Lyrics: “Faithful Son” ~ Frank Turner, 2009
In parts of the German blogosphere (is that a term people use still?) there is a monthly thing called “WMDEDGT” meaning “Was machst du eigentlich den ganzen Tag?” as in “What do you actually do all day?” in which people blog about exactly that in their various jobs / responsibilities / activities. It’s usually on the 5th of a month. But I feel like a rebel today 😉
06:00 I didn’t wake up 60 – 90 minutes hours before the alarm, which I count as a success these days. I had a few weird dreams in the early hours, which I only vaguely recalled for the first few seconds after waking up. And then not at all anymore after. Except for the fact – do dreams count as facts ? – that Frank Turner had a part in one of those dreams, but that’s not really so much out of the ordinary. Fangirl and all.
08:00 Dawdling the morning away as I do so often these days. I’m still in a bit of a weird funk after my visit to the care home yesterday. It wasn’t a particularly good day yesterday and while I’ve reached the state of mind where I don’t sit in my car crying after, the emotions and memories still haunt me for a while. Even today I guess, if only subconsciously. But going in the span of only a few months from being mostly a self-reliant person – even in old age – to being 90% depended on other people for every thing you do is so fucking hard. For the person themselves, but also for all of us caring about them. There are good days and bad days and yesterday was a bad day and I still felt the reverberation emotionally today. Which obviously put me in a dawdling funk this morning.
10:00 Spent almost two hours mostly focused on work stuff. Go me! I only did the mandatory hours yesterday, so I needed to catch up on some stuff and luckily had planned accordingly when I ran a bunch of errands yesterday and did all my shopping, so there wasn’t any need to leave the house today. It’s a foul weather outside anyway…
11:00 Am I the only one always a bit freaked out when someone calls you on the landline? This time it was my landlord’s wife wondering if he was still in the building, because he had left his mobile phone at home? I checked for his car and then walked up to the flat from which a removal company is removing stuff left from the previous tenants. But he obviously had left already. There is so much to tell about the last people who live there, but I don’t want to gossip (too much). But they were a mess. I sometimes felt sorry for them, because they obviously had a bunch of issues. You don’t become an alcoholic / messie when your life is going to plan, do you? Anyway, they have finally been asked to move out and they obviously didn’t fight it, so now the remaining stuff is cleared out and then we’ll hope for decent and friendly new neighbours.
I allowed myself a short coffee break as well, without officially clocking out. I did feel guilty about that kind of thing in the beginning of lockdown/working from home. But then I remembered the moments at the office, where we were socialising with other coworkers. Having a coffee, chatting, catching up, not just about work. I don’t do that over the phone anymore. Or just very rarely. So I allow myself the occasional 15 minutes of “coffee and something not work-related break”, especially if it’s going to be a long day. And don’t feel too guilty about it.
12:00 Lunch break before I need to log into a longer video call. Spending a few minutes reading “Malibu Rising” which is so so so good.
14:30 Done with the meeting. Phew. I’m in charge of that project and I shouldn’t still feel overwhelmed by it, but I do. Feeling prickly whenever someone in the internal project-team says something critical, not even about me, but our external partners. Like I should have a better handle on things. I know that’s not how my colleague meant it, but that’s how my overly self-critical mind perceived it. I don’t like it.
17:00 I was finally winding down with work. I felt productive for most of the day, which isn’t always the case. The tiny voice in my head already whispers: “But you could have been even MORE productive”. That voice is a jerk sometimes. All afternoon I thought I had to leave the house to run some more errands tonight after all. I even got dressed into proper “leaving the house” clothes until I realized: I don’t NEED to pick up the stuff today, just because it was delivered (to the Packstation/ the bookstore) today. I don’t need that item right away / won’t read the book today anyway. It can wait a day or two. So I changed back into my comfy clothes, got the rest of my coffee, snuggled up on my sofa and kept reading “Malibu Rising”.
20:00 I feel pathetic writing it down, but I will be heading off to bed soon, because I feel knackered. Again. I don’t want to pay too much attention to the “body battery” stats on my smartwatch, because I still don’t quite understand how these data is measured. But it’s been down since the two nights of crappy sleep on the weekend and still hasn’t recharged as much as I like. And that’s something I notice even without the data. So more sleep / rest than usual it has to be . I finished “Malibu Rising” this evening and loved it. I am always tempted to read another book of the same author when that happens, but I think it’s a good idea to give my brain a break and read something more fluffy in the meantime. If I read much at all tonight, because… knackered!
