Well, one of the things that people like just from studying 13th 15th century korean history, uh, if you ever heard of Confucianism, there was a part of the roots of Confucianism is about self improvement and education and like it's it's always trying to trace a fit like the lineage of like Confucianism and its practices and how it's exist today.


Okay it's okay.


When I was looking at it, it's basically one of the huge reasons why in asian cultures education is um, said on such a high pedestal is because there's, there's a class structure like in, you know, in futile different fuel.


Yeah. Yeah.


Parts of Asia, excuse me.


Mhm.


And the only way for somebody that's like a peasant to become part of the scholarly class or part of the public service class as there is in like these different cultures, it's all through education.


It's right. Right. Mhm.


Um, so I have really backwater like peasant genetics, like my parents are from a poor part of poor coastal part of china and um, they always emphasize education like I would get beaten if I got a D or something like that or you no see.


Jesus. What? Yeah. Yeah. What two?


Um, and then like a lot of other asian people, I knew the same same way. Like, um, you need to do well from a educational standpoint. Like my parents harped on a lot because they said if it was, if it was you against a white person in America and you are on the same footing, you would lose no matter what it is.


What?


So you have to outdo everybody else. Um, and it's not only that aspect from, you know, being it, I was born in America actually, but um, but yeah, they're, they're basically arguing like they're trying to compare african americans or, you know, slaves or black people or whatever um, to literally over two millennia of um kind of this philosophical, almost genetic kind of building blocks of culture in a weird way.


Mm. That's for. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah.


So like basically education or educational attainment is like um is nearly genetic, a lot of asian people, especially the older generation.


Yeah. Good. Mhm.


Um like you might go away in the generation after mine or something, but um, it's almost like a, so, so in korean culture, there's something called han H A N.


Yeah.


And it's um kind of like a similar concept to accept, it involves more of um doing well to represent your family well in order to do to what's called save face. Um And it's uh so yeah, education is a big thing. Um and to downplay it and say it's because people are less racist to you. I think it's completely missing like the point for the most part, completely not understanding the roots of Confucianism or philosophy that better and like a lot of asian cultures.


Is it in your view is it downplaying or is it all right, wrong. Uh People are less racist to eight people?


Um I think it's I think the less racist part maybe accounts for 10 to 20% at most. Like education is so big in like asian cultures, I would say it's uh it probably makes up a majority of the reason why like any asian person that successfully successful.


Yeah. Yeah. Pretty I again I don't have anything the counter this besides just the outcome.


Yeah. Yeah. Pretty good reference. Yeah. Yeah. But yeah, it's um I mean there hasn't been like a lot of scholarly papers on it per se because I don't think it's a point that people really interesting exploring.


Exactly. But um I mean I like I majored in computer science, but it was just like um when I was in college, I was wondering why my parents were so hard on me all the time. And uh so I, you know, I studied a bunch of random asian cultures just to see if there was like a connection and that's what I stumbled on, that.


Mhm. Yeah mm mm.


It was it was like kind of like beaten into people, it like from a from a very early time in history, like my my my grandfather was an engineer um and my parents like they're barely educated um for some reason I think, like even though they didn't do so well, um and my grandfather was an engineer, they were technically in like a poor part.


Right.


So my my mom's side, she has um one brother and three sisters and an engineer and china doesn't really make that much back then.


Um so education was harped upon, like, you know, my, my dad's side of the family, he was kind of an idiot, but my mom understood like the importance of education, so then they moved to America and all that stuff.


But why time?


Um and you know, they did some like medial manual labor work in the restaurant business. Like me personally, I worked in the restaurant business from the age of 4 to 18, um, every day at school, I'd have to do work, um, until like, the evening and then I do homework and then I eat and then that's it.


Yeah. Yeah. You sound like my best, my best friend in high school the same thing. Her parents were from china. They had a restaurant or they have a restaurant.


Ah current events content and you know they're taking advantage of her just like she gets a study in the back within help, Help in the kitchen.


Oh yeah, here help.


Mhm.


It's a shitty existence, but you know, it is what it is like, um, after I graduated college, like I started traveling a lot more because my parents never had time to um take me for vacation or anything.


Yeah. Yeah.


So, you know, it is what it is. Oh, so which part of the east coast are you at right now?


Okay. Yeah I'm in the D. C. Region.


Oh, so am I?


Nice.


I'm, I'm in Vienna.


I mean oh I'm in um Maryland Montgomery county.


Oh, gotcha. Gotcha.


I was gonna bring up to you that in my area like there's, I forgot whatever source it is. But it was saying like monk a planning of cities and towns with in Montgomery County are ranked as quote unquote the most diverse and by that definition it's like the closest to 25% split between white, asian hispanic and african american.


Okay.


So I.


I'm actually not from the Nova area though. Originally I moved there, um, back in 2012 from southwest Virginia.


Yeah. South well. Okay.


Like if you know where, um, in between you via and, and for jay tech is like, there's like a small town, they're like 4500 people.


Yeah.


Um, there's a mormon college there, that's where I'm from.


Yes. Is it south of Shenandoah? For I know that uh I want to say I do, but I don't remember.


Yeah, I believe so. Yeah, It's um, if you know where Blacksburg is? Yeah, let's get to work.


It's because no, I've been to Shenandoah for a small family trip a few weeks ago, maybe a month ago and I know that I stayed in an Airbnb right next to uh James James Madison University.


Ah, right. Yeah, yeah, yeah.


Uh huh.


So that's it in Harrisonburg. Um yeah, so my town is like an hour, an hour and half south of there.


Yes. Yes. Okay, mm I'm originally from California, right?


Yeah. Yeah, that's cool. Um, mm hmm. Oh, nice. Nice. A family in California.


So I went I was from California that I went and I lived in florida, which is where I developed my love for Disney because you get like a florida annual pass back then it's like as many times as you want, $200 it's fucking crazy.


Yeah. Yeah, it's yeah.


It's great. Nowadays it's it's like $200 for one day.


So yeah, we're two hours away from Disney. So I would go there a lot and then I moved up here and I feel like it's like it was like the perfect timing because as a little kid you want to go to like the beach and Disney a lot.


Uh huh. I am, yeah.


And then if you want education you want to go to the Nova area. Uh Nova you know the the D. M. V.


Mhm.


Area?


Mhm. Yeah.


Cool.


Where do you go to college?


Uh what do you see a Yeah, yeah, yeah, I got you.


Oh yes I have. I applied there. I've like uh I don't back then since my my parents really didn't go to like actual colleges that kind of went to like uh my dad went to college in Mexico and it's a different system. It's not like applying here.


Yeah.


So I didn't really know that much. All I know is that U. V. A. I I kind of liked the weather, the weather seemed nice and the area seemed nice and they weren't ranked you know they're working pretty good for stuff I was interested in.


Mm hmm. Yes. Uh huh.


So I applied there and it was one of my choices. So that was nice.


Oh yeah. Where did you end up going?


I ended up going to Cornell.


Oh, nice. That's really good school.


Yeah, it's weather is not definitely preferred Virginia over.


Yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah, that's what like new york is that we're recording?


Yeah, it's upstate new york.


No, I've actually always wanted to go to upstate new york um like there's certain there's like some random like farmhouse style restaurants that I've wanted to go, but I'll say new york is part of new york where you need a car.


No, well alcohol. Yeah. Yeah, definitely.


Uh mm Yeah, no.


Mm. It is so freaking cold there. Um So I went from florida to Maryland and I was complaining Maryland was like 40 degrees so I don't complain anymore.


Mhm. Yeah.


40 is awesome.


Especially.


Oh yeah, I went, I've been going for a run in the mornings and uh actually I kind of like the weather, cold weather. Um I prefer seasons, that's why I like a lot of my friends have moved out to California for, you know, this kind of work. Um I'm just like, no, I'm okay.


Yeah. Yeah.


I for one I think California is kind of falling apart just hearing from the sheer number of people they're leaving.


Well.


Um and the homeless situation that's pretty rampant and it's gonna get even worse primarily because of the way they were managing covid, like um like I say, I don't like, I'm not any particular political spectrum per se, but I don't think they should have shut everything down the way they did uh because it's just going to put a lot of people on the street, especially people in the restaurant industry because restaurant margins only like 5% um after everything is paid for.


Mhm. Oh okay. Mhm.


Um And and then the way they're trying to tax the wealthy, it's not the best.


Yeah.


There's a reason why what's face from new york city. Um What's the the annoying mayor? Um I think he's the governor but he's also annoying both of them.


Did you know? Ah Yeah.


Um Both the mayor and the governor, they're both like scrambling trying to ask all the rich people who moved out to Connecticut to come back because they rely on their tax dollars because the wealthy people pay for the majority of taxes, the state taxes and without it there basically shit out of luck in California and new york so it's all very poorly managed.


Oh. Mhm.


Um uh Oh like what I'm seeing right now is a lot of luxury home developers and designers in las Vegas and um in Mexico we're sorry about Waco texas. Um And they are doing really well because of all the people from California, they're moving out there. Um Right now you get basically three like have you heard of toll Brothers?


Right. T. O. L. L.


Yeah so they're home they're a home developer or designer that they designed luxury and they designed luxury homes so they've already I po'd a while back.


Mhm.


Um But they have some really nice houses in like las Vegas. Um that's actually like priced very similarly to houses in like uh like the Ashbourne sterling certain parts of the D. M. V. So like you can get like um oh like a lot of you get like a three story like McMansion in Las Vegas for like 600 grand. Um And so like.


Oh trust me you can get like half that of a huge house. I have family in Vegas and I spent six months there.


Yeah yeah yeah but it's like these houses are so nice and uh these people from California moving out there and just buying buying them like that because it's like I mean on one hand the weather at night time is like super cold or it can be kind of cold and then during the day it's like hot as hell, but it's technically kind of sunshine, like most of the time, so yeah, it's just kind of dry and arid.


Yeah. Yeah. Mm. Mhm. Yeah. Yeah.


Other than that, like all you need is humidifier and you're set. Um And you know, a lot of people that work in tech are working remote now, so Oh, it's fine.


Yeah. What's your job situation like? Are you?


I'm working remote. I've been working remote since technically I could work remote before Covid, but I like going into the office because it's better internet.


Um And I also get free coffee and water and all that shit.


Yeah. Yeah.


But uh yeah, I mean my it's been fine.


Jimmy.


I mean, my electricity costs been a little bit higher from doing work at home. Um But other than that, I've been pretty upset for the most part. Mhm.


