Keeping from being bored isn't that hard in the age of COVID-19 if you give yourself options. And you don't need a lot of money to do so, either. The internet makes so much stuff available for so little money, so all you really need is an internet account. And with websites like Project Gutenberg, YouTube and the like around, everything you could ever ask for is free. YouTube even has old classic movies, uncut, available for the low cost of nothing whatsoever. Sure, they're black-and-white and silent, but they're still entertaining even to today's jaded audiences. Charlie Chaplin is timeless; his comedy still works today. Douglas Fairbanks did action as well as anyone today, and did his own stunts, to boot. He was the first Zorro AND the first Robin Hood, as well as dozens of other famous roles.
And for reading, Gutenberg has thousands of free books available. They're all long past their copyright date, and thus are public domain, which means you can read them without worrying about fees or book costs. Even the used book store can't match that. And they're not open now, anyway. So, you can read old classics by authors such as Mark Twain, Henry Rider Haggard, Edgar Rice Burroughs...the list is virtually endless.
Not only that, but for those who are interested in the pulp stories (and Hollywood is no match for your own imagination), you can get more pulp magazines than you could read in a lifetime on sites such as archive.org or luminist.org. Action-packed stories for the boys, romantic stuff for the girls. Again, it's all free.
Of course, I wouldn't dream of suggesting pirating sites, because those are bad. Besides, most of what you can get for free is of better quality than the stuff you could obtain illegally. So, stick with the free and legal, because it's more fun.
There are plenty of games available for free, too. Old video games can be found on abandonware sites and run using emulators and the like; whether it's text-based Infocom games or graphic arcade-style stuff, you can pick up almost anything you want and get hours and hours of free entertainment from it. Some of them can even be used for multi-player, so you can introduce your kids to the great stuff you used to enjoy when you were their age.
So, there's plenty of options out there, all of them legal, and all of them free. Who's got time for boredom when there's so much awesome out there that you've never even seen before?
I've decided to start that Let's Read series of posts, but I'm going to do them separately from my regular blog posts, which means that I'll be posting twice a day for the duration of this. I'm going to do what I mentioned yesterday: Read through the original 1977 Traveller rule books, which I've never played or read before. I want to see how the game looks from a neophyte's eyes, and what kind of implied setting or expectations can be gleaned from it. Those who have played the game before might see things they hadn't noticed before, and newcomers will get to experience the ride along with me. It should be fun, and I'll probably start it tomorrow.
Until then, if you're looking for something new and inexpensive, you can always check out my first published book, Final Exam, available now on Amazon for the low price of $0.99. It's worth a shot, don't you think?
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