Sunday, November 9, 2014

In the balance.

My Sunday started with an early-morning coastal drive through fog and farmland.

It's like I'm in a Jane Austen novel, right? Except....one with cars. Idk. After said early-morning drive, my day consisted of work, resisting a nap, finally watching Good Will Hunting (thanks for coming through, Netflix!), more work, takeout for dinner (because when your job feeds you on weekdays, you often fail at having food in your cupboards on the weekends), then wrapping up the rest of work so my Monday morning can look less chaotic.

I never want to come across as someone who complains about working long hours, for a few reasons: I'm grateful to have a job, I need/don't mind the overtime money, I enjoy my work, I feel valuable to my team (and that is a HUGE motivator to me), and I still get to do plenty of fun/relaxing things. Plus, my hours are nowhere near what I'm pretty sure some of my fellow Silicon Valley dwellers are pulling -- and let's not even talk about Manhattan. I hear those people don't even sleep. I am definitely busy, but it's definitely manageable. And my workplace is a huge champion of work-life balance, I just need to make sure I'm deliberate about taking advantage of that -- scheduling off-time on my calendar for concerts and dinner out with friends, etc. Boundaries, you know! I'm working on finding a good zen/flow/whatever you want to call it.

Here's the things I did this week that didn't involve work: watched Brooklyn Nine-Nine with some friends for our weekly Monday TV night (oh, I'm already over Grey's Anatomy, by the way -- decided 11 seasons was too much to bite off when I'm pretty sure everyone dies off at some point anyway #aintnobodygottimeforthat), went to dinner with a new friend (and ran into another friend who ended up joining us, and that was a fabulous bonus) (and discovered the new friend is a basketball fan so NBA GAMES HERE WE COME), went to the Penny & Sparrow concert (have no words for how much I love their music -- and I got to meet them! And I got a shirt! And it is a soft shirt! May have worn it twice already since then),  spied on the Suns games scores on my phone all week (I probably need to subscribe to some way of watching the games online so I can actually WATCH them this season instead of just refreshing the score on my phone), saw Interstellar (I love outer space so much!! I desperately want to go to there!! You should all see it, and fair warning, it's more sci-fi and less Armageddon-action-type, just so you know what to expect going in)........I think those are the highlights.

On Friday at 5pm, I signed off.

There was still work to do (hence the cleanup today), but I shut 'er down for a good 36 hours. Turned off my work email/chat on my phone, closed my laptop, and got the H out of dodge. No really, I packed a bag and ran away to the northern California coast to stay in an oceanside cottage with 3 friends, 2 rambunctious dogs, plenty o' food, zero Internet/cell service, and mucho deep conversation that feeds the soul. It was everything I needed, and wrapped up nicely this morning with that foggy farmland drive. Mmmmyes

I feel good and ready to start my Monday. And now you all feel good and ready to look at all my pictures from the weekend....enjoy! (And tell me what fun things you did this week/weekend too.)

















1 comment:

FWIL Sentimental Blog Content said...

1. This trip looks magical
2. Grey's- yeah I think 3 episodes in I was like- everyone will sleep with everyone and/or die, I'm good.
3. You're a wise soul to figure this all out. So many don't get into work enough to make it big or don't ever take the needed breaks!