Tuesday, April 24, 2018

Coming Up for Air

Hi! It has been awhile since I've written a post that isn't a series of links.

I'm past the big seminar I had agreed to do. I'm catching up on the submissions I've received for Annorlunda's 2019 publishing year. I've got some promotions underway and more scheduled for some of Annorlunda's existing books. All in all, I feel... not caught up, exactly, but like I've almost got things back under control.

Instead of focusing on how much I haven't done or how I let myself get so far behind on things, I thought I'd spend a little time tonight reviewing what is going well.

First of all, the new job is good. Since that's paying the bills, that's important.

I've almost got an exercise routine figured out. It took some experimenting with my schedule and that was on hold for over a month when I got sick, but I'm getting back into what I think will be my routine: a short jog on Monday mornings (or the ~75% of Monday mornings when I can get myself out of bed at 6 instead of 6:20), a 30 minute weights circuit at the gym on Wednesday evenings, and a rollerblading outing on Friday afternoons.

The fact that I can bring Friday afternoon rollerblading back is one of my favorite things about my new job. It works because I have an early morning teleconference on Fridays, and so I work from home (a lot of people in my office work from home on Fridays, so that makes it easier to do). The early start and lack of a commute lets me finish up between 3:30 and 4, so I can get out for a nice rollerblade and get home before traffic gets bad.

The last piece of my exercise routine is that I take a 20-30 minute walk most lunch hours. I don't do that for exercise, though: I do it as a way to refresh my focus and also think through problems/issues.

In other non-work achievements: I'm trying to request 10 addresses from Postcards to Voters most weeks. This is the type of involvement that feels best to me and is most sustainable for me over the long term. I still do other things as it makes sense, but I've come to think that the best thing I can do right now is help make Republicans pay a price at the ballot box for their embrace of nativism and racism, and I like the postcard writing approach. In more normal times, I don't stick my nose into elections in places I don't live or at least know really well. But these are not normal times.

Like I said at the top, I've set up some promotions for some existing books. The ebook edition of The Burning is on sale for $0.99 this week. I've got Here's the Deal up on NetGalley (still on my to do list: figure out how to recruit more NetGalley reviewers).  I've got some more promo ideas to work on soon, too.

I've been keeping up with my New Year's resolution to read at least one short story every week. I post the short story I read the prior week on Annorlunda's Twitter feed and Facebook page every Monday. I am enjoying how this resolution (and the public accountability for it) encourages me to read more broadly.

And of course, there's the kids. Pumpkin's Harry Potter 11th birthday party was a success, and her Harry Potter obsession continues: She actually asked to watch the first film last weekend. She almost never wants to watch movies! Petunia is developing an obsession with the A Series of Unfortunate Events series, which is good, because they're a bit of a stretch for her reading level-wise.

Pumpkin passed the test that would route her to the advanced math track if she were going to a middle school with an advanced math track, so now we just have to figure out how to keep her at that level through middle school.

Petunia told me today that her favorite subjects in school are math and writing. She thinks the subject she most needs to work on is spelling. I agree with this self-assessment, and we had a nice chat about how improving her Spanish reading comprehension would help her in math (because of the word problems) and how reading more would help with spelling, too.

As much as I'd like to tackle some of the bigger items on my to do list, both side hustle related and otherwise, I have to admit that the two things I most want to improve on are my blogging frequency (I miss writing meatier posts!) and my sleep habits. I am not blessed with low sleep needs, and yet keep acting like I am, and that leaves me tired more often than I'd like to be. 

So, having written a post, if not a meaty post, I think I will now take myself off to bed. What's up with you all?

3 comments:

  1. Just spotted a link you might enjoy about time management:
    http://blogs.nature.com/naturejobs/2018/04/24/time-management-stressed-science-needs-to-slow-down/

    Isn't this ironic that in a post without links I feel like I should send you some? Especially since my first thought when I started reading this post was "Oh good, I won't need to devote hours to this post because it isn't just a set of links"? I really love the link posts, and I get a lot out of them, but they do take effort :)

    I've got kid-school envy - I would like to trade your issues for mine. We just got back from a meeting with my daughter's teacher because she just isn't getting any work done at school and he's going to have to give her an "Incomplete" at the end of the year if this doesn't change. Of course she'll still wind up in the next grade, but "Transferred" rather than "Promoted". Which ties back to the fact that she's depressed (officially diagnosed, have appointments with the Children's hospital next week) but I don't know if she's depressed because school sucks for her, or if she's struggling in school because of depression. Hopefully the professionals will help sort this out, but at this point we're seriously considering home-schooling. But at least her teacher is awesome, and knowing that we're on top of the problem had a ton of things he's going to try.

    Very glad to hear you're enjoying the new job. I was in LA last weekend and was seriously considering trying to get a bit further south to suggest meeting up - I feel like I know you from so many years of reading your blog...but I rarely comment so you don't know me at all! I will try to work on that :)

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    Replies
    1. Thanks for the link!I always appreciate links, even if I sometimes forget to use them in future posts.

      I'm sorry to hear your daughter is struggling with school right now. It can be so stressful trying to help a child navigate school issues. I'm glad her teacher is helping, and I hope you can figure out the best approach for her soon. One of the bloggers I used to read regularly started posting again recently as her tween is starting out on treatment for anxiety and depression, and she wants to create the blog posts she wished she could find when she was at the start of the process. I don't know if the posts will be at all helpful to you since it is an older kid, but just in case, here's the blog:
      http://femomhist.blogspot.com/

      If you ever make it to San Diego, let me know. I always enjoy meeting up with long time readers, no matter how much (or little) they comment!

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  2. EarthSciProf3:05 PM

    Glad to hear you’re getting back into an exercise routine! I find it challenging to sustain one myself (& really easy to drop) even though being in a routine means I feel much better physically, mentally, and emotionally.

    Thanks Wendy for the link!

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