Well, yeah. And I was gonna say even if you go into the office, I work from home between March and september and now my company has forced me to come in but at least we're like I'm easing my way in because at least when I'm driving right now there's no traffic.


Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.


So it would suck to go from like working from home like waking up 10 minutes before I need to work now, like having to drive 40 minutes and you know all that.


So.


Yeah. I mean, I would almost be healthier than I've ever been because I'm getting a lot more sleep because basically like there have been days where I just haven't taken a shower at all.


Yeah. Exactly.


I'm just like working.


Yeah. Come on. But um during the summer, yeah, if it was a nice day, I would take my lunch hour and I would actually sunbathe on my deck like why not so awesome.


Yeah. Yeah. Mm. Yeah.


And then you know if it's raining or something, I just take a nap in during my lunch uh turn on my lunch hour and then I eat as I work afterwards.


So I was like the last it might be the last uh summer vacation I ever have.


Else. Yeah.


It definitely felt like it's been.


Yeah. Anyways I think we've hit our 25 minutes. This is a good talking to them.


Yeah, it's been 41 track.


Nice. Very cool.


All right, nice talking to you.


All right. Yeah I was going to see you later but.


All right, take care of.


Okay. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, wow. Yeah.


always here some Hello?


Right. Right. Yeah.


Blue.


Yeah.


Oh yeah.


Mhm. Yeah. Yeah.


Oh wow dogs, mm Mhm Good morning scott.


No. Morning, sorry, my volume on.


No, that's okay, you're fine.


Good morning.


Yeah. So is it seven o'clock where you are dinner?


Yeah, two minutes prior, but we're fine. It's on a timer thing.


Where are you from?


Well, indiana yourself?


Okay, um I'm just outside of Pittsburgh pennsylvania.


Oh well.


Okay.


All right. Used to uh flyover into Philly every month for work, So you ever done one of these?


Oh okay. Um you know what? I did one about a week ago um with a woman from Louisiana?


All right, this is number five for me.


Really?


Uh Yeah.


Oh my goodness. Yeah, I signed up for one yesterday, was it yesterday or the day before and they never showed up so Yeah, what I think.


Uh Mine was last night I think and they like immediately rescheduled me, so I thought that was cool.


Mhm.


Yeah, about about 50% of the time. People are no shows I've been guilty of it myself, so it really does help.


Yeah, it's like, you know what, I want my 15 bucks where you at? I could walk to me.


Uh I started doing survey stuff like a year ago and I used like four or five different sites.


Yeah.


Uh Oh man.


Okay. Which ones do you use? Okay.


Um I'm on a bunch of different since I use prolific, I do swag bucks.


Um There is a a digital reflection panel, uh just a whole bunch of different ones uh that a lot of passive income, like the digital reflection panel, I get 10 bucks a month just for having a meter plugged into my router, which is awesome.


So every few months I dropped 50 bucks into my Paypal for doing nothing.


I got to do a software update like once a month it takes like two minutes. So that's, that's not bad at all. Uh Swag bucks, I mainly do games because you can play games and get money for that.


Yeah, a few times.


And I also do there, you ever done panels? So like I got 12 Nyoni, the downside of being part of so many and I don't remember what it's for uh like right now I've got a few different things going on.


Yeah. Mhm.


The post office, has me doing one where I log my mail that I received over a week and then I basically mail them all my junk mail and they're giving me 40 bucks.


Yeah. How do you sign up for the post office?


Uh They actually sent it to me. Uh They dropped a thing in my mailbox saying, hey, if you want to tell us you know about your mail usage over a period of like a week, we'll give you 40 bucks.


Okay.


Uh huh I'll send them my junk mail for $40.


Sure. Uh I am trying out toothpaste right now for two weeks for 20 bucks.


Uh So home product testing the second toothpaste when I've done in like a month.


So I've got like three tubes of random toothpaste in my cabinet, like it'll all get used eventually.


Right.


I don't mind that A friend of mine got a home product test for a Roomba and got to keep it.


Yeah. Oh, I'd love that.


I'm always on the lookout for that stuff. Free stuff is my favorite thing in the world. So better.


My husband's leaving for work. Bye. He says bye. I missed you man. It's that time of day my kids are still sleeping and he's leaving for work.


How many kids go?


I have two kids, one is six and the others nine.


Nice.


I have a four year old daughter.


Oh, do you?


Oh yes. And and a little that bowl over here.


Okay. So she hasn't started kindergarten yet.


No she's been in pre k.


Oh.


For the last couple of years so she comes to that I have split custody so she's with her mom right now.


Mhm. Okay. Okay. Yeah. My two, they start school here.


They got a log on at 8 50.


Oh yeah remote.


Yeah. Well we do, we do hybrid.


Yeah. Right.


So they go to school Mondays and Tuesdays and then Wednesday, thursday friday their home with me.


Mhm. Right. Well yeah.


And um, it's not bad because they actually get to, there's cameras, there's like four different cameras in the classrooms.


No what?


So they see exactly what goes on with the kids that are in the classroom, They get the same instruction, the same assignments, everything. Um, but they just view it online and then the days that they're at school, the hybrid kids that are online, see what goes on when they're there.


Yeah. Yeah my and so we started back just a couple weeks ago.


Yeah.


Live classes. They were doing uh remote and I guess my nephew like an hour away he's been doing hybrid but now they're going straight back full time which is extremely ill advised right now.


God.


We are one of the highest trending states right now for new daily infection.


Yeah. Oh no.


Yeah we had like 2500 new infections the other day. It's uh yeah mm Okay.


Oh, wow. Yeah, we're, we get them, we're averaging between like 1100 to 1500 a day, so, Right, mm hmm.


There's uh there's the site that I use called uh N. C. O. V. 2019 dot Live and it was a kid that created an algorithm that searches the internet for all coronavirus new data and compiles it into one site.


Mhm. Right. Yeah. What word? One? Who? Uh huh.


Uh it's really rather ingenious but I got it.


Yeah. Hey, sit down.


I don't pennsylvania 189,000 infections.


Come on. Okay.


14 8 per million and no new updates for today.


Mhm. Yeah, they usually don't put our updates out until around 12 o'clock around lunchtime.


Oh well this guy's in like Australia.


Um uh not okay.


So his daily resets at like seven p.m. Every day. Kind of weird. I think he was using a universal time instead of just resetting at like midnight to drink.


Mhm. Yeah, it's a shame. I feel really bad for my kids just because, you know, we get letters saying, oh, we're not doing parties this year.


Right? Yeah. But I still don't know what you're doing Halloween this year role.


You know, you're not allowed to send in treat bags, you're not allowed to send in birthday treats. I just feel like they're missing out on so much. Uh, well, we are, we are here, um, most of the neighborhoods around here doing it and the local municipality that we're in is doing like a special one with businesses. There's a, there's a walking trail about five minutes on the road from us.


Okay.


And it's it's a bike trail walking trails miles long and they're having local businesses set up on the trail.


That's a great idea.


Yeah. Yeah. And it's in the middle of the afternoon so the kids aren't out at night.


Yeah. It kind of reminisce of how the malls used to do the various stores giving out candy.


Uh huh. Yeah. Yeah. The moles aren't doing it this year.


No, that's a little too enclosed.


Mhm.


Yeah they I saw online some guy made a pulley system to run candy out to kids and then get the empty bucket back. So that was his like no contact but still able to hand out candy feel. I thought it was pretty clever when you consider how critical these periods of social development are and they're missing big chunks of it.


Mhm. Yeah. I mean, I think the kids need it, they need some sense of normalcy in their lives. Yeah.


It's the cause for concern much.


Yeah. Now your daughter is now that she's in pre K or is she still going or?


And that's been a point of contention between me and her mom. I mean it's, you got away risk versus reward and, but yeah, it's some of the percussions are taking almost reminds me of like airport security. It's the illusion of safety because like I have to wear a mask when I take her to pre K, but she doesn't.


And then she's around 30 kids all day and then I'm like, whatever, I, you know, would not have gotten picking her up and dropping her off. She's going to give right back to me from exposure to all these kids.


So it's, uh, it's really just kind of half assed measures.


Yeah.


This, okay.


We have some of those here to like our restaurants, you have to wear a mask to go into a restaurant and you have to wear it when you walk from the hostess area to your table, but you can take it off at your table.


I mean, how, how are you going to eat otherwise?


So I know, but it it's like okay but you're still putting those germs into the air and right you want to get up?


But no, what?


Okay? But I'm telling you you're gonna be tired for schools.


Okay. No, you're fine. I'm gonna grab, grab a little bit of coffee.


Oh perfect. Okay. Hey can you turn and make sure you keep that down? I'm talking to somebody for a survey. Okay.


Uh huh.


And don't get me started on all of the employees of people.


Mhm.


I see that are wearing the mask under the nose that, uh, you don't understand how breathing works.


Oh. Uh huh. Yeah mm. Yeah. You know what they're the masks?


The masks are both good and bad. Um They're seeing up here, especially like the pediatricians and stuff, they're seeing like a 400% increase what I'm going to move to the table because my daughter just turned the tv on um and my my dogs are like playing and growling in there.


Yeah. Yeah. Mm. Special. No, I have, I have the most plastic dog.


Uh Yeah, they're seeing like a 400% increase in upper respiratory ear infections, strep throat because the kids are breathing those germs back in that are in the masks.


There's my personal laying over there. Uh huh.


So it's like, are they really that good? I mean my daughter got and your infection within two weeks of starting school and she is your tubes in like that they're in, they're not so she doesn't get your infections.


No, it's hard for me. Like I do roadside assistance for a living.


Okay, wow.


And when I'm out there lugging around a three ton jack and changing tires on a RAM 3500. I mean that's hard work and I'm trying to breathe heavy and I got this thing.


Yeah.


It's, it's a, yeah.


Uh Yeah.


So when, when I'm working hard, it's, it's a little challenging. But uh you know that's the trade off for not getting the virus.


Yeah. Oh yeah.


I mean I have a friend of mine who is a nurse and he got it like back in april mhm.


Oh, wow. Okay.


Yeah, he was really earlier. And the thing is uh I'm a nerd.


Oh no.


I played like D. And D. And stuff and that's how I knew this guy. Uh So I knew you know, we're friends but not close friends.


And he just fell off the map for like a month and a half. I don't have social media.


Uh huh.


I ended up making a facebook to like get on his profile to try to find relatives.


