They’re not bored, they just think if they act like they have nothing else to do they’ll get more video game time.
As I’m sure at least some other work from home parents will agree, there is… an adjustment period, to having the kids home on summer vacation.
I love having them around, in fact its one of my favorite aspects of working from home. But I find I come to rely on certain days and certain hours where there are no other demands on my attention save for work. Then suddenly they’re there, all the time, and even if they aren’t actively asking me for anything, it’s like I can sense my dependents in the vicinity, and it’s a whole vibe shift. Like somewhere in my lizard brain I have to stay prepared to be interrupted at any moment.
And then, of course, but the time I acclimate to the new status quo… it’s time to send them back to school.
‘Go play in the woods’
‘Don’t forget to wear your meat coats’
Distraction issue solved.
The fact that this reviewer used a Star Wars reference (and one from Phantom Menace no less) to say that Tom Hanks was miscast shows that he has absolutely no idea what he’s talking about. Movie is brilliant as is Austin Butler’s Oscar-worthy performance. You want a by the book full story from birth to death of one of the greatest icons in music history, you’d need a Ken Burns size documentary to take on Elvis. This packs so much into the 2 hours and 39 minute film – not a minute feels wasted. So glad they showed Elvis’ roots in… Read more »
…What?
So this is the comment you chose to reply to ?. You just gave away, that your attention gets caught by out of context gibberish.
I’d be careful, this could be an elaborated scheme by your kids to find out how to most effectively disturb you during summer break ?.
He’s just really passionate about the new Elvis movie. I say let him finish his rant, and move on with your day.
I’m very interested in seeing Elvis. Glad to hear it’s good, I guess.
Forget it Tim. He’s rolling.
Possibly posting in the wrong spot? Otherwise, we are going to have to dust off the Billy Madison meme…
Sir, this is a Wendy’s.
i want an “mother-fuckin-mcmuffin” and a double “MAC-DOPPELKORN”
You’ve got a point there actually
‘Good then you can watch Dad work. You Just said you were bored, so sit there quietly and learn.’ Fastest unbored kids Ever. Well my brothers and myself all learned to cook from it but it was a good method. Much better than the alternative of listening to mom’s hospital horror stories, unless were hungry and didn’t want to be.
Time to buy them an Arduino starter kit, a robot kit or a Gunpla… 😀
Do you WANT them to never have any money the rest of their lives?
I’ve got a crazy thought, and maybe just ignore me or tell me to shut up if I’m overstepping: Could the boys come up with a new side character for Analog and D-Pad? We’ve had a couple of emotional comic runs lately, so I sense maybe we’ll be getting some action in the next issue, and I bet they’d be super proud and jazzed if they saw their character in dad’s comic. Maybe a villain? They could come up with his name, a backstory, and a power set with a little help, and it would keep them occupied for ages.… Read more »
This is a fabulous idea. Also, introduce them to Dungeons and Dragons. See if you can get them to create campaigns and paint minis. . .
D&D and painting require much supervision in the under 10 age group.
“Those are more like guidelines than actual rules”
They already paint minis. Like I said, they’re only “bored” because they want us to say “fine, go play Bugsnax then.”
Time for the old standby – Go play outside!
“If you’re bored I’m sure I can find some chores for you.”
Dad, is that you?
I’m surprised someone whose entire career revolves around video games, won’t let his kid play video games.
It’s pretty clear he lets his kids play video games, just not unlimited amounts of video games. I’m sure that the CEO of Hershey’s probably doesn’t let his kids only eat chocolate. My dad worked at a pizza place, and we couldn’t eat pizza for every meal (or even just most meals). This seems fairly comparable. Just because your job revolves around something doesn’t mean you think that people should be completely without moderation around it.
They play video games, but Tim recognizes that screen time cannot be indefinite if he wants well adjusted kids.
Believe it or not, it’s quite possible to have indefinite screen time and still be well-adjusted (I personally use myself as a prime example). As a matter of fact, I’m of the opinion that it’s a better form of parenting to not impose such ridiculous limits upon your children, despite it being an uncommon parenting technique.
The trick is to not use the indefinite screen time as an excuse to let screens babysit your kids.
