Miss the Boat
Break your Entire Childcare System
Returning from Target in a sudden panic that things were not as utopian in my neighborhood as I'd thought, I set about disinfecting door handles, my phone etc. Then I decided to give the remote control a thorough once-over with a Clorox wipe. And broke it.
It would not work! I could not access any of the streaming services we rely on and the channel it was stuck on was one we'd watched a Premier League soccer game on a couple of weeks previously. It was a Spanish channel. None of us speak Spanish. My 5 and 7 year old were going to be at home for the foreseeable future and I'd just broken the tv??? Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiittttt!!!!! Thinking quickly, I plunged the remote into our only remaining bag of rice and prayed to the electronic gods that I'd just done the equivalent of dropping a phone in a toilet. During the wait I looked up replacements but couldn't see any that wouldn't take days to deliver. I considered going to Best Buy to try my luck but couldn't see any in stock on their site. I can't remember how long I waited. Minutes? Half an hour? With a phone you're supposed to wait as long as possible to dry it out - up to 36 hours! I didn't have that kind of time, my daughter was finishing school any minute and what was my husband going to say? We might have to resort to talking to each other that evening! Anxious moments passed, I removed the black control that I realized held my entire family together. Holding my breath, I pressed the button for Netflix. YES! Praise be to rice for you have saved my life.
Read Other People's Helpful Advice
Our school had rejigged their calendar in response to the COVID-19 outbreak so Spring Break officially started the first Monday everyone was at home. I was full of ideas and enthusiasm for the coming days. Hey, it would be nice to spend some (more) time with my children. We would do Lego, watch movies, craft, do crazy science experiments and generally have a hilarious and positive experience. Well, that lasted about two minutes. Monday was OK. By Tuesday, I was all out of ideas. A post popped up on a local Facebook group I'm in. I won't quote it word for word to protect the poor innocent but it basically went like this:
Day 2 of home school is done!
9-11 - math and word puzzles
11-12 - quiet reading time
Lunch - watched youtube vid of our Principal reading a story
1pm - walk around the neighborhood with our dog
2pm - quiet time watching The Magic School Bus
3pm - watched Cincinnati Zoo youtube video
3.30pm - worked on a 500 piece puzzle
4.30pm - outdoor fun with dad
How was your day?
My reply: We struggled through an hour of Play Doh and watched Babe.
I mean, seriously. My eyes are rolling now and I've read the damn thing before. Humble brag much? Although when you look closer, it does seem like she's palming off her child to youtube and books, not much interaction needed from her. I'm slagging her off but it is actually quite genius. Make yourself sound like a home-schooling maven with minimal effort needed. My children are like two limpets. If they're not physically attached to me or can't see me, they're shouting to check I'm still in the house. So, anyway, this post made me feel a bit lacking in my capacity to entertain my kids for the next however long without resorting to a LOT of screen time but...it was technically the school holidays! That's my excuse, anyway.
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