Tuesday, November 11, 2008

Knitting and Work - If Only The Twain Should Meet

It'd be cool to make my living by knitting. I wonder how people do that?

I have started working on the sweater again. I got 10 or 12 rows done on the back last night. Not a lot, compared to how many there are to go, but definite progress. I'm kind of psyched about it again, and want to start working on it more regularly.

But since the time changed, it's dark when I get home from work at 5:00 or 5:30, and by the time dinner's over the night's feeling pretty well shot, there may be a lot more knitting evenings ensuing.

The work situation has roller-coasted through several layers of hell lately. Last Thursday my boss dumped so much additional work on me I thought my brain was going to explode. I had one of those insomniac nights Thursday night, and at 5:00 a.m. Friday morning (still awake) I called off work. I didn't go in Saturday either, and I spent those two days basically in a horrible depression about what I was going to do about that lunatic job.

Finally by Sunday a plan had formulated. I went in Sunday and spent four hours doing nothing but prioritizing and scheduling my work for the week, assigning things days based on their upcoming deadlines. Then I took everything that had deadlines I wasn't going to be able to get to, and dumped it squarely back on my boss' desk with a big note telling him, "This stuff all has imminent deadlines, and I can't get it done in time."

There. Let him deal with it. And that's the ongoing plan. Every couple days I'm going to take some time to sort and prioritize my new work, and anything with imminent deadlines that I can't get to, I'm returning to him. I figure that's the only way he's ever going to understand the concept of "too much work and too little time to do it" - if HE is the one who has to deal with it, rather than just continually throwing it at me and my co-workers and saying, "Well, you figure it out."

Since I've taken a lot of the pressure off myself, it frees up some brain space to start relaxing in the evening again - hence the knitting.

Don't get me wrong - I'm not a slackass who doesn't want to work. I work hard at that job, and take my responsibilities seriously. In fact, that's exactly why I can't let him over-commit me to work I can't do - because I know I can't do it, and I can't just sit back and watch it not get done, and not care - or kill myself with stress trying to do more than is humanly possible.

Balance! That's all I ask - balance. If I have to physically force the balance by shifting things around myself, well, that works for me.

Looking forward to getting through today and coming home and knitting some more!

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