I remember Penny Arcade making a comic about this very topic, many years ago. Needless to say I share their opinion on the subject.
But video games ARE (usually) bad at their age. I’m of an unique age where I was old enough to have video games, but too young to have the blatant access to the internet that kids have today. I remember growing up with the NES/SNES/N64 and 14.4k internet with Starcraft. Yet, I spent a fair bit of time outdoors and building stuff and having fun. This is something I don’t hear a whole lot about these days; a vast majority of what I hear these days are kids playing games, watching TikTok, and having extremely little exposure to the outdoors… Read more »
i sacrifice my nerf collection including the freshly imported 10k arrows when it sucks too much.
otherwise there is netflix or prime access from 16 for a few hours 😛
Sometimes your instincts lead you straight and true. Other times, they just annoy the hell outta you ?
Pssh, nothing a dark basement and a strong door with a lock on it can’t fix!
I can see multiple ways to interpret that piece of advise…
That was the intention 😉
Well… isn’t that what grandparents were invented for? 😀
In my family “Bored” was a bad word, you got punished for saying it like you said the F-Word.
You would be sent to your room, or told to sit in the corner and stare at the wall (or given chores as punishment).
Cause if you got all your toys, sports gear and computer games in the playroom that Dad/Mum paid for and still come crying to them that you still can’t entertain yourself… you can stay bored and stare at the walls/ceiling. It worked.
Oh yeah, that sounds healthy. Punishing kids for having active minds.
I was just thinking about that myself. I have quite bad ADHD, so I get bored even more easily than “normal” people and, as an adult, I do have a house full of all sorts of objects to entertain myself with and Internet full of all sorts of junk right at my fingertips and…I still get bored at times. Why? Because it’s perfectly fricking normal to just not manage to scrounge up any interest in what’s available to you at any given moment. Sometimes you just simply don’t feel like it and need something else. I’m not going to give… Read more »
I feel this. My parents just always made me go “outside” which for me meant roaming the neighborhood looking for other children. I have a feeling parents don’t do that sort of thing anymore, but when I was a kid it could sure be fun.
Quiet the opposite the punishment made us active, it reminded us that being “bored” was a stupid state of mind, cause the punishment was literally “more boring”… so we were more creative in our play.
It was a quick lesson to learn, to never say it, we also learned to explain how we were feeling without saying using over-exaggerated statements like “Im bored”.
I mean, you can do the same thing, without making it semi-abusive.
When I grew up, if I came to my parents and whined, “Mom, I’m bored,” she’d smile brightly and say, “Oh, really? Well, I’ve got plenty of things you could do!” And then, a chore.
Only took a few times to figure out that Mom and Dad had a never-ending list of stuff that had to be done, and I was much better off playing than going to them looking for stuff to do.
Sounds like yet another toxic parenting idea. ?
Are you familiar with the terms “confirmation bias” and “cherry-picking?” MAYBE it SEEMS to have worked in your house. But: 1) You’re not objective about your own personal life experience. No one is. Thus, you cannot present yourself as objective evidence of well… Anything. 2) And specially not, for something that is as widespread as raising children, since yours is just one case among billions. 3) The very fact you’re presenting those toxic, negative patterns as something useful and/or positive, shows something failed. Because you turned into an adult (I assume you’re one) that is ok with that kind of… Read more »
I’ve heard of this several times, at least the chores and sending them to their room (to play), not the time out in the corner just for saying you’re bored. The first two are not really punishment. If you come and tell mom and dad your bored then you will be given something to do, chores. Kids learn real quick to not to come complain about being bored. The time out I could see, if after telling the kids they can find something to do or <insert chore here>, they actually started throwing a fit but not just for saying… Read more »
is he drawing the comic he’s featuring in?~
Devil makes work for idle hands, he makes Portfolios for idle kids
Tim drew a comic of Tim drawing a comic of Tim drawing a comic.
Makes me wonder what he would’ve seen if he looked to the left.
I can relate. I don’t have kids but my sister lives near me and on summer break her kids show up at my house all the time(some times I help watch them, since she works during the time they would normally be in school, other times they just show up because they want to do something).