I'm reaching out to complete strangers trying to figure like the five of us. Nobody knew what happened to him. He just fell off the grid. So out the blue like a month and a half later, uh we all get a message from him.


Mm. Yeah. Uh huh mhm How?


He got the coronavirus and he, he had prior to that heart condition.


Um Yeah.


So he ended up having to get like a double bypass.


Yeah, incredible.


Uh, yeah, he was, he was intubated and all kinds of stuff.


Yes, wow. Uh huh.


Uh, went out to visit him when he got home and holy cow, this guy had lost like £60. I mean you look like hell, you pale rail thin and he'd been a bigger dude before that, seeing the drastic change.


Her Mhm huh.


It was, I was one of the skeptics prayer to that.


Yeah.


Having seen it firsthand now I'm like, okay, I'll wear a mask.


Yeah. Really?


I'll play by the rules. I believe you now.


Well, it's it's weird because it affects people differently, like some people have it and they don't have any symptoms, some people have it and they maybe have like a cold and then some people get it and they're in the hospital.


Yeah. Mm Yeah. Well, well I blame the media at home.


It it's like if you get it, you don't know how it's going to affect you. Oh yeah, I mean, yeah.


I mean, I blame the media for their pursuit of ratings.


Okay. Oh yes.


There's so many years. It's been bird flu, swine flu.


Hey, hold on, once, I'm so sorry, excuse me.


Mad cow. We are, yeah, Yeah.


Do you guys want to calm down a little bit, Huh? My goodness. Do you want to calm down? But yeah, the media they scared.


All and every year it's been a different health epidemic that when we have a serious one, that's not just, you know, grabbing ratings.


I think it's got a Mhm.


Hey, people to take seriously when they've been uh, desensitized to the topic and faithful to himself.


Right. Yeah. Yeah. I think they use a lot of scare tactics. Um I don't even watch mainstream news anymore because it's it's just so much propaganda and exaggeration and drama and I don't even bother with it.


It is, Yeah. No, I read the news probably about 10 minutes a day, but I can hop on a new site and select topics that interest me or stay up to date on the issues without being bombarded with all the nonsense by yeah.


Yeah. Yeah. No. Mhm. How?


All the political stuff and all the racial stuff. And I'm just like holy cow.


Yeah.


It's, it's not worth the stress to stay informed.


No, it isn't, it isn't and there's so much crap, right?


No.


This has been just a shitty year, like I don't want to hear about anymore.


Yeah, It's one for the books.


I'm done.


I normally don't give a damn for celebrating New Year's Eve. I think I'm going to rock it out this year just to be done with 2020.


Yes. Yes, I'm over it. I'm ready for, you know, things to get back to normal. Um I just um I don't know.


I, we've reached a point of no return. I think the normal as we knew it is never going to be the same again.


I I'd like to hope that it will be.


Well, no toilet paper.


But yeah, I agree with you. I mean, I think that there will never be a point when I don't go when I go grocery shopping, I don't pick up an extra, you know, if you can goods or something for my pantry or I don't toilet, toilet paper, oh my god, I we were down to like one big thing of toilet paper from Sam's Club and I brought him to more things of toilet paper and my husband is Ashley, we have so much toilet paper downstairs, I said, but what if they sell out again?


But yeah, I probably got like over 100 extra rolls because every time I go out and buy like a 12 pack, I buy an extra 12 pack and put it in a clock.


Yeah. Right. Yes.


Uh kind of kind of doubling down as I go.


Yes. Yeah.


Um So I lost my job at the start of Covid uh trip.


Uh Okay.


And the first gig that I got into was Instacart. So I was out there shopping in the middle of this pandemic and people how out of touch some of these people were with reality.


Mhm. Right.


You can't find a package of toilet paper in the tri county area and I'm getting Instacart orders for like two rolls of toilet paper, six things of Lysol wipes and I'm like, what planet are you living on?


Uh huh. Mhm. Mhm. Yeah, well you're not gonna find them, the shelves, the aisles are completely empty, like.


Right. I can't tell you how many times I accepted an order, looked at it and went and cancel this.


Yes, Yeah.


This. I'm not even bothering to go to the store because this ain't happening.


Oh yeah, no, we went through a meat shortage up here for a while, yeah, especially beef, um well, you know, you know what, I'm in a rural county, um there's like farms all around me, I am about, I'd probably say 45 minutes outside of Pittsburgh, so I am not a city girl at all.


Uh the weirdest things to bread yeast. It's what everybody making bread all of a sudden. You could not find brady's to save your life, wow. Yeah. Just weird weird stuff. Oh. Oh really? We didn't have that problem. Well, I'm in farm country though. You're on the east coast. So that help. I know there's a Quaker population over there somewhere.


Um Yeah, that's more towards like the middle of the state, there's a lot of Amish Quakers, that type of thing. Um but yeah, it was because a lot of covid cases or something with the beef plants and they had to shut them down, but there was a point where you could not, if you did not go to like Sam's club when they first opened, you weren't getting any meat because he was pretty much gone within like an hour, wow.


Oh right. Oh yeah. Sam's part Sam's club was a nightmare for Instacart. I remember standing in line, just a line wrapped around the building like a two hour wait queue just to get in there. It was absolutely insane. Uh so was never worried about food.


Yeah.


I did 18 years in the army. So I'm head of a prepper.


Uh huh. Okay. Yeah.


Uh so like I have a 250 gallon water storage tank. I have rainwater cisterns. I probably have right now. About eight months worth of dry goods that are good for like 30 years.


Yeah. Yeah.


Um So just sort of survival of stuff.


Yeah, wow.


But toller paper, I am completely dismissed.


Mhm. Yeah.


That was what I was like holy crap. Uh Yeah, I promised my little one, uh that we were going to make cinnamon rolls for breakfast uh the other day.


Uh huh and that was the biggest like hot commodity of the pandemic, everybody had, Good morning, what are you doing up? My other ones up? Your sister's up to go ahead and watch, I don't know. She's up early. Shit. No. Uh huh.


And you know, I, I didn't even think about it 5 30 in the morning. I have a four year old in my face. Daddy is the cinnamon roll time.


Yeah. Uh Yeah.


What? It's 5 30. Yeah, I guess it is.


Mhm.


She was ready to roll on that.


Oh yes, they are. They are. And when you promise them something they remember, Okay.


Oh man. I just scored. So she got a little big for her swing set and I don't know if you're familiar with the neighbors app or the next or the next door app.


Hey, No.


I think it's called Look at my phone and tell you. But it's a great app where oh uh communities basically talk about issues.


Yeah, everything.


If you got your package stolen, you can be on the lookout for these people or if you're having a yard sale or you know an H.


O. A. Meeting or whatever it might be. Some people communicate on there and help each other out.


I.


It's really a pretty wholesome app for the most part, but there's also a buy sell trade area and I like browsing through like the free section and the other day saturday was completely derailed my plans for saturday, but this person had a gigantic playset talking to had like two swings, another swinging thing, a tire swing under it, like a treehouse area, slide monkey bars are simply a freaking playground.


Mm. Yeah.


Uh which I've been wanting to get or something like that.


But his only caveat was you come disassemble it and haul it away.


I got my truck, I wouldn't borrow my neighbor's trailer, it took me nine hours to disassemble, get it back here, get it in the backyard and reassemble it. Uh But this guy was telling me, he goes man when my kids out group but when I bought it for them it was $2300 right?


Yeah. Yes, mm hmm.


So I have that in the backyard now and I haven't had her since saturday. So uh I get her tonight and I am like super excited to show her this gigantic plate.


Uh huh. Oh, she's gonna love it.


Mhm.


She's gonna love it. We have one of those for our kids and we recently moved um and it took us a couple of months to get the money up to have somebody actually like disassemble ours and move it over to our new house and then reassemble it.


What? What? Uh huh.


And we actually got it done yesterday.


Oh no worries.


They came out yesterday and moved it and oh, wow.


Can see if you can. Oh yeah it's pretty, pretty cool.


Yeah, she's gonna love that.


And of course free. Which is my favorite thing.


Yeah, there's definitely wasn't free and ours definitely cost $650 to have it moved.


Mhm. Yeah all we care


you are there? Can you hear me? Yeah. Mhm. Right, can you hear me? Hello? I can't Hello?


I hope you do.


Good, how are you?


You're so far.


It's been really bad.


So it's your job to make it no better.


What happened? I'll try my best to try my best score.


Excellent. Excellent. You look like you're very you look like you're very happy so I'm hoping you can.


Well, quick. Oh, I'm so glad you you showed up because my um I had two previous um this thing going on, but none of them showed up, so I wasn't expecting um partner, but here you are.


Yeah look. Yeah. Yeah. Mhm. Yeah. Uh huh. Well it does. So this round I think this is the fifth one that I've tried to do and I've had one other that actually showed up so well like this one like the last ones were all like I didn't someone didn't show up one day and then the next day they were there and then you know I was scheduled the next day next day but this one was scheduled on thursday for now and that's too far away from me.


Oh wow. I don't know why people sign up and they don't show up. Mhm.


I'm too old, I can't remember that.


Oh no, come on. You're young, You look young.


Right well uh thank you you you need glasses or at least vision insurance or something?


Oh no, those are just all signs of like, the education is smart.


Yeah. Uh huh. So so what do you where are you?


I am in new york city.


Uh Excellent Chicago.


What about you? Oh, nice. Another busy city.


Right. Yes. Um So I am just getting a timer going to make sure that I don't we don't under talk because yeah.


No artists, no artist.


Um So um so have you been in new york for a long time or is this a Yeah.


Um I yeah, pretty much. Um I moved here actually um from south Korea when I was 16.


Okay.


Yeah. And ever since then I just live here um at this point I don't know if you like it or dislike it, it just like my life is here, so my friends and you know like my family, everyone is here and my career.


Do you like it? Yeah. Yeah. Mhm. Yeah. Mhm.


Um So I'm like living in Yeah. What about you, have you moved to from somewhere else to Chicago or your?


Yeah I moved from uh when I moved from near sacramento and before that I lived in san Francisco so but that's a decade now, so after I it seems like it's a long I mean uh well it is I I and I've lived I grew up in boston so I've lived in this sort of like and spent some time in new york, I never actually lived there.


Oh okay. Yeah I was going to say like you lived in san Francisco and now like Chicago it's like very um kind of similar but like different busy city. Oh wow.


But another thing so I you know I like cities a lot. Um And the the thing about um the thing about Chicago is I always feel like it's it's similar to one of the coastal cities um you get like 95% of the amenities at like a third the price.


