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Tuesday, January 28, 2003

Bad Blogger Junio
I’ve been a very bad blogger in the last couple of weeks—ever since my routine was interrupted by that trip to New York, in fact. The trip and its resulting discombobulation (after all, it’s not like the tasks you’d usually tackle if you were at home go away—they just get postponed and crammed together with the current week’s) are partly to blame, but the fact is I just haven’t had much time. The week before we went to New York, Russian classes resumed, and although it’s only two 90-minute sessions per week plus homework, that seems to account for a good bit of my “free” time.

Look at it this way: In the week, I leave the house at 6:15 a.m. (in theory anyway; in fact, I rarely manage to get out before my absolute drop-dead, lag about any longer and you’ve missed your ride, gel, deadline of 7:15) so that I can read the paper before heading off to work. This is more than idle amusement. I need to have read the paper by the time I get to the office because there’s no time to do it once I’m there (ironically enough, since it’s one of those rare jobs where it’s perfectly acceptable—encouraged, even—to sit at your desk leafing through the broadsheets). I get home around 6:15 p.m.—or 8 on Russian class nights—and I often have to do a little bit of work from home. Ideally, I need to start getting ready for bed around 9:30 so that I can get enough sleep to get through the next day. So, on Russian nights, that leaves me with a monster 90 minutes of free time—during which I have to eat, catch up on Coronation Street, and blog. Friday nights are also out of the question since if I’m not completely shattered, I’d rather go see a movie than spend any more time tapping at computer keys.

Incidentally, just a few years ago, I’d have read that line about getting ready for bed at 9:30 and laughed out loud. I’m not naturally an early to bed kind of person. At university, in my long years of un- and underemployment, and when I worked at right-on companies, I followed the “stay up until the silly hours watching terrible late-night television, then lie about in bed the next day long past the hours when grown-ups are up and about” lifestyle. This is really the first job I’ve had where I work long hours not because anyone’s standing over me or because anyone’s counting, but because I want to, and I like what I do—most of the time. I’m absolutely convinced, though, that there’s no way I could manage it if I hadn’t had all those years of slacking. They were a long stretching exercise so that I could get through the current rat race.
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