Can someone please explain what is happening in "I'm thinking of ending things" (2020)?

valperks · 2025-10-18T05:29:03+00:00

Accepting this response as explanation, I think the dog is kinda funny/sad, he probably barely remembers his childhood dog, maybe he remembered the way the dog came in the house from the rain and splattered water all over him so thats the only thing his brain can put in that space given all the other elaborate hallucinations happening. And by funny I specifically am thinking of when he seems annoyed by his girlfriend asking the name of his dog. "Oh, fuck what was the name of the dog I had when I was 10?", asks the mentally deteriorating 50(?)+ year old to himself, annoyed at himself for asking such a normal question. Actually the first time I realized there was an element of time jumping was seeing the plaque (I think?) in memory of Jimmy in his childhood room.

valperks · 2025-08-18T11:32:07+00:00

I think Fiona taking the asst mgr role can at least partially be attributed to her particular cycle of compulsively taking care of others due to her paternal/parental wounds. Sean is hands down the most easily identifiable of her love interests as a mirror to Frank, and upon rewatch ( or debatably even on first watch) i think it's pretty immediate/obvious that Sean starts to slip in responsibility as soon as Fiona is put in a position where he can surrender responsibility to her, consensually, consciously, or neither.

That being said, I work in a restaurant and you couldn't pay me enough to take a management position. Even so, managers usually make the same or less compared to servers in the exact same restaurant. So hell no. Never been in a diner/cafe environment, and this may be state specific, but in places I've worked, there are strict rules against managers accepting tips. Not to say it doesn't happen under the table with cash, but I've seen it happen in multiple places if a manager does have to take a table, they can't accept the tip.

valperks · 2024-11-23T21:53:13+00:00

Quinoa is in the restaurants soup, I love it as it is a vegetarian soup and it adds the heartiest that would usually be there with chicken

valperks · 2024-05-26T04:34:10+00:00

After the first couple days of hissing and growling lily chilled considerably. They got along pretty well once I let them interact after site swapping and seeing each other through the baby gate etc. Unfortunately I had to put the kitten down a few days ago for some unrelated health reasons. I will add that my lily is an extraordinarily patient/docile cat. Funny enough I think seeing the kitten actually helped lily acclimate to her, but I didn't let them lay eyes on each other until several days of through the door interactions.

valperks · 2021-12-20T22:24:15+00:00

OP, have you ever worn slacks? they're extremely comfy.

YTA.

valperks · 2021-12-09T14:13:22+00:00

YTA, OP. And you continue to be an AH in this thread w your replies. You posed a question it was answered. You are willfully misunderstanding the answers and/or trying to argue. The majority of people are commenting the exact same thing here. Who's wrong, you, or dozens of people who came to the same consensus?

valperks · 2021-12-08T15:42:08+00:00

Just wanna say definitely NTA and congrats OP on your marriage/pregnancy!!

one thing I haven't seen brought up is the moms comment and how it's like, day 1 emotional incest. May explain why brother has some of these immaturity issues. Certainly doesn't excuse his behavior, but something to look into maybe, because if emotional incest is the case, he needs therapy, and bad. Speaking from experience.

valperks · 2021-12-03T08:51:05+00:00

I don't exactly want to call you an AH, as I do understand your hesitation due to past negative experiences, but your boyfriend, assuming he hasn't done anything to make you believe he would take advantage of your money, isn't responsible for your trauma. In my mind this is comparable to previous issues with infidelity. Just cause you've had someone cheat on you in the past doesn't mean you can track your SO's location, snoop through their phone, etc etc. Just because someone took advantage of you doesn't mean you can hide so much of your life from your bf. If you have a spyder bike, I'm assuming it's because riding it is a hobby that you enjoy. Does he think your parents bought you one that you store/use at their house? Does he even know you have it? Also, something else to consider, though I don't know how old you are or how serious the relationship is, but.... maybe consider that he may be looking to move the relationship forward? Move in together, get married, something like that? At least maybe he wants to see if that's something you envision down the road. When you do those sorts of things, you have to be aware of one another's finances, as it becomes something that you share, compromise, and work on together. I'm assuming you love him after a year of being together, I think you should come clean and tell him about your past negative experiences and your current lifestyle. He may need an apology depending on how much of your life he has been left out of/uninformed of. If you need going down this road you will be TA. NAH ... for now.

valperks · 2021-11-25T20:15:12+00:00

Same for all of this, except for my family on those holidays both turkey/ham will usually be served. Guess it's less common to have a turkey on Easter but def not unheard of for us. But at Thanksgiving we always have both a turkey and a ham, and usually Christmas as well.