Yeah all those main major cities that you worked and lived. That's great. Mhm. Oh okay.


So you know I mean because new york is she's so is so expensive and san Francisco is always sort really because I had heard that like housing prices were falling through the floor.


It's so expensive. It like it was expensive but because of covid prices just like gone up like like uncontrollable. Okay well that's just in like publicly like news favorite but a lot of um like individual homeowners that they actually didn't do anything. In fact some of them like raised price and like I know a couple of people because of the landlord raised the price and they were like fighting and like um try to you know like pay the rent on time and like it's it's just such a mess right now.


Yeah it is a mess.


Yeah.


It is a big mess. Did you live in, did you live in Seoul or a big city?


Yeah yeah yeah I lived in so yeah so I yeah but back in the day um it wasn't it wasn't as big as new york, they were just uh this all was developing in fact as the whole south Korea was developing and right after I moved here um they were just justly growing and yeah, have you been there?


Were you in the uh so you know in a big city? So you've always lived in a big city. It sounds like I haven't um I have been to actually in terms of issue that I've been to Singapore but that's it, it is amazing.


Oh I always want to go there because I see like their um their airport is amazing, so that's that's the only place that I wanted to go.


So um actually I was there it was it was it was a a short visit in the middle of a round the world ticket. So I was you know I was there for a day or two but it was so I saw a lot of that airport and that was when I lived in san Francisco and my landlord there with architect who designs airports actually and I was talking in one day and he because he was always gone, it was nice.


Nice that mhm. Oh wow.


He lived above me. I never saw him you know and he and I said what are you doing?


He's like, well I'm working on the redesign of the Singapore airport. I'm like the Singapore airport is the nicest airport I've ever been in in my entire life.


Queen yeah.


What are you going to do? But I guess because there's so much competition between Japan and china and Singapore and all of those sort of asian room uh airports that there's that they just keep one upping each other over and over and over again.


Yeah because like like you know and like like America or europe airports being there for like years so there on it was very like new like architecture back in the days but um compares to Asia, which there is like growing and they're like rebuilding stuff like that so it's more competitive competitive over there.


Um Yeah. Yes. Yeah. Yeah, I mean Japan built an entire island, right?


Okay mm. Okay this yeah it's crazy how people spending money and like you know so I guess that makes sense because when you lend to some other country like the first thing that you see is the airport and you try to like you know I guess I don't know but was it really like they have like a waterfall trees and everything in their path?


That's the airport, right, that's it's on and they don't uh huh. Oh yeah, it was beautiful. And then the like the club, the United Club was well within the United Clubs, his part was on Singapore Air which is like also Singapore Air, best airline I've ever been on by far.


Yeah. Oh wow that sounds easy.


Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.


What's what's the best thing that you liked about?


Mhm. Okay. Um it was really um it was really clean and efficient and easy. I felt like you know I mean like there are very strict rules but because there were rules you could sort of like follow them and no, I don't know, it's just it just felt very uh navigable.


Mhm. Uh That's nice.


Yeah.


That's good, that's good.


So what about you? Where is your favorite airport?


Oh I know where is my least favorite airport which is the Guardia?


Laguardia? Yeah. Oh my God. Oh my God.


Oh my God like I actually leave um like 10 minutes drive from Laguardia it's like it's embarrassing.


Okay and you fly out of, well the thing about it is that it's like I mean back in the decision, back in the day I mean back in the day it was an architectural marvel.


Yeah but like it doesn't handle flights now very well at all. Um I remember the last time I was in laguardia I was in the preferred the uh first of all the whole airport doesn't have preferred traveler stuff or at least back then but I was in it and it was like the weirdest line ever, like went behind these stores and then it like yeah it was like oh Mhm.


No. Yeah. Oh yeah it's just everything is not making sense like the the road goes into the airport it's like very um you have to go round and there are so many traffics and then um they've been doing the construction for past like three or four years and like nothing has been like finished or like try to I don't think they even try to accomplish or anything just like leave their and then goes like goes into the airport like you said.


Mhm. Mhm.


Um Like the way it's the stories doesn't make any sense.


Yeah. Yeah.


Um I don't know like compared to other airport the workers or whoever works in there just not friendly.


Yeah mm yep.


Yeah the lights is dark gives me like um I don't know it brings me negative energies.


Okay. Okay.


Yeah it's horrible.


Yeah uh so that's your least favorite and it's right down the street from you.


Yeah I think that's also plays in fact a little bit because like I see all the time and I see like uh like going in and then um people are coming out from like not present face.


Yeah. Yes. Mhm. Uh huh.


Um Most of them I don't know why but yeah it's much.


Yeah. Well it's it's yeah it's just the household um and it's always been so hard to get to the airport in new york, I guess it's yeah, like whichever airport, it's just difficult.


Oh it is yeah and the charges so much like when you go in um for like the fee is like I don't know 10 bucks.


Uh Yeah, well they're all going to find even new ways to get money out of us because uh the money stopped coming in general, right?


Some some of the airports are so expensive. I hope so. Oh yeah we pay text for for what, nothing not not for our benefit but like for someone else's benefit.


I mean people don't work, people don't pay taxes, you don't buy things, they don't pay taxes, they, you know, so Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that's true.


Yeah.


Well, and new york has always been a donor state. I mean it's a state that pays more taxes to the federal government back in taxes.


Oh yeah like every time every like March um like because I usually pay my taxes like at the end of the january or february and like every time I get my tax return around like March and I expecting this much, it's never been over.


Don't kiss me. Uh huh.


It's always less. Like can you just do me one favor?


Yeah. It's crazy.


Well, I'm hoping that we're gonna I'm hoping for a big change in overall mood and feeling soon. Mhm. Because yeah, that's exactly what I'm hoping for.


Let's hope how this election will goes.


Um Just just like this, it's just like it it's like a weird bad dream, Like I feel like the last few years have just been this like weird or I've been like a bad novel, like if someone wrote this book, it just feels like, you know, it's all improbable.


They like none of it felt like a reality like it was just it was just.


Mm Yeah, Sorry?


That's okay. Do you have like someone else is with you?


No, no, no, it's just it's the other computer though and it's telling us that there are new studies on prolific because they do uh chrome Yeah uh yeah.


Oh nice. Work it on. Yeah but back in the conversation um I was um I remember the day that the 2016 election results came out and um my friend my friend and I was just like we were pay attention to the T. V. But like at the moment that uh we were like just on the topic of like something else like some some stupid thing um friends thing and then all of a sudden we're getting texts from friends like like what's happening, are we gonna like leave the country or not? And then we're like what just happened? And the result came in. We were just like so shocked. And then following for like 2 to 3 weeks, there was a huge demonstrations going on in the street in new york city. And um like we we were hoping that some some things will change, but we just lived through these lawyers for past years. It was it's no, not at all.


Well and then you know, so there's that that all feels totally unreal and uh and improbable and then all this stuff under him, like you know that he brought his whole improbable cast of characters with him and and now um you know, and now we have now we're in the middle of a global pandemic. I mean that's that's this is not usual. This is not normal, the war.


Like, I don't know the fact that this government um just said that we're not going to control the virus. Not anymore. I mean, they've never been, but like it's just throws us to like to the ocean, like, like you're by yourself and we're just going to take all the money that we can where we are in the seat and just I don't know, it's just not making any sense.


Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, he does.


And the fact that he's denying science, he's denying um climate change. What like, he just does like incredibly amazing things like every day, just like, surprising us.


And by incredibly amazing, I think you mean horrific and awful.


Exactly.


Okay.


You got it. You got my message?


But it's like it's like things that you think, like when I first hear about them, I always think, oh nobody's going to do that or like that's so out of the mainstream that that will never get and then it happens and then like now I think we're all totally numb to it.


Yeah.


Like remember when it was a big deal that the president would go out and make a fool of himself in front of God will too.


Oh no.


And now we don't even notice it anymore. It's like wait a home list.


Every like, so in the beginning it's like, oh my God, he's not going to do that.


Like he said, like he's not going to do that and then happened one or like 1st and 2nd, 3rd, and now it's like, oh, again, like, you know, like yeah, it is what it is. He's just seeing him like so stupid finger cross.


Yeah. Well um mm I uh I look forward to things, certain things getting back to normal hopefully, you know? I know. Well, I mean, so I haven't been on facebook for over four years now because in the run up to the last election I was like I was like I was getting so sick of it. Like everyone was arguing, everyone was like sharing articles that all ridiculous and and people who like each other we're sniping in china just like this is ridiculous.


I'm just gonna take a break like six weeks till the election and we'll go away and you'll never have to see him again and then I'll get back on facebook.


Yeah. Yeah. Okay.


Well that worked out so well. Um but yeah it's really it is strange. Um Oh God.


I um I also don't go to facebook that often, but um something like a friend of mine, she kind of shared this article on the facebook to me and I was so um curious about it and then I opened that it was um I've never heard about two in on and it was like one of those articles and I'm like, as I like go through like reading and like first it was like this is not true and then it's like, are you kidding me?


Mhm. Yeah. Mhm. Yeah. All right. Mhm. Mhm.


Like so many people, they believe these things, I think like where they beat them, where they live.


Okay, mm. Yeah. Yeah you yeah yeah it's amazing to me because but there's a group I mean there's especially more than any thing a group of sort of middle aged white men in this country who really just feel put upon like everything is everything is against them, everything is and they just they wanted some hero like really?


I mean it feels like it's you know they wanted some action movie hero and they got some reality show hero and and they they believe everything he says and it's just or he tweets or he retweets thank you.


Yeah. Uh it's like I I've seen some of the comments that really um mean comments of like um like his believers like wrote it on the social media or like under the article and I just think they're so um pd because I feel like they are the ones who is not um maybe there are some like some of them like very educated um but most of them are they're not educated, they have very limited source um of what they're the information they're getting and um they have um like fears of like some sort of fears that some things might change and they're not getting benefit anymore, so he's like getting into their heads mind and just like manipulating them and just having them just follow them as like culture or like worship.


Yeah. Mhm. Yeah. Mhm. Yeah. Mhm. Mhm. Yeah. Mhm. Yeah. Yeah. Mhm. Yeah. Yeah. Uh huh. Yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah. Right. Yeah. It's the people that he had gotten into his head though that wearing me the most because I don't know I just there's his his wanting to be influenced by stupid things like praise.


Mhm. Yeah.


Well he said a nice thing about me so I'll send him some weapons or you know like uh you know I mean I seriously I think that it's just it's sad, it really is sad overall.


