Tag Archives: scheduling

Seeing How To Make My New Schedule Work (or I Have A Better Idea Of My Free Time Now)

Posted on January 13, 2021 | Comments Off on Seeing How To Make My New Schedule Work (or I Have A Better Idea Of My Free Time Now)

Last week was my first week with my normal schedule at my new job. I am glad I was eased into the new job since there was a lot to learn. So many things were similar to my old customer service job but just different enough that I had to be aware of what I was doing so I wasn’t doing what I did at the old job. It was good that I had a lot of time with training and a shorter schedule at first. Having a full week off for the holidays was a bit tough, but I took that time to work on reviewing everything I learned.

I’m not feeling totally confident with the new job, but I’m getting closer each day. I understand different processes and policies and the questions I have for my manager are becoming the more rare and specific things and not the general questions. I feel like this is progress and I’m proud of it. And while it’s not as many hours as I’ve worked before at my old job, it’s been a long time since I’ve worked this many hours so I’m getting used to not having my time be mine as much as it was for most of last year.

I also got an update from my data entry job and what the new contract would be like. The new contract is still being worked on, but I saw what they were thinking and my job is going to be transitioning a bit. I will be getting 4 times the hours I’ve had recently (although the reduced hours were partially at my request to deal with some things with unemployment), so I will be closer to the number of hours I had when I started years ago. But most of my hours will be moving away from the data entry work and going into doing some social media work.

This was something we discussed in our recent meeting about my new contract, so it’s not unexpected. How the hours will be split was slightly more unexpected because I thought it would be more focused on the data entry work. But I’m good with this idea and how it will be for me when I am working with the new contract (for now, I’m doing work as it was listed on the old contract, so I haven’t started the social media work yet).

Between the 2 jobs, it won’t add up to exactly 40 hours a week, but it will be close so I feel like it will still feel like full-time work. And while there could be some overlap with the hours I work, I feel like it won’t be as much as before. At least not at first as I need to pay more attention to my new job than I did for my old customer service job. At my old job, when we didn’t have customers to help, I was just sitting and waiting. With the new job, there are other tasks I need to work on when I am not assisting a customer. There is a bit of free time, but I am pretty busy during my hours each day.

And I know this is normal. Working and having a ton of free time is not normal and was a luxury that I got spoiled with. I planned my days in the past assuming that in a 7-hour shift I would probably have about 4 hours when I could do anything I needed to do as long as I was still at my computer. I would try to be productive during that free time working my data entry job or working on writing blog posts, but occasionally I would just watch videos online while waiting for a customer. Most people do not get to relax while they are working. Often they have to work after they are supposed to be done. I just got spoiled with how things were for me for so long.

But it’s not that bad. This is just something I have to get used to and I know it won’t be a huge struggle once I figure it out. I just have to work on my time management again with the new schedule. I have to plan out things during my before and after work time that before I might have done during work. I will still be able to fit everything in, especially since there is nothing I have outside of work right now. If I have to work on other things for a few hours after work, I’m not missing anything I had planned. I’m not going out to see anyone so all that time is mine. And it will be good to work through this plan while I have nothing else to do. Hopefully, by the time things are reopening, I will have a better idea of how to manage all my time, and my after-work time will be more stable from day to day.

I know how lucky I have been in so many ways. I am lucky with how my old job was with allowing me so much free time. I’m lucky I was able to do both jobs together because of my free time. I’m lucky that I got another job that is remote and pays well. I’m lucky that my other job is able to increase my hours so I should be making enough to be ok soon. And I’m lucky that I have the luxury of time right now and I don’t have to worry about taking care of others and I can be a bit selfish with what I do each day.

Just like with so much I’ve done lately with my schedule, I will figure out how to make it work and I have the time to slowly do that. I will need to get back into time management planning again, which is something I haven’t had to do in a while. But soon enough, I will have it down to a consistent plan and hopefully, it stays that way for a while.

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Finding How To Fit In My Workouts (or Testing Out My New Normal)

Posted on January 11, 2021 | Comments Off on Finding How To Fit In My Workouts (or Testing Out My New Normal)

I’ve had several different workout routines since I started at Orangetheory. I have almost always worked out on the same days of the week (starting with Monday/Wednesday/Friday and then adding on Saturday), but the time of the day has changed for me. I started out working out only in the afternoons. Then I did Monday mornings since I didn’t work on Mondays. When I started going to the Culver City location, I did early morning workouts before work. And that’s what I did until the studios had to close about 10 months ago.

