Archives for August 2019

I woke up from the alarm and sat up right away. Phew.

I had read all these things about agile and scrum the day before and one thing that stuck with me was „the power of a checkmark“ when you can check something off and the other thing was the question at the end of James Clear’s last newsletter:

Can my current habits carry me to my desired future?

Because the answer to that question for me at the moment is a clear, resounding ‚no‘.

So I tweaked the morning routine checklist I have in an app called ‚home routines‘. And then I left the app open on my phone over night so that the list would be the first thing I saw in the morning when I checked my phone. And I decided that I had to go all the way through that checklist before looking at email. I still lost half an hour somewhere in the morning but still.

I meditated, I wrote morning pages, I made breakfast, I wrote for 35 minutes, I talked with my husband and crocheted, I did the dishes, I did my regular Sunday exercise thing, I wrote for 25 more minutes, helped to make lunch (and made it late because of the writing and some procrastinating) and felt much better for it. Duh.

Here’s lunch. Leftover Greek-style meatloaf with baked potatoes and Greek red beet salad:

Then I did the dishes again. Took a bit of a break, bought two books or so, read 90 pages of the first one (nothing fancy, only „15 secrets successful people know about time management“). I found the book highly motivating but I didn’t really learn anything new. I might try the method of time-blocking everything instead of using to do-lists again but then I am so stubborn that telling myself ‚this appointment I made with myself is equally important as a doctor’s appointment“ isn’t usually working. It’s not that I don’t take myself seriously, it’s just that I know bullshit if I hear it, even if I’m the one telling it.

On the other hand that method of using a calendar instead of a to do-list certainly shows if things are realistic or not. If I schedule three things that each take an hour in an afternoon where I have two hours to do something I immediately see that I’m having a problem.

We’ll see. At least the first half of the day went well.

I did prepare the next podcast episode and pulled a nice stack of books down from the shelves to illustrate the topic. I’m looking forward to that.

I did not: draw, watch any of the online classes I’m taking, cut the waistband for the pair of yoga pants, sew or make music. I did refill one of my fountain pens. Does that count?

In the evening we watched a Santana concert together, all three of us. The boy was not happy about it but was overruled. I pulled out the spinning wheel again. I want to get that fiber spun eventually.

Today I want to do it all again, the run, take a shower, help with lunch, record the podcast, go and buy bananas again and then we’ll see.

I woke up from the alarm, turned around and fell asleep again. I felt sick and low on energy the whole day. Note to self: this is what too much beer, too much sugar and too much salt means the day after.

I meditated and decided to have breakfast early and to write afterwards. Yeah, right.

I did a lot of crochet.

I talked with my husband and son and read some blog posts and researched scrum and kanban. It was one of those days where everything feels hard and I almost didn’t go running because I felt nauseous, had a mild headache and putting my contacts in felt way too hard. Also, I didn’t have clean running socks.

Fortunately I know how to deal with these kinds of things, so I battled the dunnwannas, ran in glasses and with no socks. I still feel weird that I am a person who can be totally derailed by the monumental effort of having to put in contact lenses but then I know myself well enough not to battle it. It’s like living with a toddler.

The running went reasonably well:

The weather was nice, warm and dry. There were more people out than during the week but that’s always the case on Saturdays. Sundays are the worst which is why we usually avoid them for running.

I came back home late, took a shower and helped to make lunch. Lunch was totally late:

We had planned to make red beet salad as well but it turns out that takes ages.

I then went into the biggest slump of all but I did do more research on scrum for families and Kanban, crocheted a few more stripes on the blanket-in-progress, did the washing up, folded laundry and sat around moaning that I was exhausted and tired waiting for bedtime.

Also I received three packages and am now the proud owner of a new backup drive, five pairs of running socks and a thingy to mount my cell phone to my bicycle. Hurray.

Then it was time for Star Trek and even more crochet and bed.

I’m having high hopes that today will go better than yesterday. I want to do the usual stretching thing with Youtube in the morning, all the writing and such, planning for next week, some reading and more crochet. Of course.

So yesterday it was time to do our yearly hike to the Andechs monastery.

I woke up from the alarm and again snoozed for thirty minutes first. I might start to go to bed earlier. I think that might do wonders for my energy overall.

No writing, only a little meditation, nothing else but at least I had breakfast on time. Then I started working on the crochet blanket.

My plan had been to do all sorts of things before leaving at eleven but in the end I barely got packed, brushed my teeth and washed the breakfast dishes. No writing and no cleaning. Oops.

The day was warm but not hot and a little gray. Good hiking weather. We took a train to Herrsching and were left stranded in Wessling. We used the twenty minutes until the next train to walk to the Wessling lake and back.