Yes. Mhm. It's it's so much um like great things take time to build once it destroyed.


I mean I feel like I feel like even if it's just four years, there was so much that was lost over that four years, that is going to be hard to get back, yep.


It's really hard to get back where it was or even like furthermore. So um we've lost four years of the opportunities that we can we could have created something better. But yeah, like you said, let's just hope for some things will change in the next 10 days or so.


Oh my God. And I just, I do worry about his reaction because I don't trust him to just like get out quietly if he, it's not going to go quietly.


No, and it's also like the electrical thing, that's just not making any sense. I hope that's not interfering of it, like any results or um whatever that is.


I'm sorry, I didn't quite, I understand that. I think you you cut out for a minute.


Oh, can you hear me better?


Yeah, yeah, yeah.


Okay, okay, so I was saying that like because the last election on the electrical college um had lots of percentage of like, you know, deciding the decision, So hopefully this year will will be a different result with the different um you know?


Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah, your safety, Yeah. Mm Yeah, yeah. Mhm Yeah, no, I understand. It would be nice if the person who won the popular vote actually became president.


Yes, because um in new york, um early vote started sunday. So um my friend and I we actually went out like super early morning and we see lines of people there and we waited um like hour and 30 minutes to get into vote and it was so positive energy. Um I think because new york is very democratic and like blue stay, so everyone was just cheering up and like uh yeah, so just seeing that just gave me a little hope.


Uh It does, it does. I just, I've just had my hopes dashed so many times when it comes to elections that it's just really hard for me to, you know, I mean, it's the only thing I could, I can say about the last election was at least it didn't drag on into december.


Okay.


Like, you know, like um like Bush v gore, I mean that just took forever and ever and ever and ever to come to a to an answer and that that I really hope we have an answer on or close to election Day this time.


No. Mhm. Yeah. Well I hope so. Um I really hope so now that you're saying it's kind of like get into my head.


Yeah.


I really hope so. Uh huh.


Well let's talk about something else.


Yeah, exactly. Like we were just like the thing about the politics is just like once you like started, it's just never ending period like top Yeah.


Mhm. Uh huh. Yeah, it is, yeah. And it doesn't matter whether the person feels the same way you do or the opposite way because either way you'll get engaged in either holding each other, you know, it's all confirmation bias or getting, you know, going the other way and you know, we're not listening to anything the other person says.


But yeah, exactly. It's like you feel like very tired of talking it, but like you like, you can't stop it. Just like keep going.


It's like Eminem's it's like eating eminence.


Yes. Eminem's.


So I I'm always in the past trend.


Oh my God, what's your favorite color of enemy? Eminem's? That's a very fast transition problem.


Well, we got to something more less political, although so mine is the red because when I was a kid there were red M and M's and then went away and then they came back.


Mm Mine is a yellow and chocolate.


Yeah. Okay. Why?


I don't know why.


Well, okay.


I feel like the yellow and chocolate collar goes very well coordinating.


All right. Do you like any of the weird new Eminem's they keep coming out with?


No, is your new flavor?


Okay. Well, you know, like, you know, just to just be chocolate and peanut and now there's like caramel and mint, mint. Uh Mhm.


Uh, no, I'm not a huge fan of means.


Uh huh.


Yeah. So I would say the mini ones.


You know the little ones? Have you seen the many ones? Yeah.


No, I always get that package one. I don't know.


Mhm.


Like I like stick with the classic ones.


One.


I don't like new stuff.


I like kind of for each tiny ones because it'll bring my memory's really like the, the whole imaging.


Mm. Yeah. Yeah, I remember when we used to go to the take that, when my parents used to take their cars into the mechanics to get work done.


Yeah.


They had a machine there that you put a quarter in and it would probably wasn't a quarterback that it's sort of like a nickel or whatever, but you put money in and then you get this like tiny handful of M and M's.


Oh yeah.


It's always still excited.


Like you twist the things and you just like jumps off.


Yeah. No.


Oh, that's such a joy.


Are you in the sciences? Because you were talking about him denying science earlier and I'm just curious.


Um, no, I'm not, but I'm very, um, I'm trying to become environmental activists. Like I like to, um, um, not using any harmful products and like trying to recycle because, um, first like I've seen like ever since I watched the documentary, um, they forgot the title, but like by our goal. Our goal. Yeah. And, and then it just like, it just waken me up and I want us to live in this Earth as long as we can. So yeah, So I'm trying to just like as active act just as I can. And science is also like very important to our lives, you know?


Well, and it's just, it's just mind boggling to me how many people in general just, you know, they don't believe the science or they won't, you know, and yeah, science is sometimes wrong, but mostly it's right. And you know, it's like, um so the whole in general, the vaccine thing makes me absolutely crazy. Um All these sort of anti-vaxxers and the parents that won't vaccinate their kids. And then it's like, you know, but you know what, what one thing I think that is problematic and true is it like pretty much anyone who is a parent of kids now doesn't remember any of these childhood illnesses, like they don't, you know, nobody near them ever got polio and got, you know, or nobody died of measles because those were mostly they were very limited and somewhere almost eradicated.


And so like there's no experience of, wow, this is why we have eight kids because we hope that two of them will live to adulthood and lived through all these diseases.


Yeah, that's true.


And so without that experience, I feel like people just like, I can't see it, so it doesn't exist, we're back.


That's totally makes sense because, yeah, like you said recognizes it was just you, whoever lives, we'll keep it raised now because of the like science.


Yeah. Yeah.


And it made our word better less virus being around your kids.


Yeah. Mhm.


That's our kid can live without like vaccines or anything.


Um Like right, so you are not the living science especially like you don't you don't want to give your kids vaccines.


Yeah. Mhm. Yeah.


It's just not um it just doesn't make any sense. Like like like this new virus, the vaccine eventually will come out.


Sure. Yeah. Mhm.


But um like I don't think the virus itself will will go away.


Mhm. Uh Yeah, but it's, you know, I mean, it's the, you know, it's like hearing that there are measles outbreaks in California or indiana or you know, there's like there's no reason.


It will evolve to stronger virus in the future. I hope not. But I think so. So um to get an immune it's necessary. Oh, some of the other areas.


Yeah, there's just no there's no reason for that. Um So, I mean, I'm so I didn't, I mean I did, you know, I'm old enough that everyone I know had chicken pox but but like nobody had measles or rubella or polio because those we were all vaccinated against.


Ah yeah.


Yeah.


So there's one other thing it just I don't go back to politics that it's proof in the pudding that you can't elect a very stupid person and expect them to run the country.


Mhm. Mhm No, no, I strongly agree with you.


There you go. Mhm. When you really have cheered me up today.


Oh yes, I did.


Mhm.


Okay. Thank you.


Thank you.


Yeah. I see your smile bigger than in the beginning.


Yeah it is.


So I feel very accomplished.


It is. Well you are you have a huge smile and you really do and so it's infectious.


Thank you. Yes, positive.


So yes, positive. Yes and now you'll you'll get your full whatever $15.20 dollars whenever we get for this and Yeah.


So we're both getting it.


No I know I know but you can go out and buy in new york that will almost value a slice of pizza.


Yeah. Yeah. So I have the best slice of pizza stir around me so I'm going to go there and shoot myself.


Yeah. All right. Mhm. Yeah.


And you should do that to Chicago pizza.


Okay. We actually just I thought of pizza because I just made pizza. Um Well I mean I I took it out of the freezer.


Oh, you made pizza. Oh, that's even better.


I didn't make it from scratch because I was being lazy but I do make people actually I do bake a lot and cook a lot.


Come on. Let's just pretend you made a pizza.


But tonight was just it was because it was a crappy day it was like I won't taste exactly as it's going to taste and I don't want to do any work for it and yeah see in new york you just order in.


Uh Sorry.


Right?


We just ordered it.


That's right yeah.


It's it's it's true because it's dollar. I mean we call a dollar, but it's actually like $2.50 50 cents. So yeah.


Well I think our 25 minutes has passed to let you know it has been a have you got mhm.


Yeah. Has passed. Yeah. You the conversation was really fire. It was it was positive and I loved it. And I see your smile.


Yeah I know it's just bigger.


It's getting bigger and bigger so I couldn't stop talking.


I know I want to capture this moment. I don't want to do anything that's gonna mess it up mm.


Great. I hope you will enjoy your pizza and have a great rest of the night.


But it was very nice and youtube and a great rest provide to you and I will think of you next Tuesday that's good.


Thank you. Yes. Good night.


We'll have a good night.


Bye.


Oh God.


Hello?


Better work, wow.


Yeah, I can see you and hear you.


What's going on? I've tried uh three or four times now with the with the survey program to try and find somebody to talk with and every time I ever got hooked up with it it did never seem to work.


Why didn't you get somebody to join you or?


Yeah no no one ever showed up so I'm pretty excited.


Oh well.


Okay I think so too, yep.


Well their loss I guess because they know they don't get paid otherwise.


That's right. Uh So I figured do you want to uh tell me your first name, we go first names and where you're from?


Okay so my name is Francisco. I am from Venezuela and I moved to the U.


Yeah.


S. Three years ago.


Okay. Very cool. My name's Andy. I live in the U. S. Obviously I live in Missouri um lived here my whole life.


Okay.


I never lived anywhere else other than Missouri. So uh what made you move to the US?


Well the situation in my country is not really great so and I had a lot of family here so I decided to come here to study and hopefully find work to be able to stay.


Mhm. It's Mhm. Mhm. Very cool. What are you studying?


So I graduated from cyber security measure in past december.


Oh okay. My little my little brother does some sort of, I'm not very good with computers but he does some sort of uh I think he does like more networking side of things but it's really it's really interesting to me, I mean like I said, I've never been able to quite figure out how it all works. My dad always worked with computers growing up but I never seem to be able to pick it up, you know, never seem to really be able to uh figure it out too. Well, I'm oh well maybe, maybe, maybe not I guess.


Yeah everybody has their own skill set. You probably know how to do a lot of things that I have no idea how to do. So. Mhm. Yeah. Yeah for example I'm pretty bad that you know do it yourself kind of things, repairing, repairing things about around the home or God forbid I get my car breaks down in the middle of the trees because I don't know what to do so well and yeah, but like I said, you know, you know a lot of, a lot of things regarding home repaired and stuff that I have no idea how to do, I am only good at computers and basically that's it.


