Constructive...

Parndon Mill Lock

The plan for today was essentially to "Get stuff done" - too often of late I've felt like I was drifting rather, and that doesn't help with the feelings of anxiety around everything that is going on. Last week I just needed a more gentle week, but enough is enough and now it's time to get back to some rather  "better used" days.

I started off this morning with our usual morning walk - as far as the town centre with MrEH as we needed to drop a letter in to the Civic Centre, then I waved him on his way home to start work while I popped into a couple of shops to pick up some needed odds and ends, then an amble back with a slightly extended loop on the last section rounded off the walk to 5 miles. After yesterday's 12 miler in the afternoon that felt more than enough to start the day off, too!

The rest of the morning was mostly spent completing a job for our volunteer role with the Great British Beer Festival - although the festival itself is obviously from necessity cancelled this year, there is still stuff going on behind the scenes and there was a sizeable task which needed completion before emailing across to our Festival Organiser. All good, and we will now be able to return to lurking in the background for the next few months before getting a head start on things ready for next year's event which we are all very much hoping will actually go ahead! It feels very strange to think of not gearing up now ready to head to Olympia in just a few weeks - we've both done the festival for so long it feels completely alien without it in place. On the other hand, having not had to spend the last couple of months doing stupid levels of work around it isn't being missed quite so much...

Some pottering around watering plants, washing up, tiding the kitchen and putting washing out followed, before the mammoth task of sorting out my email inbox. For a while now I have followed the practise of dealing with emails once a day - deleting stuff not required, replying to those that need it, and filing everything in assorted archive folders should they be needed in the future. Over lockdown though I have got out of the habit of this, meaning that things were in the most almighty mess. Lesson learned - spending best part of 2 hours painstakingly deleting, sorting and filing is not the greatest fun, and I have without question remembered why doing it as you go along is by far the better option!

I have also done a few bits of life admin - some emails sent about various holiday arrangements (fingers still crossed on that one) and also a tentative enquiry about plans around Christmas. We have also established that MrEH's firm will be allowing a roll-over of a proportion of unused holiday time, meaning we might be able to squeeze in an additional trip with friends either later this year or next spring. Meal planning for the week - I had a sketchy idea of what we’d be eating but hadn’t matched meals to days, so that is now done. Possibly my most practical task today was to shift a couple of FB contacts to my “acquaintance” list plus also unfollowed them. These are both people who make my heart sink if I see any form of interaction from them, but “politics” means that unfriending them would be potentially awkward. Acquaintancing means they will not see my content, and unfollowing means I won’t see their content in my feed, either! A win!

All in all, a fairly successful day!

Robyn