Good evening my friends. Welcome to the leavings of a fine weekend, the makings of which you can read about in more detail below. For now though, lets get right down to the goods – before this dull-ache in the back of my head turns into full-on sleepiness and I can no longer resist the calling of the sheets. So… we go…
Written late Friday night, never made it:
Well, lest you were wondering, I pulled it off. I don’t know how I manage sometimes… I swear I’m just lucky by nature – things just tend to go right for me. If you haven’t been reading lately, I’m referring to a formal content review I had this evening some presentation material I’ll be giving at a conference later this month. Anyway, the review went stellar – better than I could’ve hoped. There was no way my material was at the requisite 95% completion, but I prefaced my review with that fact and cited special circumstances (you may call it “an excuse”) as to why that was. In the end, I actually got some accolades for having as much depth as I did under the conditions I’m working with – see, I’m just plain lucky… Oh, and as a sideline, I think this is the longest-running work-related topic I’ve ever written about. For the most part I tend to keep my work-related blogging abstract, talking more about how I work than what I’m working on. So, this running topic of my presentation crunch has effectively charting new territory for me.
And now, I’m writing a sentence here and there in between another midnight-oil evening slaving over PowerPoint and Outlook. Yes yes, work is still all consuming. However, just up ahead in the near future I spy what may possibly be a small respite from the crunch. Not tonight, however, where I’m under the gun to produce two very tangible (and very non-existent, at this point) pieces of output. So, I work till I get tired of it, then write till I get tired of that, and just keep switching. We’ll see how long this lasts, it’s already 10:30pm as it is. OK, enough about work… for real.
Sunday night now, welcome to the present.
What a weekend. Gorgeous weather, productive days. Saturday, Erik called and motivated me to work out in the backyard. We made some awesome progress, clear-cutting the forest of weeds that the winter rains gave birth to, and firing up the saw to cut pavers for the porch. Being able to see the ground through the weeds makes the yard show so much more promise… it just looks yard-like again. Sunday, Sharaun helped me cut and place the final pavers for the porch. Yup, you heard right – the porch is d-o-n-e done. And suddenly, things seem so much more measurable. I’ve probably said it at the end of each distinct phase of work, but I can count the steps to “done” so much better now: adjust the sprinklers to height, remove rocks and debris, fill/grade with topsoil, and bring in sod. Once the sod is in, it’s all “prettying” from then on. Time for plants, flowers, finishing touches, etc. I dunno… I remember saying I’d be done by last Halloween… perhaps I’ll only be a year off my prediction.
Anyway, these two days of not-working were even sweeter for the work-bonanza that was my last week. 8am to 1 or 2am each night really took a toll on me – and come Friday at 4pm I was more than ready for an outdoor happy hour at the local watering hole. My Thursday-night-to-Friday was a blur of presentation-writing and presentation-giving… all of which I miraculously pulled off to my satisfaction. This week shouldn’t be as insane, but I still have to maintain a fairly good clip if I want to be prepared for the major presentation in a week’s time. The ratio I’m shooting for this week is about 40% content development and 60% rehearsal. I want to make darn sure I have my patter down before I get up in front of that roomful of inquisitive folks. Ugh…
On on off note, I was perusing Pat’s page the other day and came across an interesting comment to one of his front-page updates (you can check it out here). A fella whom neither I, nor Pat I presume, has ever met left a comment on his site, mentioning he’d been brought there from some link at my site, which he’d originally landed on while researching Pac Man stuff. Unknown readers: the blogger’s Holy Grail. Seeing stuff like that, and WHOISing unfamiliar IPs to see if you might have a lurking regular with whom you’re unfamiliar… it all somehow validates the time spent writing. So thanks to you, lurkers, you make it worth it. Oh, and you too, known readers. You all rock.
Now, I’m going to bed. No, I don’t care what you do… I said I’m going to bed. Goodnight.
Also written on this day...
- all talk, no action - 2008
- all seasonally-displaced - 2007
- don't blog for no suits - 2006