GMT -5
I just don’t know what to do to help my 16 yo daughter. She doesn’t want to go anywhere or do anything. She was mad that we made plans to go to a friends on Xmas for dinner because the holidays are for doing things you enjoy. We went to a hockey game last night and she barely talked to anyone and sat with her earbuds in the whole time (I made her turn off her music but she kept them in for noise suppression). She had a big cry because we are having 3 families over for NYE and she doesn’t like the kids and I won’t let her spend the night alone in her room. It is exhausting.
I have another random that is more of a huge vent.
DH is notoriously awful at responding to text messages. I always joke that he's not my emergency contact because I know he'll never answer the call or see the text. In the last 3 days, I have had 6 (!!!) people reach out to me asking if he is ok because they texted him xx hours/days ago and he hasn't responded. My dude. ANSWER THE MOTHER F'ING PHONE. It is not that hard. And I am not your goddamned personal assistant so I will not be screening your messages for you. Christ.
Oh are we married to the same man? Although H has gotten a little better since I got in to an accident while pregnant and he was not my first or second call. It took calling a neighbor to come pound on the door to get him to look at his phone to see the billion missed calls and messages from basically everyone we knew.
Post by RoxMonster on Dec 29, 2023 10:38:14 GMT -5
So sick of the damp, slushy weather. I know it’s winter so I get that it will be cold but I hate this rain:snow drizzle going on since yesterday morning.
No huge plans today but maybe checking out a new coffee shop in town and then doing a holiday pop-up bar tonight. I’m hoping the weather cooperates enough tomorrow to take down the outdoor decorations and then inside probably comes down Sunday.
Post by lolalolalola on Dec 29, 2023 10:41:35 GMT -5
I found out today DH overspent his allowance this year by 75%. I’m upset, couldn’t sleep last night and feel really deceived. We track our spending separately and just true-up at the end of the year with the household budget. He over spends every year so I build in a contingency into the budget of 10%. Surprise!
I have another random that is more of a huge vent.
DH is notoriously awful at responding to text messages. I always joke that he's not my emergency contact because I know he'll never answer the call or see the text. In the last 3 days, I have had 6 (!!!) people reach out to me asking if he is ok because they texted him xx hours/days ago and he hasn't responded. My dude. ANSWER THE MOTHER F'ING PHONE. It is not that hard. And I am not your goddamned personal assistant so I will not be screening your messages for you. Christ.
Ooh, I feel you on this. My H is the same. We had a huge CTJ early in our relationship b/c I had moved out of state to start a new job and he was wrapping stuff up at the old place before he joined me. And he wouldn't take his cell phone anywhere with him, so I could never get a hold of him. He got marginally better once I explained how our phones were our "emergency hotline" and because we were about to be married he now had an obligation to care about me, what I might need from him, and if I was dead in a ditch in a whole different state and he'd never know.
That did not fix the issue of him wanting me to be his personal assistant but he does at least keep his phone ON HIM most of the time so he will respond to me at least. He still isn't great about responding to others but I don't care much about that.
Post by SusanBAnthony on Dec 29, 2023 11:05:07 GMT -5
My H regularly looks at his phone, but he doesn't look at texts because he "reads them" as they come in on his smart watch.
Except he misses some on his watch so he thinks he has looked at all of them and HE HASN'T.
Then he gets pissy with me because I "didn't communicate something".
We had a major CTJ about even if he thinks he has seen all his texts he better check that there are none from me regularly. it actually has gotten better but I basically think he's an idiot in this arena and he doesn't understand why and I just cannot even with this nonsense.
Meanwhile my father legitimately looks at his phone once in the morning and mayyyyybe once in the later afternoon. He leaves it sitting somewhere with the ringer and notifications turned off because he doesn't like to hear it pinging. O e time an actual emergency happened and we had to ask a family friend to drive to his house and notify him. Now we proactively tell him he has to keep his phone with him and the ringer on if there is something going on where we may need to contact him.
I'm having lunch with my high school BFFs today, and I'm really looking forward to seeing them. We live just far apart enough (and have just enough school-aged kids who can't drive but have lots of activities between us) for it to be a production trying to find days and times to get together, which means we really only do it a couple times a year.
H has decided that next year he's only going to schedule half-days in the office between Christmas and New Year's because it's been so slow this year. He managed to move all of today's afternoon appointments to the morning, so he'll be home by the time I get back from lunch, and then I'd like to start mapping out what we want to eat for NYE.
