Daddy 90% at home! Laborious tale of my days during the pandemic. (Trite and banal, but SO WHAT)

Wish I could be as great a teacher as this guy
(pic used by authors consent)

Funny thing is, I am working more and longer hours during this pandemic.  Although my kids just laughed at me when I told them that, "hahaha, what are you doing? Writing more emails?", I am usually working 12 hour days.  I am just getting up a bit later in the morning because I go to bed between 1am and 2am.  But the thing is, probably none of it would be considered "on the books" or creating value in this economically monetized system we live in these days.  Everything is measured by how much value it is worth.  (But if it is like that, how much value do all those facebook posts create? )  In other words, I probably won't make a dime on most of the work I am doing.  Hopefully some of it in later times, but a lot of it: nothing. 

So kids, let me tell you that I am working harder spending more time with you!

With the children in school at home, I am spending a couple hours a day being teacher.  I

Doesn't it look like a happy camper beachball?

do math and english with one daugther and sometimes math with the other daughter.  Then for at least two weeks, since my wife still has a paying job and has to concentrate on that, albeit most of the time at home in a separate room, I was doing all the shopping, and lunch and dinner meals.   I tell you, the week after Easter it was a wonder I pulled off enough good meals.  I have to pat myself on the back that I did it.  It meant doing the shopping every day, and getting the timing right.... well, we usually had lunch around 3pm and dinner at 8 pm, so um,  my timing was not exactly on.  

Morning time was always busy.  Ok, like I said, I could get up at 8am or even 9, 9.30 because I didn't have my classes to get to.  I did still have one class on skype with a student.  In any case by 10.15 my younger daughter had scheduled help with me on either math or English.  Then my older daughter perhaps requested my time for help with math at 11.15, though it didn't take long.  I didn't even get in English classes with her because she was trying very very hard to keep up with all they assigned her.  As it was and is, we have to watch over her shoulder and make sure she is sending in the homework.  And when she had a virtual class at 11 or 12, regrettably I had to come in more than once and tell her to pay attention fully to the class and put away her phone (where once she was playing a video game which made me very angry).  So I had to be school monitor too.  

At 12 or 12.30 I had my first chance to check my emails and do some reading on pre open of the stock market.  A little bit of an escapism waste of time on my part, rationalized that I have to keep up on my stocks in this volatile period.  

I hate geometry.  What to do with this?

At 12.30 my younger daughter was done and she either wanted help on TOMORROWS homework or wanted to play a game a bit before lunch.  I should go to the store NOW, but it was still only 12.30 and so I put it off to sit with her with work or play.  

By 1.15 I really needed to get to the store for what I am planning for lunch.  That could take half an hour to pick it up.  But when I got it back, it was a success.  OK, i know, making melted cheese sandwiches in various forms is not the haute cuisine I could cook or aim for, it is rather low class.  Then again, getting your kids to be artistic with simple  rolls (not baguettes) and what food goes well in them, is sort of like making a pizza, which is very creative.  It has much more value than playing a video game, in my humble opinion.  And baking  is fun and easy.  Hopefully my kids got the idea and they will be able to survive in college with their daddy's book "20 ways to make melted cheese sandwiches and never be bored with them".   I, um, haven't actually written the book because as of yet, I only have seven ways, but I am getting closer every week. 

Lunches were relaxed and fun and tasty, but when we finished it was 3pm or after.  Now my daughter got back to work or if she was done with school I hounded her to practice her guitar.  My younger daughter took the dog for a walk.  She was out with the dog till 4.30 or so.  My older daughter was really trying to catch up and stayed in and sat at the table I was at and did more school assignments.  I had to help her with some math homeworks she still had undone.  If they weren't too hard, I could take my second break to work on my stuff and see how the stocks were doing on opening.  I had some real volatile stocks that I  wanted to unload but then use the money to buy some other stuff. A lot was happening so I had to pay attention to that, though I am strictly an amateur on stock picking. In recent years I have been a rather bad one at that.  I think

My stocks

I am getting the hang of and learning the secret of how to destroy wealth.  It isn't as easy as you might think it is. It has taken me several years to see it happen and another several years probably for me to understand why.   That will be my sophomore book published after the grilled cheese sandwich bestseller. Admittedly, a book on how to destroy your wealth might not be a big seller.    