Then we took the next train and started walking to Andechs. Herrsching was pretty crowded and I got to practice my English by helping some tourists find their way.

I’m happy to say that I seem to be in better shape than the years before because all the hiking uphill was relatively easy for me. I was still talking on those steps up on the hill where the last years I was almost dropping dead.

I was busier than we had expected and it was rather windy up on the hill. Poor husband had worn shorts and got rather chilled. Here is a picture of our lunch:

And here’s dessert:

I don’t usually eat sweets like that but you can’t argue with tradition. (Tradition meaning we always get these at Andechs.) I have to confess that I didn’t manage to finish mine, I gave a big piece to the boy.

Then we walked back downhill. With loads of other people.

We missed the train by two minutes so we went down to the Ammersee as well and my husband took the opportunity to take a quick swim. The rest of us didn’t bring swimsuits so we just sat on a bench and looked over the water.

Then we took the train home, I decided there would be tortilla chips and chocolate bars for dinner and that was basically it. Turns out that one liter of very strong beer totally take the productivity out of the rest of the day. But that’s what summer break is for.

Today there will be running and food and no idea what else. I might try to get everything done or I might now, we’ll see.

Woke up from the alarm, turned around and snoozed another thirty minutes. Skipped meditating and morning pages, faffed around the internet, had an early breakfast and then wrote for half an hour. Phew.

Husband showed up right on time and I decided to start the new crochet blanket:

It took me two hours to crochet the first row. First I had to make that long, long chain, then I had to count it again, then I set up the pattern and crocheting into the foundation chain is always a bitch, and then when I had almost finished I realized that I should use a smaller crochet hook, so I started the row over.

This is the summer ripple blanket by Attic24 in cotton.

The boy was only a little late, I did the dishes, forgot to empty the recycling and restock the fridge and then I went grocery shopping. I always love walking through town in peace while listening to podcasts. This time my husband actually called me while I was at the supermarket because we had forgotten to put some things on the grocery list but it turned out I didn’t have reception there. And when I called him back he didn’t hear the phone which was on silent.

Seems we’ll need to make do without milk, polenta and anchovies until next week.

The boy was eating out with my mother-in-law and we had chili:

After lunch I settled in for some more crochet and found that I had made a stupid mistake at the beginning of row 1 which meant I got to do it all yet again.

I’m telling you all this so you realize that even experienced crocheters make these kinds of mistakes all the time. If I weren’t as experienced I might think that the blanket project was way too complicated for me and that I’d never get it done. When in fact the next rows will go much faster and smoother.

After that I just kept sitting there. My to do-list went out the window and crocheted while watching the rest of the „research for fiction“-lecture and started watching a workshop about pacing. In between I helped the boy write an email to my parents and talked with my husband a bit.

And then it was time to watch some Star Trek and do even more crochet.

All in all a rather indulgent but very enjoyable day.

Today there will be cleaning (I hope) and more words and other than that I’m not sure. If the weather is nice we might do an excursion. If not we’ll stay in. It will be a nice, open day.

I woke up from the alarm and basically started yawning immediately. I wasn’t the only one, the rest of the family was super-tired as well and the boy was the only one who had gone to bed too late.

I did not write before breakfast. Boo. I did meditate and write morning pages, though. Breakfast, knitting (I think I might be two thirds done with the boy’s scarf.

Then we waited for the boy to get up. Then I waited for a package to arrive. I did the dishes, talked with the boy and then started prepping lunch instead of going for my run so that one of us would be home all the time. The potato salad was almost done when my husband came back and the package with the yarn for my next stripe-y crochet blanket arrived. Then I went running:

I am at the point in the Couch to 10K-program where I’m running slightly more than I’m walking and this time I didn’t really manage to do that. I always find it harder to run later, just before lunch, because I’m just so hungry then and my willpower is already lower than in the morning.

The weather was great, though, and things are going well:

The paths were even mostly dry. Of course I managed to step into a puddle and get my feet wet but that’s pretty normal when you run in those Five Fingers. They are like gloves for your feet and not watertight at all. In fact, I often end up with mud on my socks inside the shoes. (Which reminds me that my running socks are starting to disintegrate and I want to order some more.)

Meanwhile my husband and the boy had gotten the grill started. My husband was determined to have barbecue at least once this year, even though it was too cold to eat outside on the porch. We also had some more zucchini blossoms (until last year I had never had any and this year we are eating them every other day it seems).

Bell peppers from our garden, corn from the supermarket, my husband is drinking a dark beer that dear Eliandhra had sent me and I’m having an alcohol-free IPA. Just so you know. My husband had neglected to restock our usual (alcohol-free) lunch beer.