My only other must-do today is getting Kid 1 to finally start studying for their learner's permit. They want to continue to do tech crew for all of their school's plays (and they go to a performing arts school, so there are quite a few of them throughout the year), and late rehearsals are not my jam. They turned 16 last summer, so there's no real reason for them not to start learning how to drive except that they don't want to.
I have another random that is more of a huge vent.
DH is notoriously awful at responding to text messages. I always joke that he's not my emergency contact because I know he'll never answer the call or see the text. In the last 3 days, I have had 6 (!!!) people reach out to me asking if he is ok because they texted him xx hours/days ago and he hasn't responded. My dude. ANSWER THE MOTHER F'ING PHONE. It is not that hard. And I am not your goddamned personal assistant so I will not be screening your messages for you. Christ.
Oh are we married to the same man? Although H has gotten a little better since I got in to an accident while pregnant and he was not my first or second call. It took calling a neighbor to come pound on the door to get him to look at his phone to see the billion missed calls and messages from basically everyone we knew.
Adding commiseration, when I got carjacked a few years ago and couldn't get into our apartment because I didn't have keys (they took them!), he had left his phone in another room and was sound asleep so had no idea I was trying to get in touch with him. He's only marginally better now but there is still a day here and there where I can't reach him at all. Unfortunately we don't have any family or super close friends here so I don't really have a backup!
Post by icedcoffee on Dec 29, 2023 11:11:18 GMT -5
Got home from skiing late last night. Quick laundry and repack and we leave for the beach this afternoon. Hoping to get in a quick workout too but man this couch is comfy. 😂
I have some bragging to do, and hopefully a message that will make some of you with struggling teenagers happy.
My son, who attended an alternative high school where it was almost impossible to not pass a class, somehow managed to fail at least one class every semester. He barely graduated, and it was mostly because he would do things like lose his homework in the bottom of his backpack, sleep through class, and generally not have his shit together. He had very poor impulse control, a crap attitude, and would make but then lose friends because of his prickly nature. I was very worried about his future.
He decided to get his shit together sometime in college (he acquired a years worth of credits at our tech college), and he just received a promotion at his first professional job out of school. He is living in his own apartment, generally happy, and with a number of friends and a solid social life.
My daughter, who suffered from such severe anxiety in high school that she had to sit in our car during her lunch hour, is crushing it in college, and has become quite the independent world traveler. She has a serious boyfriend, is on track to graduate with a degree in elementary education, and she has done so many brave things that I am truly blown away
I could not overstate the hours of fear, frustration, and anxiety I spent worrying about both of these children. Their challenges were unique to them, but equally terrifying in their own way. I don’t know if it is helpful, but I wanted to put this out there and just say that your children may surprise you in pretty wonderful ways.
DH and I went out to dinner last night and then shared a bottle of wine when we got home. I drank too much and didn’t sleep well and this cold has fully kicked in. I showered and laid back down and now I don’t want to get up.
I need to meal plan for next week and grocery shop today. The kids are with MIL so it should be low key, but I lack the motivation necessary to get moving on this stuff.
I found out today DH overspent his allowance this year by 75%. I’m upset, couldn’t sleep last night and feel really deceived. We track our spending separately and just true-up at the end of the year with the household budget. He over spends every year so I build in a contingency into the budget of 10%. Surprise!
Wtf. What was his response/attitude? Had he just not been keeping up with his monthly budgeting and was “surprised” or did he know and keep spending?
Christmas and my birthday both make me really sad. Both just highlight how much effort I put into making other people feel special and I don't get even a minimum amount of care in return. This has been an especially crappy year for both and I'm just so sad about it. Giving myself today to wallow because I'm tired of pretending I don't care.
Hoping to dust myself off later today and plan some travel for 2024. This is another point of contention bc I always plan vacations around what I think the rest of my family will enjoy, and they are still always kind of crappy about it. I'm going to plan some solo travel this year because I deserve to enjoy my vacations.
I slept in (for me)! I woke up at 7:45am. I'm usually awake by shortly after 6am at the latest.
DS has reading tutoring this morning. H has the day off so they're going to hang out together this morning. I'm excited to leave the house and do something fun for myself. I'm going to walk to the library and then across the street for coffee with a book.