When I started doing my home workouts, I tried to maintain a similar schedule to what I did in the studios. I might not have worked out as early as I used to, but I still preferred mornings. I have gotten used to working out on an empty stomach and have come to prefer that. And since I wasn’t really working, it was easy enough for me to do that.

Once I started at my new job last month, I was doing fewer hours than I knew I would be doing once I was trained. I also wasn’t always doing morning work hours. So if I had afternoon work, working out in the morning was easy. If I had to work in the morning, I was done early enough to work out as soon as I was done without needing to eat before. But this past week, I started my actual work schedule.

Now, if I want to work out after I am done with work, it will be in the afternoon. I will need to eat at least 1 meal (if not 2) before my workout. And I thought maybe I’d have to do that. I tried that with my Monday workout this past week, and it wasn’t good. I really don’t love working out in the afternoon anymore and it just didn’t feel right. So I realized I needed to work on figuring out how to work out before work and have enough time.

Fortunately for me right now, it’s easier than it would be if I was going to a workout at a studio. I don’t have a commute to worry about. I can wake up and be starting a workout within 10 minutes. So I tried waking up at the time I used to wake up for my Wednesday and Friday workouts and going from there. And that worked out. I was able to start my workout early enough that I had time to shower and be dressed before I had to log in for work. I do have to rush a bit to do that, but it’s doable. So this week, my goal is to do that on Monday as well. My Saturday workouts are easier since I don’t work, so I don’t have to worry about those.

But it also changes up how I think about things going forward as far as working out somewhere other than my house. If I went to an outdoor workout, I would have to either go much earlier than I’m used to or go in the afternoon. The outdoor workout location is much further than the studios I normally go to, so the drive time has to be considered. Once the studios are open again, I can’t do the morning times that I’m used to and would have to do an earlier time. And that means I need to get my sleep schedule in a much better place so I can wake up about an hour earlier than I normally do. It’s not the worst thing to do, but it will take some time. But because I am thinking about this much sooner than I need to do it, I can take some time to transition to an earlier wake-up.

I know I don’t need to worry about any of this really right now, but I do want to think about it. I am still hopeful that at some point this year, the studios will be open again and I can go back. And there is a chance the times that the workouts are offered will be different from what I am used to before, so any planning I might do could need to be changed. But I’m still going to keep trying to create the habit of working out in the morning when I have to do it at a specific time. That’s something I have been slacking on a bit and it’s good to get back into scheduling myself that way.

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Getting More Used To My Schedule (or My First Full Week At The New Job)

Posted on December 16, 2020 | Comments Off on Getting More Used To My Schedule (or My First Full Week At The New Job)

Last week, I wrote about my new job and how I now have to work on maintaining a schedule again. And last week was a big whirlwind. Just from the time that I interviewed to the time that I was hired was crazy. And jumping immediately into the job was a bit overwhelming.

I told the people training me that’s how I was feeling and fortunately they understood. It’s a lot to take on and I had some assumptions about the job that were wrong. Most of the work in customer service is very similar to things I’ve been doing before, it’s just the method of the work that is different. For example, I’m used to helping customers on a chat system that runs through a website. It’s like instant messaging and the type of customer service chat that I think most of us are familiar with. But the new system is actually a text-based system. This does have a lot of benefits to it, but it changes how I will work and I will have to adjust to the idea that I won’t have customers sitting on a website as I help them. The assumption that the chat system was based on a website was completely on me, so it’s not like I was misled. I just didn’t think to ask and it’s been a bit switch in my thought process.

And of course, with any new job, there are new systems to learn and new protocols to follow. I’m very grateful that everything does seem to make sense and they are based on sites I’m familiar with. Even if it’s not the exact website I’ve used before, they have a lot of the same elements that I’m used to. That has made my training a little easier. At this point, I feel like I understand the job much more than before. I’m just working on putting together the pieces and the workflow of how things go. But that’s possibly something that I just have to jump into (with supervision) and start working through. And that will likely be happening this week.

