Write, edit, tea, walk, rabbits, life – not in any order.
A random wish on my sabbatical list – and one of the toughest for me as a night owl – was to get up at dawn for a week to see what it would feel like and discover if/how it would change my day/life. With sunrise at 4.45am in June and dawn at 3.55am, this … Continue reading "Challenge: Get up early for a week"
This may be a more relaxed post than usual because… Saturday night rioja and dreamy Max Berlin on the stereo. I feel good. The screen break is currently going very well indeed. Here’s what happened in February: Practical – admin is on the backburner at last mainly because of setting up a joint account (which the BBC … Continue reading "From surrealism to Roman emperors in the bath"
I am finally relaxing into this screen break, sabbatical, time-out thing. Work decisions have been made (will be picking up freelance work again from April) and I'm not beating myself up about having lie-ins until lunchtime occasionally. Although there are a lot of things listed below, I've generally been living a bit more slowly and less stressfully after realising the main … Continue reading "Sabbatical in full swing of lying in, coffee dates, protests and trip planning"
After last month's anxiety about the myth of free time and not getting much done, I had a rethink and reduced my 'stuff I want to do' list. There may still have been a spreadsheet. I had a lot more chilling out time thanks to Pete rescuing me from evening-working and getting me hooked on Mozart In … Continue reading "'Everything does change, something is happening'"
I've promised myself I'll blog my sabbatical once a month and looking back at November I've surprised myself with how little I've achieved given that I'm only working 1-2 days a week and that Pete is away on a residency. Time really is an illusion. I thought giving up work would give me endless free time, certainly … Continue reading "The myth of free sabbatical time"
Busy day for not very nice reasons but then a lovely visit from my long-time curly chum and sambista, Carinya, who is writing up a storm over on her Guyana blog, the Humming of the Bird. Go read it. We took her on a guided tour of Stirchley's junior hipsterville-ification after an old-school Stirchley balti. To your … Continue reading "Day 12: Humming of the bird"
I've been meaning to do the annual Harkive project and this year I'll finally got around to it, albeit a couple of days late. Here is it: I work from home. I generally wait for a bit of editing work to come in that I can do 'with my eyes shut', which allows me to have my ears open. … Continue reading "Harkive – how I listened to music on 19 July 2016"
My first-ever animated gif is of a series of pretty glitches that appeared in a video with chocolate entrepreneur Jo Fairley, co-founder of Green & Black's. She's generating rainbows… And here is a glitch still of the lady herself in a room snowing colour pixels…
Today a baker called Tom Baker opened an awesome community bakery on Stirchley high street. Here is Tom (and, I believe, Dom).
A little bit of family history was made today. This afternoon Moselele (the ukulele band I play in) performed a gig as part of a sensory weekend for the kids at Acorns Children's Hospice in Selly Oak. There were four or five young people with Profound and Multiple Learning Difficulties listening in, along with carers … Continue reading "From little Acorns…"