Yeah. Oh is that right? Mhm. Oh. Uh huh. Sure, yeah, I actually I am okay at that stuff, I bought my wife and I bought a house uh here in town and I always like to say it had good bones, but really nothing else, so it just you know the foundation was solid and and things like that, but pretty much every room needed to be repaired in some way or another, you know the floors were bad, the uh the electrical had issues and the doors and windows were all old and things like that. And so I ended up, I mean, I'm I'm somewhat handy but not as handy as I needed to be to do everything to fix the whole thing. So I ended up uh learning how to do a lot of things that I never really wanted to learn how to do, you know, restoring restoring hardwood floors or um I mean, just working with, I installed all of our appliances installed, you know, doing tile work and things like that. Uh Yeah, most of, like I say I, and now I'm at least comfortable with doing it, but I have no uh no desire to really do it anymore, you know, we've talked about moving again or you know, buying another place and I said God until I actually retired from my regular job, I don't think I would want to have to be doing it again. Uh you know, to try and to try and live in in a construction zone like that because it's just too much. Oh. Mhm. Mhm. Yeah, Okay, that's all right. That's that's more than enough to get you by really, You know, I mean, there's always a need for it, so that's great.


It's I mean, I was like I said, my little brother, he works for a firm here in town. And he I mean, God, I mean, the guy makes he's got to make probably twice what I do, you know? So he's obviously very comfortable. And I can remember when I was graduating high school, uh my dad, it was that I had just graduated and my dad said, hey, you know, once you come down, he always had his computer room in the basement of our house.


And Uh huh Yeah.


You know, it's a finished basement. And uh, and he said, hey, once you come down here and I'll show you how to do some of these networking stuff or show you how to build this PC or whatever. And I was like, I'm going to the river dad, I don't have time going to, I'm going to go swim with my friends, I don't have time for this. And uh, you know, my little brother did have time for it. So you know, I mean, I ended up, I'm 39 now and I ended up being, uh, I think I was about 33 or 32 before I ever actually got a job where I didn't have to work on nights and weekends or holidays and stuff like that.


Mhm Yeah, we're actually the same age.


So it's uh, I should have, should have probably listened in retrospect, but that will. Okay, Cool, very cool.


Yeah, november.


When's your birthday? Okay. You haven't had it yet then? Not hit the big 40 yet.


Yeah.


That's good. Yeah.


Yeah, I mean, I think I actually had a tough time when I turned 30.


Oh really?


Yeah, yeah, I really don't don't like getting older, I don't like my birthdays and all of that and now now that I'm going to get hit for it and it's going to hit me that I'm actually middle age now.


Okay. Yeah. Right.


Yeah. Yeah, I think so. I didn't bother me too much. I feel like I feel like it's not necessarily the age so much as uh some of the like this year I threw my back out and uh I had always um when I had always talked to people previously who had thrown their back out, you know, I always kind of thought like, oh really?


Mhm.


You know, you sure you just didn't need a few days off work or you know, but man, I had to I had to make some apologies when I did it because oh, I mean it was just agony and and you know, stuff like that, discovering gray hairs and my beard and things.


Mhm Yeah.


I mean, you know, I've been losing my hair for a while now, but that's been at least a gradual thing, but then you know, getting myself hurt and throwing my back out or just waking up in something new hurts. I asked my mom it's been a long time ago what it's like to be old and she said well you know, and she said well you know, you know if you've been out doing something like if you've been out, uh I grew up in a large city and then when I was 14 before high school, my dad had had a farm way, way out in the country and uh so I moved there and then I lived there for a time and then I moved back to another city.


Yeah. Mhm mm.


But uh you know, so we were splitting wood and things like that, she said, you know mom said well you know if you're if you're out splitting wood all day and you wake up and you're sore, you know, and she said getting old is like that only you didn't split with the day before, it's just something something's hurting for no reason, you just don't know why.


To Yeah, that sounds, yeah, that sounds like I had, I have had a few pains myself like for example, two years ago I started getting this pain on my right leg mostly a when I'm driving and I have to stop on a red light, so I have to push the right foot over.


Cool. Mhm. Mhm. Mhm, mm. Mhm mm. Sure, yeah.


Uh So I still have that pain and I don't know exactly what is causing it, but it's not like extremely painful for me to actually do something about it. But I tried to search around and uh I don't know if something called c attica attica or whatever, I don't know if something related to that, but I have that and sometimes, well I really don't have a good posture right now.


Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah sure.


I'm just like being on my bed. Uh So I know that I cannot hold this position for many years because now I'm going to start getting pains right here, around the back on anything.


All right, yep.


But most of the times if I'm at home and not working or anything like that, then I just use my laptop here and I use some platforms such as prolific just to earn a little bit of cash on the side.


Oh okay. Mhm. Yeah. Mhm. Yeah, sure. Yeah, I've gone through a couple of them actually go ahead.


Um How?


I'm sorry a friend of mine that I work with um he recommended it to me because we were just talking about making some extra money here and there and he said because I had read stuff about other survey apps and it always seemed to kind of be mixed responses, you know, some people saying because I've got I've got an mturk account as well through amazon and and that one uh it doesn't seem to be as either as like user friendly, as prolific or and certainly the rewards or not because I mean at least prolific, you know, if you get a survey pops up, you're qualified for it.


No, no, I I was going to ask you how did you find out about prolific? More? Yeah, me too. Yeah, well you should usually, I am a member of more than 15 sides and actually, and actually mturk will be like the second best for qualifying service because all of the rest of the sides actually, they like to kick you and even kick you at the end on mturk if you get kick, which I will say it's only 5 to 10% of the time you get, you usually get kicked at the beginning, not at the end, but Okay, well slack box was my first one and I was actually when before studying anything else, I was getting around 600 a month from snack box.


Um but like I I I did mturk for a while, I still do it on and off, but mostly it just seems to be a lot of work or like you you will go through and get halfway through a survey and then it'll kick you and say that, you know, you don't qualify for this survey. Uh I was all right, yeah, what was that? Right. Uh huh Right, mm. Mhm. I think, I think all I've got is just I've got prolific uh Mturk I'm on pine cone research and uh and I did swag bucks for a while, but man, swag bucks is another one that's just that one was punishing, that one was just like I felt like I was working and working and getting like nothing, you know? Mhm What, wow.


But most most of the reason of that is because I I wasn't working.


Yeah.


So I used to do it something like six hours a day or something like that.


Mhm Oh yeah.


But sock box is still useful for some things.


Yeah. Okay.


Uh Sometimes they have what we call moneymakers and these are offers like you have something like you buy something for file or $10 and they pay you back $20 or $30 or something like that.


Yeah. Mhm. Mhm. Mhm Oh wow.


So so that's why we call them a moneymaker because you actually get more than than what you pay for them.


Mhm Sure.


And sometimes you can get like free trials or or stuff like that.


Yeah. Uh huh Mhm Oh.


Uh They have popular offers like for example you pay Honolulu for one month, you pay $7 and then you get $30 back. And yeah you just have to remember to cancel to avoid getting charged.


Uh right. Yeah.


Yeah but once I started, once I started working then I try to reduce the number of sites.


Mhm. Yeah. Uh huh.


So that's what I have been concentrated on. Emptor can I can do between 507 100 per month doing that.


Oh wow, okay. I know, I I've read some like guides and stuff like Reddit and similar where they said it's important to try and get your numbers up to a certain amount of hits done and then that opens up a lot more or like the returning, you know, hits that you can, you can do an entire series of them or do many, many hits, you know, combined into one.


Yeah. Mhm. Yeah mm I have almost 10,000 hits now.


Oh wow, man. Yeah, that's why Mhm.


Yeah. And you you usually usually when you get around 5000 you will be able to do almost everything. But to to to tell you the truth the numbers hasn't really do anything good for me because this past month I just made 500 on the previous month I made 700 on the previous month I made 800.


Mhm.


So I'm actually earning less of course and torque usually slows down around the summer because the universities are on vacation.


Mhm. Uh huh, mm hmm. Right. Yeah.


Yeah but if you want to learn more on mturk you need to download some scripts and to those grapes actually catch, catch some hits because most of the time when you see a hit pop up and you click on, I said the most of the time you get you get the message, that is not a better way anymore because somebody else grabs it.


Uh huh, mm. Mhm. Uh huh.


So what the scripts do is that they keep trying the hit and see if anybody drops the heat and releases it, so you're able to grab it.


Yeah. Mhm. Sure.


So, so yeah, it requires a learning corporal if it doesn't have any of that car. However, I can only earn in prolific around 40 £40 per month.


Mhm. Yeah.


So, so so that's that's the difference you you don't get as much work there.


Right. Oh yeah, sure. Absolutely.


Yeah, I think uh like I said, I just mostly I just use it uh just for my own spending money, you know? Um my wife has an account as well, we've gotten a couple of surveys that were um joint, you know, we both had to fill out a diary or you know, what have you kind of a thing, but mostly that's all mine is as far as just my own, I just use it for my spending money, you know?


Yeah. Mhm.


So I mean I guess like I'm because I know some folks, especially with everything going on the way it is now, a lot of people out of work um you know, so a lot of people are really relying on it, you know, more than more than just for spending money, you know, or beer money or what have you, so Yeah.


Yeah. Yeah, I actually, before I started working I was starting between 1500 I'm very aware months I could do 2000 but really hard.


Yeah. Uh huh. Yeah. Uh huh, wow. Yeah.


It really hard.


Mhm.


Yeah.


I would imagine that you'd probably have to be on on any of those sites for more than eight hours a day to pull that. Right?


Uh Yeah, I would say between 68 or 10 hours, but it's not like you're working those 10 hours straight, for example with Mturk like I said sometimes you see a list of hits and you use the script to mark all of the ones that you want, and then you start doing something else and then you get a you get a sound once you get the heat assigned to you and then you start working on them.


Yeah. Yeah. Mhm. Uh huh. Mhm. Okay.


So so it's not like yeah, it's not like you're 10 hours doing it straight and there are plenty of other platforms and if you like um there is one that I'm going to recommend to you is called user testing.


All right, that's not bad. Huh. Uh huh. Mhm. Yeah. Uh huh.


Uh basically you need a microphone which you already do.


Okay. Mhm.


What they do is that they perform usability testing.


Mhm. No.


They give your website to test and then you have to speak out loud while you're testing it and give your opinions and each test it pays $10 flat.


Mhm. Mhm. Okay. Uh huh. Oh wow, that's not bad.