I found out today DH overspent his allowance this year by 75%. I’m upset, couldn’t sleep last night and feel really deceived. We track our spending separately and just true-up at the end of the year with the household budget. He over spends every year so I build in a contingency into the budget of 10%. Surprise!
Wtf. What was his response/attitude? Had he just not been keeping up with his monthly budgeting and was “surprised” or did he know and keep spending?
His hobby is sports card collecting. He planned to sell a bunch of cards before year end but it never came together. This has been the same comment every year he is over his budget- he has a bunch of cards that he will sell in the new year and 'earn back' his over spending.
He put together a whole analysis on what he bought, how much his inventory is worth, etc, etc trying to soften the blow. It did not work... he needs to sell some shit to prove that he actually can. It's a lot easier to buy than to sell collectibles.
19 hours into our 42 hour visit to the ILs and I'm pretty much ready to go home 😬 It's not unpleasant, it's just not my space and so much noise/talking.
They do have a new golf cart that DD(15) got to try out, that was a fun preview of her learning to drive in the next year!
I just woke up. I’m usually up by 6, sleeping in for me is 7:30 at the latest. I’ve been sleeping so late and have been exhausted. Even though I was barely sick with Covid I’m wondering if this residual.
I just got over Covid and have been sleeping so much. I definitely think it’s related!
The exhaustion was the number one covid symptom for H, DS and me. The day I slept my normal 7-7.5 hours I knew I was finally starting to feel better. Up until then I was sleeping 10 hours a night. And taking naps during the day.
Post by basilosaurus on Dec 29, 2023 11:37:05 GMT -5
I slept until noon, and I repeated every bit. Friday/Saturday is weekend in this state.
Met up with a friend for drinks this evening, and neither of us could get rides back home. It would have been faster to walk the few km, but the dark streets with no sidewalks made it a no go. We just had another couple beers. They're weaker than bud light and about $2 each so nbd. But it was great to catch up with my only American friend.
She fed my ego at her absolute glee when I brought her holiday turkey I managed to get and roast. She's been out of USA for 20 years, but good nostalgia had a very strong pull, and both of us feel it for pretty much turkey only
jinkies, I'm so sorry. I generally feel that way about my birthday too, though for some reason Christmas feels different (maybe because I'm never the host so it isn't a ton of effort for me?). I think a trip on your own is great! And I think you should do what you want for a family trip, too, while obviously considering avoiding things they will actively hate. If you are the only one making the effort, I think your opinion weighs most heavily! Your kids are old enough that if they have real opinions on how things are done they can help make them happen.
Speaking of travel, I signed up to be a travel advisor with an online company. This will be a side gig and I'm not sure if it will even take off because I'm not going to spend a ton of time chasing clients, but I have always enjoyed planning trips and think this might be a fun hobby sort of thing. It will hopefully give me some ideas for future trips for myself, too! I will generally get extra perks at hotels and stuff for anyone I book, so throwing it out there that if anyone needs help booking or wants to see what I can find, let me know. I am hoping to get started on some of the training materials this weekend - there is a lot to learn but it sounds interesting.
We are super busy on NYE between a football game and going to a friend's house in the evening, but otherwise we have nothing planned for this three day weekend! I am probably going to run a couple of errands tomorrow but hopefully will just be able to read a book and relax for much of it. We are almost always traveling to visit someone or we plan our vacations to overlap with holidays to save PTO, so it's pretty rare to have a three day weekend at home and I'm excited. It's a nice bonus that MLK day is just two weeks later, too! Last year we flew to Boston for the weekend but this year nothing is planned.
We NEVER go to the movies. DS has been begging to go to see Wonka and we agreed that today was the day. DH bought the tickets and I just found an ancient $50 gc for the theater 🤦🏻♀️. I called their 1-800 number and it’s still active and valid. Guess we’ll be dining at the theater tonight!
Wtf. What was his response/attitude? Had he just not been keeping up with his monthly budgeting and was “surprised” or did he know and keep spending?
His hobby is sports card collecting. He planned to sell a bunch of cards before year end but it never came together. This has been the same comment every year he is over his budget- he has a bunch of cards that he will sell in the new year and 'earn back' his over spending.
He put together a whole analysis on what he bought, how much his inventory is worth, etc, etc trying to soften the blow. It did not work... he needs to sell some shit to prove that he actually can. It's a lot easier to buy than to sell collectibles.
I would be livid too.
Creating a list of things he *could* do is useless. Past time to put the plan in action, Mr. Lola.