It’s Thursday, which means that, as of late afternoon today, we are officially half-way through this 168 hours Time-Tracking Challenge! Late Thursday always feels like the end of the week. But it is not. It is the half-way point, and getting my head around that concept has been transformative to how I see time.
Anyway, last night was fairly relaxing. G got the 2-year-old down before she left, so I was only dealing with the big kids. I did a lot of reading in between chatting with them, reading to them, and putting them to bed. Indeed, I finished Dan Pink’s When, the book I started yesterday! (I was also very happy to see that he listed 168 Hours as one of his recommended books on time). I got the big kids in bed by 10, spent some time hanging out with my husband and went to bed around 11:30. Here’s how today went:
6:15 – 2-year-old got up. He agreed to snuggle in bed for a while with his “stuffies” but by 6:30 we were heading downstairs. He watched a show while I showered (my husband was taking an early phone call — not ideal, but a 6 a.m. call often means it was with some place like London, and a call is better than flying there).
6:45- 8 – made coffee, made my breakfast, made the kids’ breakfasts (more pancakes…), hung out with them until G got here.
8-8:30 – work, plus getting the kids ready and on the bus.
8:30-9:45 – various work projects. The plumber came to deal with an issue with a pump, but my husband was still home so he dealt with it. The pump stopped making the noise as soon as the plumber was there…of course.
9:45-10:15 – music practice. For me! I sang through the songs my choir will be rehearsing this week.
10:15-noon – worked, mostly on some fiction I’m writing. Purely speculative, but I’d like to write another novel. So I wrote about 1000 words, figuring some stuff out.
12:00-12:20 – phone call about a potential speech.
12:20-1:30 – lunch, and read a book by an author I’m chatting with soon (so I guess that qualifies as work reading?)
1:30 – 1:35 – very quick call about another potential speech.
1:35-2:35 – got ready, then ran outside. It was 53 degrees out! Amazing for January in the northeast. It was not a perfect run in the sense that some of the sidewalks I hoped to use were slushy, forcing me to run on the roads with people driving by me way too fast. But the weather was lovely all the same, and I did 5 miles. Five miles outside in January wearing just a long-sleeve shirt! Amazing.
2:35-3:30 – finished the book I was reading.
3:30-4:05 – worked on various projects.
4:05-4:25 – kids off bus. Got 10-year-old ready, and into car, and drove him to an audition for a local community theater.
4:25-4:55 – sat at audition. I think I read Shape magazine and eavesdropped on some extremely animated mothers sitting near me.
4:55-5:05 – drove home, debriefing 10-year-old about how it went (he was happy, though said it was nerve-wracking to sing “alone in front of 100,000 people!” I pointed out it was not 100,000 people, it was 10. I guess it just felt like more).
5:05-5:20 – quickly ate a salad that G made me (thank you!!) as my 10-year-old changed into swim gear and the 8-year-old got ready for wrestling.
5:20-6:15 – drove. Drove, drove, drove. First, dropped 10-year-old off at swim, then went and picked up one of the 8-year-old’s friends, and drove the two of them to wrestling practice. I had to wrestle my kid into his wrestling shoes. Then I drove back home.
6:15-6:35 – talked to agent. Looks like we’re good to go to have another book coming out in early 2019! More on that when that when contract gets done and officially announced, but it was a very celebratory moment.
6:35-6:45 – gave daughter a shower. As you do after getting major exciting professional news.
6:45-9:15 – to choir, sang 7-9 p.m. Then home! The big kids were still up, so I confiscated their various screens and marched them up to bed. Now I’m posting this and hope to enjoy a celebratory glass of wine.
How was your Thursday?
Photo: Shoes…for running. I’m running out of photo ideas here, people.
I just started Daniel Pink’s “When” on Thursday so I’m only about half way through, but it’s a quick and an engaging read. I’d love to hear your thoughts about it, I hope you’ll do a review.
Sometime in 2016 I consulted with you about adjustments in my schedule to find more time and my concern with adding a “second shift” in the evening was that it seriously threw off my sleep cycle and the next day. According to Daniel Pink, I’m not a “third bird” like most people but squarely in the “lark” territory, which totally explains that problem and informs where I can find more time.
What ended up happening with schedule change is that I changed my primary job, something I’ve done about four times since reading “168 hours” and “All the Money in the World” and slowly tweaking how I spend the hours in my life. The books truly changed my life. I’m keeping a very simplified time log right now, and I hope to do it for the whole year as I implement some more changes. So far the week was very productive and I’m anticipating the second half to be more fun and relaxing.
@Morana- I’m in the third bird category, though I might lean a bit more to lark. It’s hard to know – because young children are involved, and so I’m not sure what I’d do if they weren’t a part of my life. I think my actual preferred schedule is to get up on time and work through the morning, take the afternoon off, then work through the evening. But this is not terribly convenient for anything else in life.
You could do the equivalent of a split shift by working from, say, 5-7, then taking time to deal with family, then working a normal workday 9-5 too. It’s the same thing.
Congrats!
@Connie – thanks! I’m very excited about the project.
Quite a heavy day. Despite time going waste, thanks to you, I ended up translating six pages between 2.30 and 5 pm at state central library and planned the rest for tomorrow. Learning the rope. Thanks. Hope to meet my challenges and complete pending works.
@Deepak- good for you! Sometimes just knowing there’s a time for it can help with mustering the energy for something. Good luck with the rest of the week!
So exciting – congrats about the 2019 book!!! Can’t wait to read, whatever is it 🙂