14 september 2025
Wrist is killing me. Think it's just a stress injury from all of the writing by hand I've been doing- it was a pretty drastic adjustment period.
I guess it's also the universe's way of telling me to cool it, since Sundays are loafing around days- though I do get some light admin work done, mostly to make my week ahead easier for myself. Still have a spot of laundry that needs to be handwashed- (delicates are pretty annoying to wring out with a dead wrist), though I did find out excitingly, that my writer's group is running a journal centric event at the end of the month for their big writing event of the year.
I'm still not totally decided on whether or not I'll participate, because I've been struggling so hard as is to even find time to write while I'm establishing and settling into a new routine, but it's like Dan said- if you aren't careful to keep up a life outside of it, it will eat you alive. (And there are plenty of warnings about people who find that they don't have much of a life at all by the end of it... So it's good to be consciously mindful, especially because life is really just a big ol' Sims game of balancing various needs against your aspirations tab, and one needs a bit of mental loafing around to not completely burn out, especially since it'd been a rough year.)
Had some chunks of cheese and marinara sauce for a breakfast snack. Shockingly, even with the mini breadcrumbs, it was only 100 calories if you ate the whole thing- which, I didn't scoop out all of the sauce, since the ratio of ingredients in the snack pack is totally skewed, but it's nice to whet the appetite. And eating treats on the weekend that I really shouldn't during weekdays amuses me to no end. Special time limited snacks...
Not sure what I would write for the big writing event, either. Could go back to my Bluebeard novel I had outlined entirely, but it doesn't compel me. And that's the silly, indulgent part of being a hobbyist writer: you get to focus only on what draws you in, rather than applying the same project management skills I've gained from shepherding myself through academia to something that isn't grinding my way through the academic slog with demands of papers, regardless of passion. (Though my writing always was worse for those than in a creative lens.)
People don't have the same twenty four hours in a day. Even if you set aside the variable of sleep, the capacity you have for action fluctuates wildly on an individual basis. Most days, I'm lucky if I get one big item off of my to do list done. I'm just not the kind of person who can really effectively multitask. (And the science says vanishingly few, if any people, really are.)
Sundays are meant to be my recharge day, the same way some people find solace in attending church services. They're to soak in doing a little bit of nothing, so that I have more energy during the week to draw from. I've already done a bit of work on Saturday, which I try to avoid. And the workload really is quite reasonable. But it's just... Frustrating, to want to do things, and not have the energy for it. Because of needing to hold other things in higher priority, or because you need to eke out the meagre rations of whatever juice you've left in the tank after a long day.
I've debated not commuting in on the work days I set aside, but it's good for me to put on real people clothes, sit in a different, quiet, environment, and generally maintain some semblance of boundaries around working hours. Even if I do normally work on things at home as well, after showering post commute, and slumping my way through dinner.
Wrist hurts. I'm tired. Sunday's just for picking out clothes for the week.