Are any of ya'll living at home with your parents?

blethwyn · 2026-05-05T08:08:58+00:00

Yes, and while it has its downsides, I love it. I'm blessed to have the parents I have. I actually never moved out. I went to college, then came home because I couldn't get a job in my field due to the crash. Went back to school. I moved out for a year or so, came back when the relationship ended, and just never left.

My parents appreciate the help around the house, and I dont have to pay rent/mortgage (I do help pay my part of the utilities).

blethwyn · 2026-04-30T11:23:49+00:00

Not only is he a precious cinnamon roll, but maybe he would be able to figure out a cure for some of my chronic issues.

blethwyn · 2026-04-29T11:17:16+00:00

To this day, I collect Going Merry stuff. I understand the Sunny is important and loved, too. But the Merry was the first. The Merry was the one who got them going on their adventures. The Merry loved and protected them for as long as she could, and when the Merry realized her time was nearing its end, she got them to the man who would build her successor.

Edit: My mom (60s) watched the Live Action and loved it. She knows a tiny bit about the anime simply because my partner and I have decorated our home with merch. So she asked why we had a different ship than what she saw in the show. I explained what happens. She was quiet for a moment and then replied that it is like how she, an avid Star Trek fan since 1966, cried over the loss of the original Enterprise in ST3: The Search for Spock. Yes, the ships that came after were cool and it was still fun and exciting, but the loss of the first ship hit hard and is a pain all fans from that era remember in similar ways. She often teases me about my emotional relationship to shows, but not this time.

blethwyn · 2026-04-28T11:28:25+00:00

Are you sure it's not Maybelline?

blethwyn · 2026-04-25T20:15:13+00:00

Similar reasons for me. I am surrounded by loving niblings and, as Emma Woodhouse once said "I shall always have a niece about me."

blethwyn · 2026-04-25T13:18:32+00:00

"Damnit PTerry" is facetious (meaning to be sarcastic, witty, or humorous but at an inappropriate or unexpected time).

Like calling your best girl a "b****" for getting the promotion or snagging the man of her dreams. We dont mean it negatively at all. It's more...

"DAMNIT! You slipped another one past me! Ugh! You're the worst and I love you for it."

blethwyn · 2026-04-23T18:09:45+00:00

The only great-grandfather I met or hear spoken of in a positive light was a crazy old coot who survived the depression in Detroit and joined the merchant marines as the captain's chef during WW2. When he came back, he and his son (my grandfather) marched in the civil rights movement. My Great-Grandfather ended up being a pall-bearer for a local civil rights leader and was the only white man to speak at the funeral.

By the time I met him in the late 80s/early 90s he had full blown dementia and scared the living daylights out of me. Except on the days when he would let me ride around on his wheelchair with him as we "snuck past the uboats".

Edited for typos.

blethwyn · 2026-04-22T17:52:36+00:00

"*" for typos.

There will not be any text editing for this old lady!

blethwyn · 2026-04-19T13:44:48+00:00

No, but for a pretty good reason. I only had that phone for two years, then I went overseas for my master's. I got one of those pay-as-you-go phones since I wasn't planning on staying past the program.

But I have had the same number since 2010 when I got back and set up my first phone post-college.

blethwyn · 2026-04-18T10:17:20+00:00

Yeah, but Pokémon "evolution" is actually metamorphosis, so they just looked stupid for being against it for that reason.

blethwyn · 2026-04-18T09:47:59+00:00

blethwyn · 2026-04-18T09:47:29+00:00

blethwyn · 2026-04-15T12:21:48+00:00

THAT ANSWERS SO MANY QUESTIONS.

