Did your friend also try to save twenty bucks on a dumpster and end up paying for three?

Saw an old barn framer do that once with a mallet and a chisel.

My father-in-law is 74 and he got me into the original 1970s "Star Blazers" dub a few years back. He swore up and down that the cheesy English voices were the only way to watch it, because that's what he grew up with. I finally sat down and binged the whole series with him, and you know what, he was right for that show. The over-the-top delivery and the corny music actually made it more fun than the more polished Japanese version. So I get where your friend is coming from, sometimes the first version you see just sticks with you no matter what.

That thing you said about making fun of yourself out loud to your cat is actually a solid coping trick. I do something similar where I'll literally knock on wood or touch iron if someone brings up a clean streak. The superstition part is real for me because I've seen three different superintendents on other jobs get their perfect run broken the day after they bragged about it. So now if anyone mentions my zero incident streak I just change the subject or make a joke about it being a fluke. It sounds crazy but treating it like a fragile bubble instead of a solid achievement takes the pressure off.

oh yeah, 100%. those repeat clients nickel and dime your time with tiny requests that take forever to add up. i had one guy message me 12 times about a font size change last month. theyre great for steady cash but bad for your calendar if you don't set hard boundaries.