Overwhelmed

I am in ostrich mode.

I'm feeling overwhelmed by my freelance work (especially by one client, who seems to think I have access to limitless time, funds and even government ministers. Hah! I wish) and so I am doing what I usually do when things get too much - procrastinating. I've been blogging, reading blogs, going through my junk emails folder, chatting with colleagues and generally doing everything I can to not do what I need to do.

Clever, hey? Putting aside the big pile of work until I have even less time to deal with it. Tsssk tsssk, Tamara.

My dad reckons I work better under pressure. I think I have no choice - the pressure is usually my own fault. I just don't know where to start, so I don't start.

I must get over this. Let me take a step towards that goal now and go and nail at least the top things on my to-do list. Fun, fun.

Today is one of those 'ugh' days of work, where everything on my 'to do' list makes me want to crawl into bed and hide. Writing local government profiles, chasing marketing people that have made the typical list of empty promises, following up approvals and begging various people for the time of day are just a few things that I have the (dis)pleasure of attending to today.


So, instead I am blogging, lurking at various other blogs, and daydreaming about my weekend away. But this must not continue. I have to be able to tick something off my list. I think maybe I should write down 'update blog' and then at least I can cross that off. Or 'consume daily requirement of caffeine'.


No, I am going to be good and go and do my admin now. Then I will reward myself with a peek into all my regular reads. *sigh* Being good sucks almost as much as Telkom. Almost.


Here's a funny for you:

Sometimes when you're angry, it helps to sit down and think about the problem.

Back from the bush and ready to (not) work

*Sigh* I had a lovely weekend away with hubby and our 'couple friends', Richard and Ania. So hard to find a couple that we both like, and it's lovely to have these guys whom we just adore. Our weekend was filled with good conversations, good wine, good food and a very hot (to the point of scalding) jacuzzi, as well as giraffes walking past our windows and warthogs chasing their chihuahuas, which they had smuggled into the resort. It was bliss.



And now I'm back at work, typing away at a deathly-dull corporate report and trying to phone sources who are all on leave for the week. *double sigh*. Sucks to all of you away on some stunning holiday for the week.



Jealousy makes me nasty.



Anyway... A pic for the day:

Power cuts boost productivity... by preventing procrastination

Yikes! It has been a long while since I last blogged. Why, you may ask (or not. i suppose it depends entirely on whether or not you actually care). Well, if you're in South Africa you probably know the answer... Eskom. And for those of you who are not from this glorious land of sunny days and dark, electricity-less nights, that is not a rude Afrikaans word. Although it should be.

Eskom is our national power supplier, but they're not doing a very good job of supplying electricity to us at the moment. Not that it's their fault - they have been warning our government for years that we needed to invest money in building new capacity. But, as President Mbeki has admitted, the top dogs did not listen, and so now we are stuck with rolling blackouts everyday, usually twice a day, around the country.

All of this rambling about the uselessness of politicians and utilities is merely background to explain my latest excuse for delayed blogging... "load shedding" as Eskom calls it. This annoying and highly disruptive policy of turning off our electricity at random intervals during the day does have its plus side though... It has put an end to my procrastination. See, to make my deadlines I am forced to sit down immediately as I get into the office and do as much as possible while the PC is still on, as well as copying everything onto a USB stick to use on the laptop while the power is down and drawing up very organised 'to do' lists of people I need to call and things I need to do that don't require electricity for those two-hour sessions. When the power is off and I have no internet or email access, I simply go through my lists and feel very good at being able to tick things off.

So while Eskom's little switch-flicking games may halt the work on the Gau-Train project, lose millions of Rands for the mining companies, and generally wreak havoc and mean that nobody can get a good cuppa, at least little old me is doing just fine.

The only down side (and some will debate that this is a negative at all) is that there are long gaps between blogs.