Routine

As I mentioned recently, I was unable to work for about 3 months. Before that, I worked abnormally long (and unsustainable) hours, for several weeks.

Ironically, I'd forgotten that in November last year, I said:

I'm actually at the point of liking the idea of stopping working and living on my savings for a few months.

When I wrote that, I had gone from working about 80 hours per week to 90, and in the weeks between then and stopping work, I peaked at working around 100 hours per week until my work stopped abruptly in December. However, back then I only ever planned to take 4 weeks off over Christmas and into the new year. The unanticipated delays ended up meaning that I did end up stopping working and living on my savings for a few months.

Guess what?

Those months off were a disaster. When I was working, I had a routine. I had to get up at a certain time on work days. I had to schedule my life around my work, including scheduling time for outings en femme, waxing, getting my nails done, etc. When I stopped working, my entire schedule stopped with it and I quietly sank into a bout of deep depression. About the only thing that remained consistent was my nail appointments, because while I'm getting my nails done, I always make the next appointment before I leave the salon.

So ironically, while I was not working, everything else that I should have had more time to do stopped too. I've been out en femme just 4 times so far this year ~ 2 cafe nights and 2 of my 10 nail appointments.

I also haven't chased up the architect who stuffed up our plans for house extensions and renovations last year. I let this slide partly because I had no income at the time and partly because I just don't like confrontation. It's going to have to happen, though. We need the extra space!

My attempts at sorting out my sleep and weight while I was off work were not very successful. Now that I'm back working, the morning treadmill sessions are impossible (due to work during the week, and due to my wife sleeping in at weekends and the treadmill being in the room next to our bedroom), and the attempt to establish a workable sleep schedule has failed dismally. I can't really blame anybody but myself, as it is I who persists in wasting time on Facebook when I should be on the treadmill, having a shower or in bed asleep. I need to make a conscious effort to change that, as part of establishing my new routine.

So now I'm gradually getting back into the swing of work. The new system means that work takes longer to do than it used to, but that's gradually improving. I'm allowing more time per job, so seeing fewer clients than before. I've also made a conscious decision to aim to limit my work to between 40 and 50 hours per week. It's probably around 55 hours per week now but I am close to keeping up with the backlog of paperwork waiting to be finished for jobs I've already done. The backlog of clients waiting is another story, but I'm trying to work on that gradually as I'm not going to let myself end up with an unrealistic and unsustainable workload again.

As I get myself back into routine, I'm hoping that that routine will again be able to include regular outings en femme.

If all goes to plan, my next outing will be tomorrow, when I'll meet some other members from Beauty Heaven who I haven't met before. Unlike the Beauty Heaven open day and the 4 times that I went to Sydney for meet-ups last year (Fashion Weekend Sydney, Estee Lauder staff shop, a day in the city, and IMATS), this will be the first Newcastle meet-up, at Charlestown Square. That means that I don't have to get up at 4am, 6am or even 8am like I did for the trips to Sydney. I still have to do some preparatory work today (as well as paperwork) and I need to get to bed at a reasonable time tonight!