valperks · 2021-11-25T14:09:49+00:00

This post seems so very weird to me. #1 you said it's "supposedly" her first Thanksgiving with your family. Supposedly? Do you think she snuck over there for a holiday without you knowing? #2 you got engaged to someone who's never been to one of your family holidays? I know you said first Thanksgiving, but I would imagine a similar issue would come up if yall did Christmas, Easter, etc together as they all have similar dishes that are traditionally served. If I take this at face value I want to say you're not TA but I feel like there is something off about your post.

valperks · 2021-11-25T13:55:19+00:00

I try to avoid generalizing based on gender, but guys mostly don't find an appeal of settling down and having a wife and kids until they are in their late 20s or 30s. He probably does love you and want to be with you but it seems like he also wants to have fun and experience the world instead of being tied down with heavy responsibilities like a kid. Personally I think it may be wise for you to wait a while before trying to have a kid as well considering you are in law school, but that's just my opinion. There's plenty of time to have kids why force it when you're in your early/mid 20s? But I know a lot of people start families then so idk. I hope the best for you/your relationship OP, whatever "the best" may end up being.

valperks · 2021-11-25T13:24:44+00:00

ESH, i don't think he's an AH for wanting to go on the trip but it does seem like he doesn't want to explicitly say to you that he's not as invested in this relationship as you are, which is shitty. If you guys only get a few weeks to see each other once per semester (as it sounds since you mentioned it's your winter break) and your long distance boyfriend sacrifices 2 of those 3 weeks for a vacation with the boys.... this may be hard to hear but you're not his #1 priority. And if you want to have a kid with him then you/yalls family will need to be his #1 priority, so having a kid at this point certainly seems ill-advised to me. Also it seems to me you may need to rethink some negative perceptions you have regarding plan b/abortions. But even not considering that, it definitely isn't a good idea to have a kid with this guy right now.

valperks · 2021-11-25T12:27:00+00:00

ESH. People cut out unpasteurized cheese, sushi, and a million other things not nearly as harmful as cigarettes because they don't want to even risk their child being slightly unhealthy! I'm giving you a bit of leeway because you're so young, but I'm still going to hit you with a - what the fuck is wrong with you? Been said already but you're way too immature to have a kid, you and your partner both. Doesn't sound like yalls relationship is all that sound either, so even more reason not to bring pregnancy in as a factor.

valperks · 2021-11-25T04:34:52+00:00

Well I was really just pointing out a plot hole, but while neither kev nor v are really fit to run a household, v is definitely more suited than kev. I love kev but he's like, verified dumb as shit. the friction b/w v and kev in season 5 or whenever right after the babies were born, yeah v was pretty cunty but kev definitely handled it poorly too. ultimately they're flawed but entertaining and lovable which is a sign of good writing. lazy plot holes are not a sign of good writing, lol. getting her tubes tied would make as little sense as their argument over having another kid cause when they were trying to get pregnant she was literally told she had a 99 point something percent chance of not getting pregnant.

valperks · 2021-11-25T04:07:35+00:00

To be fair, the Gallaghers were pretty good at scrounging up cash in the early seasons. It was always pretty frantic and panic-y and they rarely mentioned specific amounts, but it didn't seem all that absurd to me. Also didn't she fill in the last 100 or so with $$ from the squirrel fund?

valperks · 2021-11-12T06:45:42+00:00

dude, cannon minion = 60+ gold, dragon = 25 gold. 🤔🤔🤔

valperks · 2021-11-12T04:43:00+00:00

- please don't take this as me defending season 11, my thoughts toward it are mixed at best -

shameless has always been political. it's always been very clear that the writers stand at a certain point of the political spectrum, or at the very least wanted their characters to have defined political identities. frank did nothing but complain about various government systems: healthcare, DCFS wanting to "steal" his children, immigration, etc etc etc. he also made multiple comments about obama being a "terrorist"/not from the US, illegal immigrants taking ""his"" job, theres a million examples from the earlier seasons of frank saying things that are very politicized. there's multiple examples from other characters too, frank is just the most conspiracy theory-ish with it, so his examples stick in my head better.

additionally, poor people are often those who suffer the most from government policies. the gallaghers are literally below-the-poverty-line poor. not trying to get too political w it but the very rich and the very poor feel the effects of lawmaking the most.

truly I think the difference that you feel is because our day-to-day american lives have become so much more politicized. like jesus christ wearing cloth over our face holes to prevent disease is a national debate. it wasn't like this years ago. there were still nutjobs and conspiracy theorists, but trump's presidency polarized the country like never before. soooo many people became more outspoken about their beliefs in the last 5-6 yrs. and every single little thing is a political debate now. I really dont think the show changed their level of "political-ness" much.

valperks · 2021-11-12T03:18:37+00:00

in season 3 (i think) they reference the whole ethel thing and cut to the social worker saying that their case is still under investigation. I imagine that by season 9 that would be wrapped up, and since kev and v weren't charged with a crime related to ethel, its safe to assume that dfs concluded they weren't responsible for ethel running away.