It is even worse that they are someone else’s kid, because they have no concept of me working. Just because I am on a pc, doesn’t mean I am free to do whatever!
Video game what now? Does not compute, have you some how figured out how to squeeze a 25th+ hour out of each day?
I’m old. Summer meant “Go outside and play and don’t come home till the street lights come on”
Fuck that. It’s around 90 degrees outside here in the midwest.
That was what drinking from a garden hose was for.
For real. Grew up in a desert and summer was still “go play outside until dinner time”
If you were spotted inside, you were metaphorically grilled about why you weren’t outside
Oh yeah.. Why did garden hoses had the most delicious water I ever tasted?? Sweet summer hose water…
Cheers
I remember that time! And the one time the street light outside of where we were playing went out, there was a very creative discussion about if the other street lights were on.
Pen and paper RPGs (calculate some ThAC0 kiddos) or chore wheel. Pick their poison.
Dude, don’t use the T-word. Some of us still have nightmares about the AD&D days. ? [Begins muttering to himself about negative numbers…]
ThAC0 was the way. It’ll be the way again. 😉
Cheers
I’m guessing it wouldn’t be so bad if society didn’t sneer at parents who let kids, like, walk around the neighborhood as if they had abandoned them to die of starvation.
I got a lot of mileage out of my bicycle, still do as an adult, just between going 6 miles around town I’m now going 30-40 miles two towns over and back. It’s a bit of an epiphany to realize you can get around pretty well on foot and even better on two wheels without needing a car and license.
When I was a kid, I lived in the boonies with curvy streets lined with trees, 35mph speed limits, and cars that regularly drove at 50+mph. No sidewalks. No way riding a bike was safe where I lived.
See, my solution to this growing up was to use the time I wasn’t allowed to play video games to make plans for things to do *while* playing video games. I used to buy Prima and Brady strategy guides almost religiously and would spend hours, days, weeks pouring over the information in those tomes then plot out plans and builds for various games. Working out parties and equipment in RPG games, tuning for racing games, etc Growing up my father quite literally pounded the six p’s into my head, and it has stuck with me in everything. Proper Planning Prevents… Read more »
I get the exact same vibe from my border collie.
“I’m bored mom… get off the computer and take me for a walk.”
Solution. Home school so you don’t have to re-acclimate again. 😉 But seriously, even for home schooling this is a thing. Our older son who’s doing school acts like has nothing to do and is bored to get Switch time. One thing we’re doing is a summer reading challenge with a reward at the end if he reads enough (to encourage him to read so he gets better at it). He’s also gotten into watching a dad and son playing Farm Simulator videos on Youtube and I told him if he wants to play games like that, he has to… Read more »
“I’m bored, I’m hungry, the lizardmen are eating me………..”
Always something with kids, innit? “I don’t want to work 16 hours in a coal mine!” – You SAID you liked MINECRAFT!
Parenting is about learning how nothing you do is good enough.
….
/s, just in case.
Yes it’s hard for us work from home parents. I send them outside, 30 min to 1 hr later they are back in..it’s too hot, I’m tired. There was a shooting at our local park so I don’t want to let them roam the neighborhood. During summer they get more screen time than they should, but I try to direct it. Play a game that requires math, reading, creativity rather than watching videos.
Yea this is a feeling I can sympathize with. Godspeed, funny picture-story man. Godspeed.
What’s wrong with kids these days? I was never bored during summer break.I played video games. I made video games. I built LEGO castles. I turned the living room into a war zone with army men. I’d binge-watch movies. I ran a guild in an MMO. I built things in an online metaverse and ran a business. I read books.
Any boredom I had wasn’t boredom, but actually a melancholy from chronic depression or feeling isolated from friends.
Ah, yes, the good, old “if they don’t have the same interests and possibilities as I do, there must be something wrong with them.” God forbid anyone have different interests and tastes or not have all the same stuff available to them as you.
I never said or meant such a thing! Please don’t automatically assume the worst of people and put words in their mouth.
It just feels weird to me. That’s all. It makes me feel like a drowning person hearing someone say they’re thirsty.
I have the same feeling with my two kids. It’s not boredom it’s just like with their food: “it’s not my favorite so I don’t like it”
there’s no middle way. It’s either awesome or it’s not. They’re not satisfied with “it’s good” it has to be super.