I also got trained at the end of last week on the other part of my new job doing outbound engagement. Again, this is similar to something I have done before but different enough that I have to remember specific things. And it can be a bit scary starting something new that doesn’t have as much of a chance for starting with supervision, but I also feel confident that I can handle it. I know that I will likely be getting feedback and need to make some adjustments to the work I’m doing, but I’m expecting it so hopefully it will be easier when it happens. I just want the clients to be happy with my work and to have my work seem similar to what others do so they don’t realize I’m the new one doing this.

Because I’m still training for the customer service part of my job, my schedule is still not completely stable. Each day I work different hours as I learn different parts of the job. But this is just for training and soon I will be doing very steady hours for this work. It will likely be about 3 hours every morning, which might increase eventually but I accepted the job knowing it was probably only 3 hours a day. But I do also have 90 minutes of work for the outbound engagement side to do every day and I still have my data entry job that I do a few hours a week. I will eventually figure out how I want to schedule all my time, but for now, I’m just taking it day by day. I’m hoping once my schedule is regular, I can split up my outbound engagement to be partially before my customer service shift and partially after (doing 90 minutes in one sitting is actually harder than I expected). And I will try to fit in my data entry where I can. And if I find out that I can return to my other customer service job, I will figure it out at that point. But for now, I don’t expect to be asked if I want to come back for at least a few more months.

Right now, I am not making what I was making before, but it’s much closer than what it’s been for most of this year. And making any money is good these days. I will be losing my unemployment because of my work, but I’m ok with that. When we had the supplemental unemployment, things were different and I was doing ok. But since that ended, I was making only a fraction of what I was before. And if you make more than what you would get in unemployment, you don’t get it anymore. But I’ve been working with less money for most of this year, so I will be fine without it.

I know that the world is still far from normal, but things are finally starting to feel a bit more normal for me. I know that it’s not completely there and I cannot live this way the rest of my life, but having a regular schedule is something that I know I’ve needed. As much as I’ve tried to do this on my own, it’s nice to have something to actually work on every day. And any issues I’m having with figuring out how to schedule things are not that bad. It’s more about just getting adjusted to the new schedule and I know I will be ok before I know it. And because this is how things always work, as soon as I’m used to the new schedule I bet things will change again (hopefully, a change because I get my other job back). And then I’ll be back to figuring out my schedule again and I’ll have to just do it.

But for now, I’m just getting through my training and being really excited about my new job. I know I jumped right into working and it was a little much at first, but also I think I started at a good time because soon I will have shortened weeks because of the holidays. So hopefully that little break will be time for me to relax and be prepared to fully jump back in and make 2021 a much better year for me.

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Getting Myself Back On Schedule (or At Least This Is A Slow Transition)

Posted on December 10, 2020 | Comments Off on Getting Myself Back On Schedule (or At Least This Is A Slow Transition)

For most of this year, I haven’t had too much of a schedule. Once I had my work hours reduced, most of my days were free. When I lost my old customer service job, I did continue to log into our chat systems a few mornings a week to check in with my manager and to see if she needed me to help with anything. I wasn’t being paid to do that, but I also wasn’t really working. I mainly did it so I had something that I needed to do each morning. I didn’t want to get into a bad habit of sleeping in and not doing much each day. So those mornings helped to keep me on track.

Even when I’ve mostly been out of work, I rarely sleep in. There are 2 days a week that I can, but I don’t sleep in that often. Sometimes I’ll sleep in one of those days, but I have been pretty good about making sure I keep my sleep schedule somewhat consistent. The issue has been that I haven’t been going to sleep at the same time that I used to, so that was making me tired. I’ve been working on getting my sleep more on schedule, and I’m slowly getting there.

And now, I actually have a schedule to work with again. It’s not too crazy because  I’m only working a few hours each day, but it’s still something. And my schedule right now isn’t the same every day. It may get that way when I’m done with training and fully working. But right now, my schedule shifts each day to be a different time so I can be trained with different things.

Even with my old work schedule being slightly different each day, having a schedule that isn’t consistent from day to day is still tough to get used to. And because I’ve also been dealing with having almost no schedule for a while, I haven’t been great with time management. I only have had a few things I need to do each day and it didn’t really matter when I did them. So I got pretty lazy with when I was doing stuff. If I didn’t get to something until late at night, that was fine. I could put some things off for a day without it being an issue. I could do the things I wanted to do when I wanted to do them without worrying about a scheduling conflict.