And here’s the barbecue. Nothing fancy:

I had more sausages than that, by the way. The boy had actually grilled everything. Even the bratwurst which he doesn’t eat.

Then I finally took a shower, did the dishes and got ready for teaching.

My first student arrived five minutes late with her six-month-old in a great mood but not asleep. It’s always a risk, she doesn’t have child care until late evening so she brings her to lessons. The baby was all smiles and rather excited about her toys so that was good.

Then I had two long hours before the next student and that is always hard. I mean, two hours is a long stretch of time but to use it wisely is something I do not excel at.

I answered email and started writing this post. This time the computer didn’t freeze, by the way.

Then I taught a singing student whom I made practice a classical Schumann-song and then proceeded to show her different singing styles using „Summertime“ as an example. She foolishly had expressed an interest in learning how to sing jazz, poor thing.

Then the boy and I watched an episode of Star Trek while I had one of those excellent dark beers and started turning the heel on a sock. I tried writing more on the novel but was too tired.

Today we might go to a beer garden for lunch but then we might not because the boy is having lunch with his grandmother at the Mongolian restaurant. Depending on that I might go to the supermarket or I might not. If we stay home I am hoping the make progress on the sewing projects, namely the black yoga pants that only need a waistband. We’ll see.

Trick 1:

Going to bed on time makes you get enough sleep, wake up earlier and have more energy.

Trick 2:

Opening the Daily Stoic on my ebook reader makes it the first thing I see when I open it in the morning which means I don’t forget it and read the quote for the day.

I still spent way too much time faffing around online before breakfast which meant I did not meditate or write morning pages but then I applied

Trick 3:

Telling myself that I only have to sit in front of the computer with the novel-in-progress open until the timer dings. No pressure, just a little light reading and maybe changing a word or two. Result: 500 new words and an idea for the next scene.

I got up, had breakfast only slightly earlier than my husband, knitted, talked with my husband, looked at some more pictures of Gibson Les Paul guitars (choosing a guitar is even more serious a business than choosing yarn, slightly more expensive too) and waited for the boy to show up.

Since I was convinced that the boy would be extra late again I re-applied trick 3 again and wrote some more.

Then the bell rang and the guy who was scheduled to look at the broken glass above the entrance to the annex. He was actually rather nice and businesslike but won’t be able to help us because his company doesn’t do glass. So that went both better and worse than expected.

Dishes and such and then I went and ran errands. The tea shop, the post office and the health food store. I almost didn’t get stamps at the post office yet again because it was already so late but applied

Trick 4:

Think of future me and do her a favor. And since I was so late the post office was rather empty, there was no line and I was in and out in no time. And now we are all set with stamps for at lest a year.

When I returned home it was already lunchtime but lunch wasn’t ready yet. Ultimately because I decided writing was more important than eating on time. The boy was even helping with the cooking. I unpacked the groceries and entered the fray. We had homemade pesto Genovese with spaghetti that my husband had brought from Italy and salad. All veggies and herbs were grown in our garden and it was delicious:

I did the dishes right away (another trick, the longer I wait the harder it gets), watched a little more of the lecture about research for fiction writers and did a round of social media. Right in the middle of that I remembered that I had wanted to try out a new trick,

Trick 5:

Putting the sewing machine on the kitchen table after lunch to get myself sewing again.

And it worked. It took my husband reminding me on top of the silliness that would have been putting the machine back without using it.

I sewed one seam on the black yoga pants, decided that the next step will be to cut out a waistband. The pants are sitting way lower than I would like but I have enough fabric left over that I can cut a generous waistband to make them fit better. I’m not quite sure how long I want the legs but I’ll decide that after the waist is done.

I also did all the mending that I needed the sewing machine for:

Two dresses and two pairs of leggings that had ripped seams.

I also decided that I was tired of lugging my laptop, tablet, phone, ebook reader, notebook, several pens and glasses around all day (from the bedroom to the kitchen, from the kitchen to the studio, from the studio back to the kitchen and then back to the bedroom every day) and put it all in the laptop bag that I love but almost never use:

I think that might have been a great idea.

Then it was time for my next trick:

Trick 6:

Use my son as an accountability partner to get strength training done. First time doing strength training in weeks.

And then Trick 7:

Set a timer to remember brushing my teeth before watching TV so that I won’t snack late in the evening. The three of us watched the second half of the Woodstock DVD:

This time we watched it on my husband’s computer because he has that hooked up to a nice sound system and it turns out that watching a concert with better sound makes it much more enjoyable.

We finished watching that, I got ready for bed, started this post, read a bit a turned off the lights.

It would have been even nicer if all the things on my list would have gotten done but I am pretty happy with that day.

So. Today there will be running and maybe finally barbecue and I’ll be teaching two students. And the usual stuff.