At 4.30 pm my younger daughter was home with the pooch  and she wanted to go out and play catch.  I said yes yes, in ten minutes.  At 5 pm I finished and we got ready to go out.  Masks on.  It is very nice that my older daughter also wanted to join us outside.  She actually picked us over a video game of BRAWL, which by now, I despise (more on that in a later post).  

I have to say it has been one of my greatest successes and pleasures so far this year to start to teach my girls how to play touch American Football.  Excuse me, I have to call it American football as I know I have a lot of European readers who know football as soccer. So my girls, 8 and 11 really got into learning how to play football.  The downfall NEARLY came when they learned that in fact you can have a repeat of the four downs if you make a first down up 10 yards from where you started.  My older daughter was quite disappointed by that.  "But then you can have endless four downs and always make a goal."  She had first liked it and assumed that you only got four downs to make a touchdown.  Then the other person gets four downs to get a touchdown.  We had played it that way on the first day.  But by the second day they had so progressed that I had to clarify and expand the rules.  

Well needless to say, it is schooling in process.  It will take a while yet.  Maybe we' ll get more chances, or in the summer more games.  It was 6.30 at the end of the game and I had to do the shopping for dinner.  You might ask, why didn't I get the dinner stuff at lunch?  Well in fact I did get stuff on Tuesday which I had planned to have in the fridge till Friday, but when it came to the day, I had either changed my plans or something was lacking that I had to run down to the store to get still.  Bad planning, or just inexperience.  It still happens to my wife though.  Also, i can't carry a lot. I am not driving because the grocery store is two blocks down the street.  So, I get what I can carry.  

Since the lunches had been successes, I wasn't as concerned if I failed for supper.  And in fact Wednesday was a real winner with just a simple meal of a really good klobassa with potatoes.  And I actually made the potatoes so they were done at the same time as the meat.  I may have graduated to a higher state of cooking consciouness with this accomplishment. It isn't so simple.  I think destroying wealth is easier to do than getting the potatoes done at the same time as the main meal.   

Even the next night's dinner was a success with a bachelor's version of chicken cordon bleu (just plunk the ham and cheese on top of the breaded chicken).  I think I failed Friday though because they said Mommy would cook that night, but when she came home, she said, "no way" and I had to throw something into the oven but I did it wrong.  I always mess up with pork chops.  

The thing is, I was cooking from 7 and it was done by 8 or 8.30 and then by the time we were done, it was about bed time.  I had to acquiesce and give in for a bit of TV watching because I guess it had been my bad planning and my love to teach them Football, which had thrown us way off schedule.  So they were going to bed by 10 pm or a speck after ... which is a bit later than I would prefer.  But they get up a bit later these days also, so...

I still had to push them, make sure they brushed their teeth and had things ready for tomorrow.  It was after 10 pm  now.  

All in all these are 12 or 13 hour days we are talking about, with a bit of a break for half an hour in the late morning and another in the mid to late afternoon.  12 hours dude, all week.  Why don't you work all week in the office for twelve hours and see if you come home able to stand.  I know, some of you are saying, "but I do", well, but you don't do 12 hours with your kids sonny.  And let me tell you man, THAT is a whole different kettle of kilbasa!   Not to mention that after my kids are in bed, I either will still be walking the dog or looking at emails and trying to do a bit more of my own work which is on half hold, but is also keeping me busy in alternate weeks.   

Anyway. I am not complaining.  I just want to pat myself on the back a little and say, "yeah, you can do it".  And even though many people  won't consider it worthy of payment, unless they have to get a nanny, then they see how much it costs, anybody who spends any amount of time, and probably more time during this pandemic, with their kids will know that it is worth a whole lot more than so many peoples' worthless button punching jobs.  Here, put this casserole in your pipe and smoke THAT!


I wrote this for the first time at the weekend cottage. Saturday night, so I was not listening to anything.  But upon returning and correcting, I listened to a new label I really like.  I will get this single on vinyl.  A real beaut of a deep house ep. 

Sascha Dive: Detroit Sunrise ep