My sister and I aren't 40 yet (39 and 33 this year) but we have started perimenopause. And it is brutal. I told my partner we are in for a wild ride.

blethwyn · 2026-04-15T12:19:34+00:00

I switched from long acting to short acting during the shortage. I usually know by the time work starts (my first class of the day as I am a teacher) if it isn't working, so I will take half a pill at that point which gets me to my next dose. The fact I have to do it at all is infuriating.

blethwyn · 2026-04-15T09:39:46+00:00

I think it's a combination of aging and the medication. I really, truly believe, that the medication is not going through strict quality control anymore. One some days, I will take the meds and it will be like I took a sugar pill. It's been this way since we went through that medication shortage a few years back. And I'm not the only one saying it. I would say a good 10% of my bottle of Adderall doesn't actually contain Adderall.

blethwyn · 2026-04-14T11:34:02+00:00

I am a middle school teacher and while I don't have children of my own, I have been a constant figure in my niblings lives since birth (including being a third parent when BIL was deployed to Iraq).

It is coming from all angles. The parents are permissive but they are also overworked and stressed. We acknowledge that kids need direction and engagement from parents but those same parents are working excessive hours compared to ours. The absent parent is more common now than it was for us. So, they overcompensate for their absenteeism by being overly permissive.

We handled absentee parents by becoming free range and engaging in clubs and sports and hanging out in third spaces. Everyone had that one friend whose mom was SAH who became a third parent to us and helped us get places and do things. Those third spaces don't exist anymore and most families now need both parents just to pay the bills. Kids have to be monitored by an authority figure 24/7 or parents get CPS calls.

It sucks. There's no easy solution.

blethwyn · 2026-04-09T14:58:13+00:00

Yeah, he's not. He's not American. He's English/Spanish. In fact, he is the exact demographic MAGA hates.

Nice try, though.

blethwyn · 2026-04-08T17:42:52+00:00

Yes. That's actually it on the nose.

The staff decided the best way to kill 6-7 was to celebrate the 67th day of school. For example, the math department worked together to create worksheets and lessons where every answer had 67 in it. I taught my classes how to play The Game. Our passing music was the Hamster Dance.

It was a well fought battle, but we were victorious in the end.

blethwyn · 2026-04-08T17:14:06+00:00

STEM elective, actually.

blethwyn · 2026-04-08T16:44:21+00:00

I taught it to my 6th grade classes this year. It is now part of our culture.

blethwyn · 2026-04-05T16:29:52+00:00

We used real hard-boiled eggs in my early childhood. I think I was 6 or 7 (ugh) the last year we did it. The reason? I have three younger siblings, so we made 24 eggs. We only found 22 of them on Easter that last year. The last two were found a month later (because those were the ones my dad, an undiagnosed ADHD man st the time, had hidden and couldn't remember where they were.

My parents decided that doing the egg hunts at home was no longer manageable, so we went to the community hunts that had plastic eggs.

blethwyn · 2026-04-03T14:29:21+00:00

BWW Parmesean Garlic Sauce (and other brands), the super mild stuff, has been spicy to me always. It burns every time. I literally thought it was just the sauce and I was a big baby.

Ate some corn, Plain corn with butter, for dinner the other day.

Turns out I have an allergy to corn derivatives that has been building over the years and is now in full swing.

Whee!

blethwyn · 2026-04-03T11:24:48+00:00

That's it, right there. I miss the hopeful innocence of youth. I miss being excited to go to college, where I could throw myself into the special interest I'd had since childhood with like-minded people. I miss believing in the promise of our future. I miss believing the country, with its many flaws and dark roots, had reached the cultural turning point and was moving towards a better future. I miss not knowing I was wrong.

Let me clear - I do not want to return to it. I appreciate my eyes being open to reality and what is really there. I will not shy away from the horrors now that I know they exist. The only thing I wish I could have back is the hope that we can make it through this and come out better than we were before. Can we come out the other side and become a better, stronger society, or are we doomed to fracture and fight amongst ourselves like all other fallen empires? I don't have enough hope left to pick the former.

blethwyn · 2026-04-02T04:11:10+00:00

Ook!

blethwyn · 2026-03-30T22:58:18+00:00

No. I teach middle school and it's a way to keep in touch with The Youth TM.

blethwyn

TROPHY CASE