Lockdown Day 325: Zooming with Friends is Too Much Like Work

It's been a while since I've written in my "Lockdown Day XXX" series. The last was Lockdown Day 309, sixteen days ago. I wrote about... leftovers. 😂 Well, today I'm writing about something that's also not exactly new. Although today is Lockdown Day 325, this topic is one I could have written about on about Day 30. I don't enjoy Zooming with friends.

Wait, what?

As the lockdown made Social Distancing the law the land (or at least some lands) months ago, we all looked to stay social despite physical distancing. Years ago this would've meant hours on the phone. Today we have sufficient bandwidth and tools to run video chats.

That's a good thing, right? I agree, it is. But here's the drawback: it's too much like work.

I average 6-7 Zoom/Meet/Webex/etc. meetings a day for my job. Many days I'm on camera talking to people for 5 hours or more. When I'm done for the day I'm ready to unplug. ...Not from data entirely, but at least from the camera and microphone.

The same goes for chat tools like Discord. I'm on Slack for my job all day every workday. There are several dozen channels I need to monitor. Keeping Discord open during the day would be a massive distraction. And after hours... well, again, I'm glad to be done with any app that lights lights or makes sound effects every 2.3 seconds to demand my attention.

I'm Turning into my Mother-in-Law!

People often joke that they're turning into their mother. I feel like I'm turning into my mother-in-law! And the issue is leftovers. The other night I packed away the remnants of dinner in the fridge and marveled at how full it was:



The shelves are not only full back to front, but containers are double and triple stacked in many places.

This makes me feel like my MIL because her refrigerator is always ridiculously full. For years it's just been her and FIL in the house. Their kids all moved out years ago. Yet they have a large refrigerator that's always stuffed.

For years when I've visited their house I've wondered about how two people could possibly eat their way through that much of a stash before it all rotted. Their fridge is bigger than the one my parents had when I was a kid, and fuller than I ever remember seeing it, too, and our family was 6 people. They're just two empty-nesters.

Well, we're just two empty-nesters, and now we're like them.