My kids have everything you named and more (really… a lot more…) and still if they run out of screen time they just drop on the couch like a bag of potatoes and nothing will happen anymore 🙁
where did this response came from? O.o
You have very specifically designed your living quarters to prevent boredom; they have no right to complain.
Seeing this one really made me think: Has Tim ever had while drawing himself one of those epipheny’s of “Oh…I need to draw myself differently now…”
Father of five here and my kids know better than to say, or indicate, they are bored. Boredom is a CHOICE and if you tell me you’re bored I will find something for you to do. It only takes a few times pulling weeds or wiping baseboards before they realize they aren’t really bored.
Have summer holidays started already??
I’m almost through this stage… The College Student will be a senior this year, and after that, hopefully be able to find a job and move out. Just hoping that an Industrial Designer can make enough moolah working for Apple (his goal in life for years) to afford living within commute distance of their main campus.
It never stops to amaze me how people who know what children are like, decide to have children and then complain about them. Is it “my kid will be different” kind of thing? Because that’s what almost everyone said.
#antinatalism yeah!
It’s a joke, settle down. Nobody is complaining about their kids.
Also you can love having children and also recognize that it can be, at times, difficult, complicated and confusing. That it means your life changes, sometimes in ways you expected and sometimes in ways you didn’t anticipate. That it is a constantly evolving situation, and it doesn’t matter how many millions of times previous generations have done it, it’s still going to be a new experience for each individual person.
I know about turning real life situation into jokes. Sometimes adding more exaggeration for comedic effect. And it works 🙂
Just pointing out that nothing had changed really in the matter of family. I’ll keep to myself why a family is a thing of the past, it’s supposed to be a site for humor and fun 🙂
Thanks for reply, keep the good work. I’ve been reading this comic for over 20 years I think. Wow.
oooooooooooooh my gooooooooooooood I can’t even…
this is like people getting married and then joking about their spouse! It’s okay! This is a comic not a psychological or educational magazine!
IDK where you live, but it’s hot as fuck here, and I’m cool with people staying in playing video games.
The struggle is real. Knowing the house is empty gives a completely different vibe to anyone else being home too, and you know that you could be interrupted at any moment.
wait, how can they be bored? Don’t they have a gaming backlog yet?
20+ years. Wow! To think that I have been following this strip from when it was in its second year or so. Maybe I’m more like your kids on summer break than I’d like to think… ☺
My dogs do the same thing, but my Labrador is less patient than the boarder collies. She will literally climb into my lap and start whining. It’s incredibly cute, yet I don’t want to spend ALL day playing with them. (Which is what they want)
My parents would easily find some work for me. So i never bothered them.
Board Games, always the answer to boredom. You need time to build the board game up, to understand the rules and then to play it. Perfect time and boredom killer. Also a good family time. Just don’t play Monopoly or else there is no family anymore.
Now we are lving in our first own house “in the village”, incorporated village in the city, yor feel the iq drop and the redneck-vibes. but the kids can go out now without a main street with heavy traffic and they have playgrounds and a lot more kids all age than before.
my kids, sittin in the house, i have home office and they have days off because of short staff at school. sommer break is in 4 weeks and i feel you. mothing is more anoying than the stare in the back of my head.
Easy, if they’re bored, give them something to do – chores. Eventually they’ll learn not to look bored.
SOOOOOOOO TRUEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!
Heh. my mom used to say “go outside and play. Be back by dinner.”
“Oh, you’re bored? Well, I’m sure we can find something for you to do. Let’s see… the lawn needs to be mowed, floor need to be mopped, there is laundry to be done, car to be washed, and the front room needs to be vacuumed. Also, check with your mom and see if she needs anything.” You might think it won’t work, but my father did it when I was a kid and it worked.
Wait? What do you mean “more” video game time? Don’t they already have unlimited video game time?
…
Hopefully you just mean that they want their turn on the the PS5 or something, otherwise you’ve failed as a gamer and become… your PARENTS!
“Kids are loud. Until they aren’t. Then you start to worry.”
-My dad (and he wasn’t wrong)