The last time I picked a phrase-of-the-year it was "Make life easier". The year was 2020. I'm going to sit this one out again. You're welcome.

What exactly do you hate about the co-op? Be really specific. Can you change any part of what you hate to make it more tolerable for you? Are the friendship opportunities for you or for the kids? How old are your kids? What other opportunities do you have for the kids to make friends? (Scouts, 4H, art classes, park days, library events, chess club?)

I read your original post. The words that came to mind about her were: oversharing, overly chatty, overly familiar. She sounds like she's jumping to a high level of friendliness, and you aren't at that same level. Maybe she's being territorial and trying to position herself as the "Cool Mom/Cool MIL", (any chance her son is going to pop the question this Christmas?). Whatever she is, you don't like it, and that's fine. It doesn't mean you wish her any ill-will. Your baseline duty is to be polite and make small talk when circumstances throw you together. If she calls again, give her 10 minutes of your time and then tell her you have to be going.

Not a fan of co-ops based on what I've seen around here. They are all another person's vision of "The Perfect School". Lots of effort for little return. If you hate it so much, can your kids make friends in other places? Is there a local play-date/park day group you could join? That's where both I and my son made friends, (until lockdown blew the whole thing apart).

In my experience, the guys that want to chase you are the sort of guys you should run from. Why does a guy have to chase you? If you want him and he wants you, then no chase is necessary.

Warm chestnuts from a street vendor in NYC.

I let it rest, but probably not long enough. It was a smaller turkey than what we usually get, so my mental math for how long to cook and rest was probably off.

No big hits, no big misses. We keep it pretty traditional because that's what DS requests. My only complaint is that the turkey was a little dry. Not bad, just a little dry. Leftovers were juicy, though? 🤷‍♀️

Good point. I've run across a few people that say they have long covid but haven't been formally diagnosed, (no insurance, doctors that don't know what to make of their symptoms, doctors being technical jerks about it because the patient only did a home test to confirm, etc) . The numbers on long covid may be an undercount.

I didn't take statistics, so I don't understand what this means re: long covid. Is the bolded saying the more doses you've had, the less likely you are to get long covid? In a group of 100 people that received 3 doses before finally contracting covid, would 73% of them (potentially) avoid long covid?

Dino chicken nugget pillows: Dino nugget pillows

Yes, but none of the previous places have sold recently, so I don't have updated pics of the interiors. I sometimes "drive" around the neighborhood via google maps. I try not to do this too often because it makes me homesick. 😥

Traditional foods: turkey, mashed potatoes, sweet potato casserole, stuffing, gravy, whatever veggies DS wants. I'm the only one that likes cranberry sauce, so I'm skipping it this year. DS wants a chocolate pudding pie. Okie dokie, easy enough!

Does the monolith get holiday decorations? I'm really hoping for pics!

$100 of Lego items

I had to bump my total to $140 to get $20 off ETA: The extra $10 off seems a little glitchy. I started taking items out of my cart, bringing the total below $100, but it kept the extra $10 off.

Maybe he should feel some shame since he's not helping and is often difficult.

Mine were becoming eratic, (heavy then light...every 4 weeks, then every 2.5 weeks, then back to 4...). I went on the pill, but if that isn't an option, I'd probably try the patch and see how that went.

Turkeys are 98 cents/lb here. I grabbed another frozen turkey for Christmas because I doubt prices will get cheaper than that! Target has a deal where you get a $10 giftcard if you spend $50 on select Lego sets. Amazon has a similar deal: $10 off $50, $20 off $100 on select sets. Of course, they didn't have anything we wanted. 😕 ETA: the Amazon code seems a little glitchy. Sometimes it takes $20 off $100, sometimes it doesn't.

Also, you can apparently add food to a gift registry. I hit the wrong button and instead of adding shredded cheese to my cart, I added it to my registry. I'd actually be pretty excited if someone gave me cheese as a gift.

My Target Circle had $10 off a $50 food or drink purchase. It stacked with a Circle 40% off 12 packs of sodas when you buy 3.

Yes, anxiety and white, hot, anger. It didn't help that I'd had a falling out with my FOO and then lockdown happened. I felt like I was drowning, every day. Birth control helped a LOT. My quality of life is so much better now. I have a lot of empathy for tweens and teens hitting puberty.

Same here. I am more fit at 51 than I was at 41 or even 31.

If you use that pool regularly, you won't have nearly the trouble getting in and out of it because you'll be strong and fit! 😉 As an aside, I really dislike it when people moan about how old 50 supposedly is.

The package wasn't wet on the outside at all? That is weird.