March 20, 2024 Day 2/93 - Talk Tuesday
After I got home from work today, I had the opportunity to go on a long walk around the neighborhood and to the lake with Kylo. If you didn't know anything about this dog, you would think that she has never been on a walk in her life; jumping on me to get her leash, whining at the door, peeing on every third bush she passes.
The other day, on the last day of winter, Mandy and I took her out to the beach and watched the sunset together. Since it was the last night before sober spring, we decided to ring out the season with a few drinks and some friends.
But before we got their, the dog howled and screamed and couldn't wait to get out of the car. She acts like this every time.
And today was no different. On our walk, it took a good half mile before she finally calmed down enough to walk next to me, without pulling.
Eventually, we got down to the entrance of the paved trail around Empire Lakes where I noticed the temperature drop a few degrees right as we stepped off the street and into the woods.
More sniffing. More peeing on bushes. Seriously, how does she pee so much?
On our walk, I realized, only one day into sober spring, that I'm already finding more time to do things I like.
As we passed by the lake, I took note of how high the water was. We've been getting some gnarly rains over the past couple of weeks and the lake is swollen. It would be fun to get the kayaks out on the water before the water level recedes again. Maybe I'll try to do that sometime.
But that takes having time. Right now in my life, I feel this sense of never having enough time to do anything I want to do. I always seem to have the time for others, for work, and so on, but not for myself. So one of the things I want to get better at over the next few months is getting a handle on my time management and finding ways to give myself and my family a little more of myself.
My Time Goals During Sober Spring
So, to get it down on "paper", I want to share just three small things I am going to do over the course of sober spring that I can easily incorporate into my life which will buy me more time through the spring.
Prioritize Tasks - Let's face it, we're busy. The first thing I'm going to do by the end of this weekend is to write down some of the most pressing time stresses that I am feeling at the moment, then I'll assign a priority number to those tasks so that I can feel like I'm getting my important things done. For example, I have home maintenance projects that are ongoing, work reports that I need to finish, my son's guitar lessons that I need to schedule, and not to mention a wedding that I need to plan. These things wont go away, so I need to tackle them in an orderly manner.
Plan Family Time - With work and school and dinner and all the other things a busy dad has to do, I admit that I fall short on planning an adequate amount of no-distraction family time. I'll start simple: I'll plan one dedicated family event per week and I'll write about those as we do them. Time to blow the dust off the old bowling ball.
Streamline Household Tasks - I think this will be my single biggest time buy-back program that I can implement right now. Meal prep? Chore charts? Time blocking? These are all ways I can reclaim my week nights and I need to start prioritizing doing these things.
But It's past Midnight and I'm Still Awake
Well, okay, it takes time to implement change, and yes, right now, I'm pretty behind on everything. I'll report back soon on what actions I am taking, but for now, I HAVE to go to bed as I'm just as tired as the dog is. Unfortunately, I have to get up for work tomorrow and she doesn't. Spoiled.
Drop me message and tell me how you are planning on reclaiming some of your time. Also, I think I'm going to start posting some videos soon so watch out for those.
Night!
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