'sup Pabs.

I got sick enough with COVID that the studios told me I couldn't work, and in not working my job, a couple friends who substituted for me kept their houses, so I retired. It took like two years but my pulse-ox is back up to 99. Still not as healthy as I was by a long shot, but there are lots of dead people and I'm not one of them.

I taught myself casting. Then I taught myself cloisonne, well enough to know I hate bending those little silver wires. Then I got an opportunity to buy a $70k cnc machine in broke-ass condition for like $10k and have been spending the year turning it into a $200k CNC machine.

I cut out my parents, but not before discovering the FBI still has my grandma's phone tapped.

The in-laws are getting inflexible, cranky and awful in their dotage. It's taken eight weeks but we're going to counseling with them next week. Counselor is concerned that the mother-in-law thinks an hour session will solve every problem, so my wife promised her that if they bail, we'll stick around. On the plus side, my wife and I are supportive and loving enough that we absolutely don't need counseling. On the minus side, I'm learning just how little responsibility my in-laws feel they have for the happiness of the people around them.

Healthcare sucks now. We're realizing that our demographic at work is about 95% Karens.