I have baked bread on numerous occasions, so making a sourdough starter was not anything I was interested in. That meant that the Quarantine Trend I could hop on was Animal Crossing!
Actually, the kid wanted it, and at this point I’m down with buying him as many video games as he wants. For one thing, he’s being great. I know he’s bored and sick of the house, but he’s keeping himself occupied. For another, he’s working e-school despite how much he hates Google Classroom as a platform.
(Honestly, I’m not sure how many more issues we’d have had if he were in elementary. Middle and high school here are centered on Chromebooks and already use Classroom, so while it was still not easy to go completely online, it wasn’t quite as bad as for elementary. But, that said, Scott has been adamant that Z be computer and internet-savvy since he could play with a mouse, so maybe that would have helped?)
(Oh, and we are totally those Gen X parents who are like, “Fuck it, screen time–the world is on fire, watch five hours of Buzzfeed Unsolved, whatever.” I got a master’s degree and can tell you the names of all of Reva Shayne’s love interests on Guiding Light; he will manage.)
Anyway. Z played Animal Crossing until the weird not!Easter rabbit showed up, got sick of finding eggs, and went back to his Japanese anime boarding school murder thing on the Playstation, so now I’m playing Animal Crossing again. I got a house, I have a cute plaid maxi-skirt and green shoes, and one of those WWI pilot’s hats with the goggles. Oh, and a pet squid. Now if they’d just sell notebooks in the general store I’d be set.
My next thing to consider is the boy’s birthday, which is coming up. He’s turning 13 in quarantine. I have promised that I will bake his cake, since the one his father made me for my birthday was … interesting. Dad, however, will do the frosting and decorate it. Which, I’ll be honest, I’m kind of debating livestreaming for the entertainment value.
Laura E. Price 