Yes. Yeah. That doesn't matter if it's one minute or if it's 15 minutes they're going to pay $10 and sometimes you actually get one study live with the researcher.


Uh huh. Yeah. Yeah. Uh huh.


For example I had one on friday that I didn't having many months and this actually pays $60 for just 40 minutes.


Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, wow, that's that's very good.


So it was really good.


Yeah, Yeah, that's awesome.


Yeah. So so it's it's another good platform to have on your belt.


Mhm.


Uh Just sign up and they are going to test you like test this website for five minutes just to see that you are doing it the correct way and all of that.


It yeah. Mhm.


And if they approve your account then you are able to to take more tests and sexually pretty good.


Yeah. Yeah, that's cool. Yeah, I'll have to check that out.


Yeah.


Yeah, I was gonna say about the only because like I said, not not ever, I mean it's only just been this past year that I've been on with prolific um since before then I was either to make extra money, I would just ebay some of my old stuff, you know, sold selling some of my old video games or what have you and I mean way, way, way back in the day, I haven't had to do it, but uh, there was a time in my life when I was having to sell plasma a couple of days a week, you know, to make ends meet there and I mean you can make some decent money that way, but you know, I haven't, haven't had to do with that, haven't had to get that in the end of that matters in a while anyway, so that's it, it's good, but yeah.


Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Another way that you can do is especially right now during the pandemic is just working or doordash or any of those food delivery like we we have this group on this court which is like an online chat where we discuss peer money earnings methods and all of that.


Uh huh Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, uh huh, mhm, mm, mhm, uh huh.


And for example, there was one guy that yesterday, he made about 10 orders for doordash and he earned something like $90 something like that.


Oh, wow. Yeah, that's not bad. Yeah, I'm, since I'm an essential worker, it's, you know, it's always hard then at the end of the day especially I work primarily indoors but I have about 25% of my job that's outside, so a lot of times now that it's been so hot during the summer and Missouri summers are always humid so they're always it feels even worse.


Yeah. So yeah, there, yeah, I'm in texas.


Uh and I can handle cold weather really well but hot weather I just can't do too well, so it seems like after I get home from a day's work, I just kind of want to sit down and chill for a while. Yeah. Sure.


So right now we're having very hot weather and the winters are what you will probably call mile because it gets down to maybe 2030 degrees and that's about as low as it goes.


Oh man. Yeah. Okay. Mhm. Uh huh. Right. Mhm. Mhm. Mhm.


Of course for me that is still a lot because where I come from it's 90 degrees weather all year long.


Oh yeah. All right.


Sometimes sometimes sometimes even more mm.


Yeah if I I've known a few people um you know from south and central America um my my little brother is actually, his ex wife was Guatemalan. And uh and I mean it was always it was always funny whenever we would see what she would wear during the winter because it was like a coat and then a second coat and then it was you know um did you ever see the movie a christmas story?


Mhm. How much? Yeah. Yeah I think thank you.


But there's there's at one point the main characters, I think it's his little brother is so is so bundled up by his mom, he's like a starfish and he kind of waddles around and then fall, you can't he can't get up out of the snow.


That's what she was always like was you know, it just seemed like, you know, she was so so bundled up, she couldn't hardly move, you know?


Yeah.


And I figured if she did follow we wouldn't be able to, she would be able to get up by herself I think.


Oh yeah that's funny.


But no I can I can do cold weather all day. I actually like cold weather better. It seems like the past couple winners have been mild but man, I I like snow and ice and all that kind of stuff. I'm I'm a big fan of that, I can handle that better than heat, that's for sure.


Well that's pretty cool.


I figure there's only so much clothes you can take off but you can always just put more on if you get cold, you know she Mhm.


Yeah I don't really like that part of winter because it's like I never find out the right balance.


Uh huh.


So if I if I feel appropriate with the clothes I'm wearing for being outside in the winter and then once I get back inside the house then you have to immediately take everything off or else you start sweating.


Yeah. Yeah. Mhm.


So the whole take clothes out and put clothes on.


Yeah. Yeah.


It's just it just bothers me.


I prefer I prefer around this summer because I can wear the same thing outside or inside and then the A.


Yeah. Uh huh.


C. Takes care of the rest.


Oh yeah, sure.


Yeah.


Absolutely. So have you been have you been furloughed because of the pandemic or are you still what we did?


No actually actually I can't complain. I have been working from home since March and I'm actually saving time and money because work was like 30 40 minutes drive drive away.


Uh huh. Mhm. Mhm. Yeah. Uh huh.


So right now I just have that laptop over there that is my work laptop and I just have it like six ft away and that's and that's my commute.


Uh huh. Right. Yeah. I've talked to a lot of people, I think a lot of people are finding out that a lot of companies are finding out that you know people could even probably work from home even after this is all over with and it will be better just for the company itself because they don't have to maintain a brick and mortar story, you know, I mean, just keep people on my, my wife, I'm like I said, I'm an essential worker, so I go in every day.


Uh but my wife's been home pretty much since the same, she's been home since March. Um and other than just, you know, some minor boredom, it's, I mean it's been great for, she loves it. We actually just got a new puppy uh in March, and so that's been great for her being able to stay home with her and and uh and just kind of about time for work, so she rolls out of bed at you know, 10 till she has to be on her computer doing stuff rather than an hour to get ready and things like that and no commute. So as as terrible as it as it sounds, I mean obviously it's a horrible thing that's happening and a lot of people are going through a lot of really awful stuff, but I can't complain either.


So or uh huh.


In fact, it's, I mean it's been pretty okay for me, you know, it's it's uh all things considered, I'm saving money, I'm saving gas, you know, and she's saving time, so um yeah, it's all working out okay for us.


No. Yeah.


Mhm Yeah.


I think companies were scared that we were going to slack off from home since they can't really monitor us but, but I think everybody at least in my company that everybody has been responsible, they have been working as hard as normally they will and and when they started mentioning like one or two months ago that they were actually planning to go back to the company to the bid to the brick and mortar building, many people including me were saying can will you stay working from home?


Uh huh mhm. Yeah, Uh huh, mm Sure, mhm Okay, but uh huh, uh huh mhm This point, yeah, Yeah.


Yeah, because really we, we even have software, we do Bertel meetings twice a week.


Mhm, yep.


We see each other face is if we went I know that it's not exactly the same but for many people we don't really care.


No. Yeah. Okay.


We don't really need to see somebody in person.


Yeah. Right.


And actually I I work at the customer support jobs so I actually had to take phone calls.


Yeah. Yeah, Uh huh. Yeah, mhm Wait happened, yeah.


So right here in my bedroom I am completely isolated for every noise. So for me for me it's better.


Mhm Yeah, yeah, sure.


The only downside is uh my internet connection is not as great as if I was I was at the company and I had a few power black house and but mostly minor annoyances. Nothing really nothing really bad.


Oh yeah, well, and I can't think of the last time at my work that we had a meeting that couldn't have been an email, you know, I mean, it seems like every time they have a meeting and it's like okay, this this absolutely could have been an email and you know, even a step further than that. Like I said, I mean, since I'm since I'm essential, I I actually worked for a police department, I work in the property room, so taking in evidence and things like that, but so I have to go in. But even then, you know, a lot of the meetings that will have, it's just like, okay, this this definitely could have been an email and I could have just read it at my desk rather than having to go to a conference room or what have you to do this stuff. So so much of it is, I I think that's what a lot of companies are figuring out is even, it seems like just people's morale has improved by letting them work from home and you know, you can just wear your shorts and a T shirt and get to work on on what you have to get to work on rather than having to get dressed up and you know doing your hair all those other things.


So it Right. Yeah. Just Yeah.


So I mean I don't have that problem is only hair, but you know that's just that's just you know my bad luck anyway, so let's see what else do you have any, mm.


Yeah. Mhm. Yeah. All right. All right man. Uh No it was really nice talking to you. I think we have met our our requirements.


Yeah, you too.


It has been 25 minutes so I will let you go so that we can complete the we can complete the survey.


Cool. All right, man. Absolutely. Well, good luck to you man and take care of yourself.


Thank you. You too nice meeting you.


All right, See you too.


Bye.


Thanks.


Yeah, wow. Four. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Mhm. For the time, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Shit. Mr Yeah. Mhm.


Hello can you hear me?


Yes. Hello?


Hi how are you doing?


How about? How are you?


Not too bad. It's friday.


That's true.


And again I'm not quite sure what friday means anymore so.


Yeah. Right. I was just, I was just actually looking at messages. My sister is presumed positive for covid, so I was just checking up on her.


Oh. Oh that's horrible I'm sorry.


Okay. I mean she's she's relatively healthy. So we're like, just hoping that, you know, nothing too crazy happens.


Right. No nothing but crazy.


But you never know.


Yeah you don't you don't I've had a loss in our family from it so it was shocking.


I'm so sorry. Yeah.


It was because you kind of go through a bubble for a long time of I don't know.


Yeah. Right. Right. It's not happening to me. So like even though it's happening, it's like it's not so direct.


Yeah it's direct, yeah.


Yeah.


You know somebody wants, somebody told me that you know eventually everybody will know somebody. I'm like yeah.


Right. And I was kind of the same thing. I was like, I mean, we're all taking precautions maybe, but here we are.


Yeah. Yeah. Well hopefully everything works out, odds are good the odds are there and that that seems to be a huge part because my my cousin who passed away she had she had pre existing conditions that you know it's kinda is one of the things if she didn't have any of those pre existing conditions she probably would have recovered and been fine but you know when you already have health problems it just kind of falls down maybe, yep.


Thanks. I hope so too. I'm sure. Yeah, that's the thing is I'm like, she doesn't have anything that's on like the high risk list. So at least we have that in mind. Right. Mm hmm. Uh huh. Right. Because your body is trying to attack all the issues you already have. And then you get this thing that's like so foreign. Yeah. And I've heard like, yeah, even the people who are healthy, some of them have to end up in the hospital anyway and like their symptoms last for weeks.


Then everything yeah. Mhm. Okay. Yeah.


Like it's not just like a few days, it's like six weeks or more like, oh my God, you shouldn't be for a long time.


Yeah. Yeah. Right. And yeah, yeah, you know and yeah we just don't know if it's gonna be a year from now, you're still recovering from something.


Hopefully not. But Right. Yeah.


That's right, yeah.


I was just reading, um, just stories of people who have had it or are recovering or potentially have it.


Mhm. Yeah.


And they were just talking about like, hey, it's been three weeks and I saw symptoms, hey, it's been two months and I still have symptoms like, has anyone recovered?


