What does 24 hours look like in my life? Let’s go midnight to midnight. This is my yesterday.
12:00 – I’m asleep. Yesterday ended and I was actually asleep at midnight.
12:17 – One of the kids comes home and the sound of our alarm disarming and our front door unlocking wakes me. I drift back to sleep quickly, but obviously not soundly.
12:34 – I wake up and peer over at the alarm panel and notice that the house was not re-armed after one of the kids came home. Jen wakes up too, checks her phone to check on the kids and I ask her to arm the house.
12:59 – Another kid comes home. Same routine, I wake to the sound.
3:26 – Another kid comes home. Wash, rinse, repeat. Hey that’s kind of the motto for 2020!
5:30 – My alarm wakes me up. I’m not feeling it. I go back to sleep and await a second alarm.
6:00 – 2nd alarm (I now sound like a 911 dispatcher trying to direct fire resources across the city).
6:30 – I’ve been up, showered, fed the dog, drank my coffee, taken the stubborn dog out once and tried a second time, but he refused and already sent to 2 emails (IT and our department chairs).
6:45 – I spent the last 15 minutes playing a baseball game on the computer. Why did I do that? Why did I waste that time? Oh wait… I probably spent more time typing this blog, but I needed the separation in my mind.
7:00 – I’m leaving the house and heading to the office.
7:20 – I arrive at the office, ask the Alexa to play music and it starts with Hotel California. I’m immediately taken back to sitting in the front seat of my dad’s truck going down some deserted road and my mind relaxes, for just a moment. That’s two relaxing moments already this morning.
7:32 – A colleague comes in with a question and work in the office had already started, but now, officially begins.
11:58 – My wife pops into my office (I so love her) and brings me lunch because she knew I would be swamped and wouldn’t have time to leave to get something today. With the ever changing landscape at the university, it’s hard to predict minute to minute what is going to change/happen.
5:48p – I am finally leaving my office. Where has the day gone? I sent 103 emails, participated in 3 hours of meetings, rewrote a blog intro for Blackboard for a piece I wrote 4 years ago that they want to repurpose because they said it is getting 600+ views a week right now (engaging students), wrote several data reports for Academic Affairs for our ever changing fall semester, met with the dean, two of the department chairs, put together an office chair for our secretary, took out the trash for our business manager.
5:51 – I am headed home to eat and work on a data report that will consume my evening. Lots of rain so I doubt I will be able to listen to the #Cubs game while doing so.
6:15 – Got home and started to work.
7:10 – I stopped for dinner and realized there is no Cubs game. Rain.
7:33 – I start back to work on the data report while talking to Alex and watching the Nats/Blue Jays game because we can’t watch the Cubs whip the Reds (rained out). So glad that baseball is back in some fashion. I don’t even like the Nats, or the Blue Jays, but it’s baseball and it makes it feel almost like a normal summer.
7:58 – I promised Academic Affairs that I would have the last of the data report done by nightfall. I told them the last nightfall in the US is in Hawaii, 5 hours behind us so I know I had plenty of time this evening to get it done. However, the report is done before nightfall, in the Eastern Time Zone, waiting on one clarification.
8:38 – I just finished paying bills. I think I will stop for the day and relax for the rest of the evening and watch some TV with my wife.
8:55 – That didn’t last long. My wife went to make her evening coffee and I followed her to the kitchen and opened the box on the new 1000 piece puzzle to get started. #GoCubsGo #WrigleyField
9:45 – OK, I really just need to stop for the day.
11:23 – I’m taking this dog out and headed to bed.
11:39 – Oh wait, one last email from IT that I need to send to the faculty with an explanation. Sent. Now bed.