No, seriously, what do you do? — Hey there. I’m Matthew, and I am a gamer, an amateur musician, and a writer in more ways than one. I’m also a husband, a cat dad, a homeowner, and an unabashed nerd in many ways. …

How do you quantify something like that? — Writing has been something that people do for quite a while now. Thousands of years ago, people wrote poetry, philosophy, and epic tales of gods and heroes. Hundreds of years ago, people wrote each other flowery letters where they talked about their love for each other. …

Pets are expensive, yo. — My partner and I have four cats, and having four cats means four annual vet visits. We’ve done our best to wrangle this in a variety of ways to make things easier for everyone involved, but it’s always a bit of a hassle. Last year, we took all of them…

It wasn’t supposed to be this way. — The vision for the future was supposed to be robots and AI doing all of the dirty and dangerous jobs in the world while humans lived a life of leisure. By freeing humans from the hard work that we were previously forced to do, we could instead focus on creating…

Period, full stop. — I am really tired of hearing about state legislatures passing bills that strip rights from trans folx, drag queens, women, BIPOC folks, and pretty much anyone who isn’t a straight white guy. It is clear to see that the Republican party in America has descended into full-on fascism at this…

Or: Celebrating your friends with baklava cheesecake. — We have a friend — I’ll call her Sam (that’s not her name) — who is very much like us in a lot of ways. She has spent much of her life helping other people plan for their birthdays while not actually getting hers celebrated a lot. …

It seems to pour a lot here. — There is more noisy work being done on our house today — they’re replacing our gutters and the siding on our second story, which was damaged by hail and needed to be fixed up. Thankfully, insurance is paying for this one because I don’t think I could manage another five-digit…

May is Mental Health Awareness Month, but depression doesn’t end on June 1. — It’s May again, and that means several things. First off, Spring has well and truly arrived for much of the country, temperatures are rising, and the days are getting longer. May is also Mental Health Awareness Month, which has always felt a bit token in a country that, until recently…

The joys of homeownership: tens of thousands of dollars fixing stuff. — When we bought our house many years ago now, there were some things that needed to be fixed in the intermediate future. Some tuckpointing would need to be done at some point, the HVAC was getting on in age, and a handful of other things were likely to go off…