So many of us have been home with our spouse/family/significant other/adult children working from home/home schooling for about 8 mos. What did you learn about them that you didn’t know? I discovered that my DH likes the Hallmark channel!! Who knew? What gems did you discover?
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Gems? Not exactly.
My H spends WAY too much time talking on the phone. HOURS it seems some days.
He often sleeps until 8:30 - I never knew because I leave for work 7ish.
This is a COVID thing I think but he doesn’t shower until noon sometimes. That’s hard for this early shower person to fathom.
He jumps from one thing to another - scattered routine. Drives me crazy! FINISH SOMETHING!!!
Makes me sound mean, I know - I just think in terms of daily routines we are really, really different!
My H has endless stamina and patience.
My H is a tireless worker be it for his profession or in our home (or in yard).
My H is the most amazing son-in-law. My parents have always told me this, but now I’ve really seen it. It’s pretty amazing.
My H loves me and our sons and our dogs so much and he is rarely moody. (Like not even a handful of times in 8 months.)
Our teens are pretty neat interesting kids. One is beyond creative and shows it in gifts he literally designs and creates and gives to others. The other is even more brilliant intellectually, and patient and caring towards others than I ever knew.
I am truly thankful to have had this time with them. I have MUCH to be thankful for and I appreciate this thread!!!
Wait, if you shower after noon, that counts for the next day, right?
@abasket Wow, you guys are still showering every day?
I learned that if H retires early, I will go look for a full-time job immediately.
I already had a trial run of this when DH and I spent almost three months in what was essential a hotel room in Hong Kong in 2018. It drove me crazy not to have a kitchen and that there was no where for me to go. DH had an office, but they said professors were too important to work in the lab. I took some painting and cooking classes, but it took way too long to get them into my schedule. We had a wonderful time, but it was a lot of togetherness.
At the beginning of the pandemic DH’s lab closed and they froze all their samples. There were zoom meetings, virtual grant review committee meetings and our house has lots of unused bedrooms. I had a couple of projects that were able to trundle on with just one person on the job. My husband really liked the slower pace and didn’t miss the labwork. He’s now back at the lab and back to coming home late, but he works a lot more at home and we often have lunch together or make time for walks during the week. I think he’s gotten more relaxed. We seem to get along better than ever.
It’s been interesting to see how much more OCD he is about worry about contamination. Clearly habits he’s picked up at the lab.
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Wow, the shower comment really is netting responses!!! 
I do work full time. And I do shower every morning. 
I would seriously love to hear what my other half would say about ME!
I’ve learned what I always suspected. These people need to stay in their assigned zones and places because I’ve been WFH for 20 years and they are encroaching.
I’m fine with him retiring. He just needs to be out of the house between 8 and 4. He’s an 140 lb elephant operating constantly at about 1000 dB.
My husband has mad cooking skills
Now to get him to properly clean up!
I’ve learned that being able to socialize in some way, shape or form is incredibly important to my formerly shy and still quiet 22 year old. She has been coping fine, but it’s starting to wear on her. Today she’s going to a big museum in the city and having lunch with her boyfriend. I’m so glad she’s doing something “normal” and that the museum hasn’t shut down, because I expect that will happen soon.
My hubby is a pretty “stiff upper lip” Brit, but I was surprised at how elated he was with a recent event. I didn’t think things had been getting to him, but we had an impromptu outdoor gathering with a few friends and he really let his hair down. It was nice to see him behaving foolishly, haha.
I’ve learned that my son is very relaxed. The past eight months haven’t been much of a hardship to him. He really seems to be taking it stride, with the exception of absolutely hating online learning. It’s truly a poor substitute for the real thing, in general.
I haven’t learned anything new, but then again, H’s been working from home for a couple of decades now and except when I’m at school we’re together a lot.
A big part of what made us a couple is how well we get along together and how much we love each other’s company. We look forward to when he can retire - esp now that I’m not at school. We have fun together doing all sorts of things from walks to cooking to games, etc. And when we watch TV/movies, it’s always together unless he’s not up yet and I have the morning news on.
Our DIL is living with us, so we’ve learned a lot about her. Mostly we’ve learned how well she fits in. One difference is we’re always “clean your plate” people. She leaves small scraps on hers. Fortunately we have chickens, so it’s not a big deal.
We do not shower daily. We shower as needed. When working full time (me) or out getting dirty with the ponies/yardwork that’s daily. When not getting sweaty, it’s every third day or so.
My college freshmen D is a really interesting person, more so than I already knew. She’s an artist / activist and we have had many spirited debates but respect each other’s opinion (at least I respect hers 
)
Her art (primarily a performing artist but quite gifted at many forms) has manifested in to baking. Really. Not just delicious but beautiful creations of pastries, cakes, breads, etc. Magazine cover quality. Really amazing, and no, I don’t swipe my finger over a cake to taste the frosting (which is rare for me).
Several families have asked her to make them holiday pies / cakes. This could become a local business.
I’ve learned that my husband is the laziest man in America. He sits on the couch in front of the TV and watches old football, soccer, rugby, tennis matches. The only excursions he makes out of the house are to play tennis and walk the dog. While he is high-risk and we’ve agreed I will do the bulk of the shopping, he is using this as an excuse to not get off the couch for about eight hours at the time. Then, he goes upstairs to read or play solitaire on his ipad for another three or four hours.
And he showers about every third day.
I’m going a little bonkers.
This is what I have learned about me, me, and another me. Wait, it is because there is no one in the house but me. I have learned that I actually enjoy being alone and I like video games.
DH had been retired for 2+ years when the pandemic started, so I haven’t really learned anything new about him. The things that drove me crazy before (his OCD) still do, and the things I appreciate (his initiative, his cooking) I still do.
@VeryHappy ??? Your response sounds so familiar. I too am going crazy with H’s hours upon hours of television watching. He works 3 days a week, but when he’s not working, he’s watching TV. This leaves me with all of the household chores and cooking. I recently stopped doing his laundry because I was becoming resentful…and this leads me to a funny story if you’re in need of a laugh.
By way of background, the pandemic has given us separate bedrooms because H is a physician and has a higher risk of contracting covid. Apparently it was too much effort to go from his bedroom down to the basement to do laundry, and instead he washed his underwear in the bathroom sink. Next he clipped each pair to a pants hanger and hung them above his bed on the ceiling fan! I walked into his bedroom one day, saw 5 pairs of underwear hanging from the ceiling fan and just stopped in my tracks. The underwear stayed on the fan all week, an empty hanger appearing each day as he retrieved a new pair. I must admit, this has given me many, many laughs during these dark days of the pandemic. There are times when I overhear a solicitous nurse or admin on the phone with him, my H the ever the charming doctor, and I say to myself, ‘I wonder what she’d think about his underwear hanging from the ceiling fan?’ ?
I learned that dh can retire and that I probably won’t kill him. We are getting along surprisingly, to me, well. I admire his teaching ability as I can overhear him while I’m in the kitchen.
@GoldPenn: Thanks for the laugh!!
I’ve learned that DH is not only NOT handy, but does break things when trying to force them to work. We are down one ceiling fan light, one lamp and multiple can lights. He is no longer permitted to do anything more to a light source than turn it on. If his first attempt at that fails, he is to walk away…
Guess what he is getting for Christmas?
We’ve learned that we can do Walmart to Go grocery delivery, which my mother had done for years before she passed away in July (and I helped her in last months, learned the website). Ideally we’d supplement with more in-person shopping, but it is OK. I sort of wish I had done it when we were busy with work and kids.