jimsjournal
Had I but world enough and time -- 02/11/05


I've been feeling cramped for time -- not stressed out or exhausted or anything like that, but just so very aware that there are just not enough hours in the day and not enough days in the week.

Why can't we have a 28 hour day and an eight day week (with a three day weekend)?

I am trying to be more efficient in my management of time.

I really have no choice about this... I have not made any formal New Years resolutions, but I have determined that I really need to get into better physical shape (yes, yes, I know, long-time readers here know that I was babbling away on the same topic four and five years ago... run more and workout more and loose weight, yadda yadda yadda and blah blah blah) and here I am, once again, trying to do the same thing. I also need to manage my time better, my time at work and my time at home and my time doing everything...

It's not just that I am always complaining about a shortage of time... it's that I have really hammered myself by taking two courses and I have become aware of the time burden imposed by that...

Two full work days.

Yeah, that's the equivalent of what it is costing me in time to take these two courses.

That literature course I'm taking with Jill takes four hours each week just for the class (two and a half hours for the class itself -- 7:00 to 9:30 every Tuesday night -- plus the round trip commute time) plus the time to read the assignments (and re-read and study and cover the written assignments, etc.) and there are three exams during the semester and the first of them is coming up next week so Jill and I need to get together on Sunday and do a little studying.

Then there's the UMass Boston grad course in Instructional Design that I'm taking over the Internet. The course syllabus suggests that we should allow at least nine hours per week for the course. I got the required textbook a couple of weeks ago -- last night I ordered the "recommended" supplemental book -- and I figure ten hours a week is a reasonable number, which will be higher in the weeks we have to submit pieces of our semester project (and I have until Monday to think up what that project will be).

So there goes the equivalent of two work days each week.

Not to mention that my normal work week is in the 45 to 50 hour range.

Not to mention shopping and cooking and various chores like that.

So I figure I've finally got to bring some planning and efficiency into my life or I'm going to crash and burn.

And, much to my amazement, things do seem to be moving along... it is rather hectic, but I am surviving and I am getting things done.

Last weekend, in addition to the usual grocery shopping and laundry and gathering at Nancy's Mom's house for Nancy's birthday (with some of her sisters and their husbands and offspring) and watching the SuperBowl on Sunday (okay, the second quarter and the halftime show and the last five minutes or so of the last quarter -- you're right, I really don't care all that much) I also cleaned up Jeremy's room (he's now sharing a house with a couple of his buddies so I went through the debris left behind and piled up good stuff along one wall and threw out junk and vacuumed the carpet, etc., so the door can be left open without causing shudders of revulsion)... oh, yeah, and I studied and did some homework, too... and I rode twelve miles in the basement on the exercise bike on Sunday and used the weight bench for leg lifts and rows and worked out with hand weights...

And I've worked out every day since then except for Tuesday (but the hike from the further reaches of the campus parking lot plus charging up the stairs to the sixth floor keeping pace with my speedy 22 yr old daughter has got to count for something) -- Monday did 18 miles on the exercise bike and nine miles on Wednesday and 15 miles yesterday and today I got out in the fresh air (34° with 20 mph winds, gusts to 40 mph but it was sunny) and got in a three and a half mile run around the neighborhood (oh, okay, it was more of a jog than a run). I've not been goofing off on my workouts, but this has been the best week yet (i.e., the only week where I only took one day off).

And so here I am this evening, typing this entry (and sipping a glass of Australian Chardonay) while Nancy is keeping me company here in the den (she's grading papers) -- and now it's 9:30 pm and Jill has just come home from work and she and Nancy have plans on baking a couple of apple pies and I have some studying to do, so I think I'll post this entry and go read some of my instructional design text. Oooooh, and Jill brought home a bag of Twizzlers Red Licorice! Yum! (Yes, I have weakness for certain junk food candy... and Twizzlers is one of them.) Now I can study while on a sugar high.



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