Here’s the dinner report after the husband’s folks came for dinner.

So it mostly went to plan. After dinner and I had cleaned up I sat down to do some needle work but bro was bored and he’d been very sick, just came out of hospital, so I took pity on him. After he insulted me just a little and I pushed back a little I asked him if he reads audiobooks, as that may be an easy way for him to do an interesting activity. He said they always send him to sleep. My radar immediately pinged real loud, I’m always on the alert for when he or others talk about their experience in cults. I went on to explain that the books he was listening to were designed to relax him and even send to him sleep. I explained how the tapes were relaxing, why the makers of the tapes did that and how those books differ to regular audio recordings of regular novels and nonfiction books. I never once used a value judgement or trigger word. I never mentioned the cult nor any people in the cult, I kept it fact based and impersonal. He listened with interest and very intently.

I’m a very good cult deprogrammer.