Timmy is in the well

"get a second job"

"start your own garden"

"stop buying name brand"

"don't get your nails done"

"learn to budget"

"live within your means"

“It’s funny,” I told Flewin. “We have an old Nintendo Game Boy floating around the house, and Tetris is the only game we own. My wife will sometimes dig it out to play on airplanes and long car rides. She’s weirdly good at it. She can get 500 or 600 lines, no problem.”

What Flewin said next I will never forget.

“Oh, my!”

The husband was writing an article on classic video game records, was surprised to find out that holding the Tetris record is a bit of a big deal, and mentions how good his wife is at it.

The guy he’s talking to mentions that the record is 327, way lower than his wifes usual scores of 500-600.

They travel to a tournament, and she goes to do her attempt. Just after she beats 327, and is climbing higher, a judge brings up to the husband that the specific version she’s playing actually has a different record of 545.

The protagonist has just won the world famous sword fighting competition in the big, rich capital and is talking to his mentor, and says something about being the best swordsman in the world. The mentor frowns and tells him that no, he isn't. He is the best swordsman out of the people that could afford to show up to this tournament. There could be a mercenary way out in the mountains, patrolling a snow encrusted fort's walls that could kick his ass and there was no way to know until he was already losing to the guy.

In my case music is well, everything and everything else is superfluous. [...] I just live and breathe music, whether it's playing guitar or playing the piano or listening to records or collecting records or watching music videos… all sort of stuff like that. My whole life revolves around my ears. […] That's all I do, I just live music.