It's one thing procrastinating madly when the chips are in the air, but once they come down, then I do (finally) get to work.
Wednesday was a washout, work-wise (see previous post).
Then Tim told me he was taking Thursday off so I wasn't going to get my work done then. But that's OK. If I know I can't work on a specific day that's fine; I don't get The Guilt.
So on Thursday we took delivery of a secondhand freezer and an old set of sofas and armchairs. Why? Well, the freezer we currently is too small and with no supermarket within easy reach we need more space. Now we have an extra appliance in the basement. Excellent! And as for the sofas etc, the ones here before were a vile off-white leather set - too small, too revolting and too uncomfortable. The ones we've managed to swap them for are much bigger, not quite so vile and have dark blue covers. They'll do.
A lot of reorganisation was done on Thursday, including a trip to the shop to stock up on lots of food for a change.
Therefore, Friday was designated as my Bloody Well Get Some Work Done day.
This is how it went:
After four and a half hours of dreadful sleep due to leg cramps and my mind working overtime, I finally got up at 5am. This is an unnatural hour for me (I'm a confirmed night-owl), but it was rather nice. I felt more than fine.
I booted up the PC, got a cup of tea and caught up on news, emails and so on while watching a pair of jays outside the window. They were gathering nesting material. A good start to the day.
Got myself some breakfast and another cuppa and continued as above.
Woke Tim and Rhiannon up for work and school. A new experience for me and both were shocked!
Usual mad rush to get Rhiannon onto the bus - she was going for a sleepover so needed to have a case packed.
By 0815 I was out walking Kita. This I must do more often. We met more dogs than usual - not such a great thing at the moment as she's on heat, but we escaped without incident. I also saw four tiny ducklings which were delightful soul-food.
Once I got home I was ready to work because all my usual procrastination websites had already been browsed and closed down. "Like"!
I motored through and wrote five articles out of the nine that are due by the end of the month. I give myself false dreadlines, partly to ensure I have plenty of leeway in case of unexpected incidents (such as Rhiannon being violently ill or Tim taking unannounced days off) and mostly to clear the decks ready for my other projects.
Yes, I took breaks, but these were necessary for health and not, in my view, classed as procrastination: a walk around the garden to stretch my crampy legs, a quick play with the dog - that sort of thing.
However, Tim returned from work early, so although I was on a roll by then, I had to finish it there.
I finished the day's work feeling rather pleased with myself.
As a reward to myself, I cut some branches and a bundle of unidentified tree flowers from the garden and lost myself creating my first Ikebana arrangement in several months. I'm actually qualified to teach Sogetsu Ikebana, but my Sensei in Tokyo would have been dismayed by my lackadaisical arrangement. It looked pretty to me though.
Tim took me out to dinner in the evening and then we watched a movie.
A Good Day!
Note: A lot of the reason for my procrastination problem is that I don't particularly enjoy the subjects I write about. As you've seen by this blog (and possibly my Japanory one,) I certainly don't have a problem with getting lots of words typed up. That's because it's all about ME and therefore a terribly easy subject to write about. For a start I don't have to do any research.
For this freelance writing job, I only have to produce these articles once every three months, leaving me plenty of time (in theory) to concentrate on my other, non-paying yet far more interesting, projects.