Mhm. Mhm. Mhm.


And I was like, oh my God, do you believe?


Yeah, I want to see the people like, no, I feel awesome, thanks tom Hanks.


Right.


I think tom Hanks feels good, you know, they're they're like it was no big deal, what does everything about?


Right. They symptomatic people, they're good, we're fine. They're chilling.


Uh perhaps um funny enough I worked from home before, I'm a writer, yeah I'm a writer and I write books so I'm always at home and um my husband he's works at home too, he's worked at home for eight years except, well we haven't really changed by Sanders like oh this is really a struggle, it's like really hasn't our daughter's home that she's dead and that why yes.


Yeah. So do you what do you do for work, are you working from home or? Okay. Not much different. Nice. Oh so you guys don't have to change much? Yeah. Mhm. Mhm. How long is your daughter? Yes. Okay. I've worked your kids. I totally know what you're saying. I get the five. I know exactly what you say.


Mhm. Show me always there.


Yes. Yeah.


So when you Mhm.


I actually worked before I um so I have a daughter too. She's 10 months so different ages.


Oh especially.


But I know I can't believe she's about to be one but that's a whole other, all other story.


Yeah.


But um we tried going back to work because I was in a I was working at a preschool and I was doing the after school program with like 10 year old.


Well. Mhm. Uh huh. Yeah.


It was it was anywhere between five and I think 12 was cut off, so it was after um after elementary school and like the sas the attitude I was just like, wow.


Like that was the oldest group of kids I had worked with in a while. So it was just like, okay.


Mm.


I mean it's funny because a lot of people always ask me like what's your favorite like age group to work with?


Oh yes.


And I was like, you know, they all have pros and cons. So I don't.


Uh huh.


But yeah, I haven't.


I feel bad for all the parents you have to like be home schooling or whatever you have to do right now.


Oh yeah, I can't complain. I have one. So you know I can't imagine having multiple kids and dealing with multiple right awesome.


Mm hmm. And trying to work from home at the same. Like how do you even you have to?


You split it, you split it up because my husband, yeah we're on the west coast. My husband actually works East coast time so he's up early and he gets his work and then but we spent today we spent combined like 2.5 3 hours helping her with school work today trading bigger.


Mm. Mhm. Mm. Oh my gosh. I remember watching my parents do that with like my little brother and always so bad. Like it would and will.


And it's like I'm I know well and again but you know I know people keep saying it, but it's like this whole new math thing doesn't work right.


Yes. Oh my God. Well that part of the program I was in as we would have to help them with homework and I'm like I'm pretty good with math so it was okay like but I would have to reteach myself every time I look at a problem I'd have to like really like look at the page, look at the examples and instructions to make sure I'm teaching them the right way.


It was just I don't know why they did that. Apparently it helps them like in the long run so they can break it down easier.


Yeah.


But yeah the answer then like there's just memorizing a formula kind of thing.


Like their comprehension of why it is and not just the repetition of learning the answer. I get earth. I was doing long division on paper this morning and it was taking me a long time.


Yeah well even that's what I would learn that I did that's okay.


No, but it was fun.


So I mean I guess if it's if it's faster and easier in the long room and what I know seriously?


But cover alright. Yeah. Well hopefully it'll be normal by the time your little ones in the school.


Hopefully I'll already have learned it and I'm like okay let's do it.


Yeah. All right martin right now you're still on the fun stage.


Yeah, she's she's getting that tall.


Yeah. Yeah.


Their attitude though. She's already got it. She started at like nine months with, you know the like bend the back, like throw themselves and I was like alright, here we go.


Look. Uh huh. Right. No, no, no, we're just gonna put you in your car seat. No, you're not.


Yeah, she surprisingly, she loves her car seat and I mean we haven't been in it in a long time, so Yeah.


Yeah. Yeah. I you know, you don't even think about that like the adjustment back for kids because what about your dogs started my dog barks. But um she hates my husband.


Oh I haven't, it's okay. Yeah.


Um uh but you know your dogs aren't used to you being gone anymore. So like I was five hours the the other day we left the house and our dogs were, they weren't that were like, oh we're going to ease them back.


And then your kids, my daughter had left the house since mid March.


Mm mm.


So we uh so we took her to the farmers market. Yeah, asked up but we took her to the farmers market and it was outside so we figured ok, we can control that.


Yeah.


So kind of like what is this crazy world? What's going on?


Yeah. She's like, wait this is trained, I'm not used to this anymore, right?


She's not like, I'm sure babies are like, I'm not getting in that car seat again. Uh Not gonna Yeah.


She has like so the biggest change because we I I ended up quitting my job to stay home with her because it just wasn't working out for us.


Well.


You know, she was not happy with daycare.


Uh huh.


Um We gave it two months so we tried. But the only thing is we were really doing is we would go to like this like library storytime or we would go to the park, or we would go to, she had like a gymnastics class, so it wasn't like we were constantly seeing people and going out, but she then doesn't have any socialization now.


What? Yeah. Mhm. Uh huh. Yeah.


So I've been thinking like how is this going to affect her development?


Like is she gonna, once she finally we'll like see another kid, is she gonna freak out or is she going to understand like how is it?


Yeah. Okay. Okay. Yeah, completely valid, completely valid.


I don't even know. I Mhm.


I nanny for a 16 month old. She hasn't seen anybody but her mom, her dad and two nannies.


Um Mhm.


I'm one of them. But since the beginning of March, she's had no story time at the library, she's had no music class, she's had none of this stuff.


Yeah.


It's just her world has gotten really tiny wonder how she's gonna do the next time she has to share a toy or Uh huh.


Yeah. Right. No, that's exactly what, because I'm like this is the age where she like my daughter sharing with us sexual, she'd be like, oh you have this, but she also will take it back when she wants back, you know?


Mhm. Mhm. Yes.


So how is she gonna be able to work through that?


Money.


She can't really like, she can kind of do it with us, but when it's another kid who also wants to take the toy back, like how are they let work through that?


Yeah. Okay. Like yeah, you worried they missed that developmental moment, They miss that developmental moment at that age range, can they do it later, can they jump ahead or?


Hasn't ever had to? Uh Exactly. Right, Right.


Uh huh.


And that's what I was thinking. I was like, maybe because I actually I have a degree in child development, I was like, okay, maybe this because I know they're so Moldable at this age, so I was like maybe it'll just cause a delay, but they'll still be able to kind of pick it up later on to go years.


Mhm. Mhm. Mhm.


But then the ripple effect, how does that affect other milestones?


Okay.


Are they every kid like generation going to be delayed?


Oh yeah. Yeah, I know it's that in the unknown of being able to like my daughter's 10 and she's like well what do we do next?


Like is this going to change everything? It's great. Oh and right. You're like, I don't know, mm I was supposed to get married next year.


We have no idea what's next. She's supposed to go to middle school for the first time next year. Oh. Oh.


We have to stop planning the wedding because I'm like, I don't know what we're doing.


Oh God.


It's okay. I mean it's okay. We have we're still together, we have the kid, we have a house, like, you know, we're still doing okay.


Right. Yeah, but you put a lot of effort and details into that so imagine.


Yeah, so we're we have to stop planning. I'm like I don't want to start paying for my venue yet if I don't know if I'm going to use it. So yeah, we're gonna wait see because I'm like, you know what, Because next year will be our five year anniversary of us being together.


No, absolutely not. But yeah, no, it'll be fun.


So we wanted to do it next year. So I'm like, okay, maybe we'll do like a small courthouse wedding next year and then when this is all better then we can have the huge party, you know that we want to have something that's probably what's going to end up happening, Like it's gonna be like 19.


Yeah. Yeah. Mhm. Have a party needs, Yeah, for sure. Yeah, but they don't care.


Yeah. All right.


They totally don't care.


Oh, it's just Oh, were you just like sitting here this whole time or what?


Oh goodness. Uh Exactly. I had to know shows so I'm really happy to get to talk to you. I did. I still like the first time I waited like eight minutes in, the second time I waited 10 minutes and she was like, yeah.


That's annoying. Do they have to reschedule it or did you just like, okay.


Mhm. Mhm. I just see, I put in that I could reschedule again and reschedule in and I don't know today was going to do it then you're gonna be my like, maybe last chance we are done little counter.


Uh Yeah, absolutely. You're like, I worked on 15. Well here we are. We made it. I'm already halfway through. Based on the little timer. I do something.


I was on a zoom call anyway and I was like, hey, I have to jump off this soon, called to jump on a different chat.


Yeah, I was face timing my family.


Mhm.


So I told my fiance was like, here, take the, take the phone, take the baby.


Yeah, I did.


Yeah.


I was I was writing with other authors because it's a motivator.


Mm feed off each other's energy.


Okay, we're all doing it at the same time. Maybe we'll get some work done here is the idea. Yeah. It's just peer pressure, what it is.


Yeah. Well, not having pages. Maybe I can do three.


Yes.


Okay, Right.


So it's always a challenge to do it. But yeah, and I was like telling everybody, I'm like, okay, I'm in the room, the doors closed. Don't bug me Well, mhm burger.


Mhm. Yeah, I can't, I haven't, I used to write music. That's not happened.


Yeah. Any of these top things, mm super hard.


Yeah, I haven't, I don't even remember the last song I wrote, I think it was like 18 so I was like five years ago. But who has the time? It's so hard like to sit down and be like okay, inspire me like ah mm.


It's always hard. I've, I actually, I'm not one of those people that was like, oh, I've always wanted to do this kind of fell into it accidentally. It's as possible.


And um so I've been doing it for six years um is basically my main job.


Yeah, that's how did the accident happen?


So, you know, it was it no, I actually pure greed.


You just absolutely wrote an Oscar on paper and then someone was like, wow, okay, okay.


Um a huge reader. Um actually I, I write romance novels, so a reader and my sister is a huge reader. And then it was right at the point where it's really, really easy to make money on amazon. And so we're like, hey, let's give this a try.


Yeah.


So we like booked a hotel room for the weekend to see what we could, right?


Mhm.


And we're supposed to write like these really like short little things that were spelling, that we're selling very quickly on amazon at the time because basically didn't have any story.


Mhm. Mhm.


Um and I ended up writing a story and I published it and people like, and then I wrote another one and I wrote another one and I wrote another one and it just kept going and going and going and six years later I'm like, I still don't know how yeah, it happens, you know?


Oh you're like, wait, how did that? That's so funny.


But it was, so I started writing when my daughter was four and I'll finish it.