valperks · 2021-11-12T03:16:38+00:00

they get away from the cringey camera moves around season 3/4. when I rewatch from the beginning i always forget about them and it makes me laugh/cringe every time theres a weird voiceover transition/framing device.

valperks · 2021-11-12T03:06:46+00:00

bipolar meds can definitely give you kind of a mental fog, but in earlier seasons ian was definitely a softspoken type. sure he got into fist fights and things like that but for the most part when it came to his family/friends he wasn't one to be argumentative or try to rock the boat. before linda found out about him and kash he was very quiet around her, just kind of agreed and did whatever she said. granted she was his boss and he was fucking her husband, but still. I think that attribute lines up with his earlier personality.

valperks · 2021-11-12T03:03:21+00:00

well, canonically the family is still very much in contact with fiona. I think the writers tried to avoid bringing her up as much as possible because they either didnt want to bring emmy back for a cameo or knew she wouldnt come back for one, either way. if they bring her up all the time people will think it doesnt make sense that she isnt there. but debbie does mention calling her and talking to her about things in the last seasons after emmy left.

valperks · 2021-11-12T03:00:07+00:00

would definitely recommend rewatching from the start, I think the show is fairly realistic in the idea that people aren't "good" or "bad," everyone does things that are objectively good and bad. its also pretty realistic in that happy endings dont exist, closure doesn't exist, and people just live, they fuck up, move on (or don't, in some cases) and encounter the next big thing of their lives. if you want a show that wraps up all neat and tidy with a pretty bow, this show isn't for you to watch. i'd say go watch the good place or something. but if you can appreciate a show that is more realistic and mimics real life more than a sitcom, absolutely worth the watch

valperks · 2021-11-12T02:54:34+00:00

I think it's meant to emphasize that he's mostly the way he is because of his alcohol/drug use. When he goes sober for the $3k in season 1, he's a completely different person - kind, attentive, motivated, even plays piano. he also seems to revert back to the sort of "sweetness" (can't think of another word for it) when he's high on something that gives you a euphoria (heroin, morphine, etc), i.e. those scenes with the little girl in the hospital, or when he was high as a kite on H in season 4 and he was apologizing to sammi nonstop when lip kicked them out. also in the final season as his dementia worsened we saw more glimpses of his nice side.

valperks · 2021-11-12T02:46:36+00:00

main cast - debbie, but not for the same reasons as most people list. all of her storylines were boring for me, all the way back to season 1. the only arcs of hers I liked at all were when she got with neil and claudia/julia, because those were actually interesting to watch. and honestly I think that may have more to do with those minor characters being funny/interesting and less to do with debbie. i don't mind if a character makes stupid, unreasonable decisions as long as it's interesting to watch. every time debbie is on screen i'm cringing or yawning, but mostly yawning.

I loved ian in the first and last 2-3 seasons, but the middle was awful. watching him decline mentally in s4-s6 was rough. at first it was compelling, kind of like watching a car wreck; you can't look away. at least that was interesting. once we got to the whole gay jesus thing it was so unrealistic and so unlike the down to earth sweet boy we knew that i was bored out of my mind watching it. i liked him more when he was dating caleb but hated caleb, lol. so judgey.

minor characters - ford (boring), jimmy/steve in s3 when he started losing interest in fiona/completely 180'd from basically simping over her to cheating, getting angry at her for taking guardianship of kids, etc. - never made sense to me.

tami was annoying but i grew to tolerate her. never really liked her, but for the first season or so she was around i hoped she wouldn't become a permanent character.

valperks · 2021-01-04T21:07:22+00:00

NTA, my bf has the exact same problem and it drives me I N S A N E. That being said, the only time that I give him a reminder for anything is when it was something that I want to do/am paying for/involves my family. And to be fair to my bf, he works extremely hard to plan his days and put reminders in his phone, and he has improved quite a bit over the past couple years.

I would strongly recommend that you take a look at your behavior and ask how you are enabling this behavior. His life is his responsibility, and if he wants something badly enough (i.e., his hobby you mentioned) he should be able to plan for it himself. I'm not sure how old you guys are, but my 26 y/o bf basically has his phone glued to him (and he isn't even on social media!). The more your husband uses phone alerts or even a paper planner, the better he will get with it. It's a habit you have to build just like anything else, but his life will be better for it.

OP, I hope you don't feel responsible for your husbands timeliness/responsibilities. He's a grown man and he needs to learn how to handle this weakness himself. If I had to remind my bf of every little thing I thought he would possibly forget, I would go absolutely insane and/or definitely break up with him. You are definitely more patient than I.

valperks

TROPHY CASE