Now, I still have a lot of flexibility, but I also have to be mindful about my schedule and making sure that I don’t start working on something right before I have to focus on something else. It’s not a big deal, but it’s enough of a change for me to really pay attention to what time it is and what I have to do each day. And I’m sure I’ve had this feeling before when I went from being unemployed to having a job, but it’s also a bit different because I’m still not going out to do things and most of the things I’m doing are in my home. So it feels a little less like a schedule than when I would have to go out for things and plan for traffic.

If I got my old job back before I started this new one, I would guess I would struggle almost more. Especially if I was brought back to my full schedule. It’s not easy to go from having almost all the free time in the world to a set schedule. At least with my new job, my schedule is only a few hours so I can still have a lot of the flexibility that I’m used to. I’m easing into the idea of having a schedule again. And I think I’m going to build upon it even more than I need to. While I don’t need to blog at the same time every day, I’d like to have that as a part of my schedule. I’ve also been doing my workouts at different times based on when I get up and going and I know that having a set schedule would be better for me. Especially if I think I might start trying the outdoor workouts. And I want to make my time to watch tv or do other lazy things set times instead of accidentally wasting away most of a day because I’m not focused on making sure I do other things.

I know that it might be a while before I need to have a more set schedule like what I’m thinking of doing, but I have the luxury right now to take my time to get back to that. I don’t have to worry about being on a schedule immediately. I can play around with things and see how it goes. Right now, it’s not a lot that has to be done at a specific time, but there are things that need to be that way. And I need to make other parts of my life work around it. But I see this as a positive thing. I’ve been a bit aimless lately and this will hopefully get me to feel a bit more grounded. Maybe this will help me get other things on track in my life. I don’t know if it will and I’m not expecting it. But it would be something nice if it did happen.

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The Week That Didn’t Happen (or Last Week Was A Mini 2020)

Posted on November 17, 2020 | Comments Off on The Week That Didn’t Happen (or Last Week Was A Mini 2020)

I have joked for a few months now that 2020 is the year that didn’t happen. It seems like this year doesn’t exist. Nothing is progressing forward (or it’s progressing a fraction of what it should be). It seems like I’m just moving along this year but not doing anything. So it really does feel like until the pandemic is over and it is safe to get back to life, everything is on hold and time isn’t really happening. I know it sounds weird, but that’s the best way to explain how this stagnation feels to me.

Well if 2020 is the year that didn’t happen, last week was the week that didn’t happen. I know that it’s ok that’s how my week went because I was dealing with vertigo and had to take care of myself. But it’s still weird to think back to last week and not really know what I did with all my time.

I have some things that I know that I did. I know when I was trying to work. I know when I was doing a virtual movie hangout with friends. I know when I tried to do some cooking. But for a lot of the week, I was in a bit of a cloud. I tried to read sometimes but gave up when it was too difficult to focus on the words. I know I took a lot of naps. Some of those naps lasted hours and I slept away the majority of the day. I tried to watch tv from time to time, but it wasn’t easy to keep my eyes on the screen when things were spinning or swaying.

Maybe I slept away more of the week than I remember. That’s the easy explanation for why I don’t remember how I passed the time. But I know that I probably also just zoned out from time to time and that’s what occupied my time. It’s weird to feel so confused about what I did, but there’s nothing to show me what I did since I spent all my time alone in my house. I guess it’s a good thing that I was safe and had everything that I needed in my house.

The vertigo is still affecting me, but it’s much less than what it was like last week. I am able to read and watch tv and it doesn’t bother me to focus on stuff. I’m doing a bit more work and trying to do more things sitting up rather than laying down. While the vertigo was at its worst, sitting up was very difficult. It’s still not normal, but I can do it more and more. And I want to get back to things that I know I didn’t do last week that I was planning on doing.

I’m still trying to apply for jobs because I do need to find work. I want to believe that my job will be back soon, but I really don’t know when it will be an option for me. I also technically don’t know if I’ll be guaranteed my job back when locations reopen, but I feel pretty comfortable that it will be offered to me. I’m only looking at jobs that are remote, but that’s more and more common now so that helps a bit. But there still aren’t that many jobs out there while things are still shutdown.

And I didn’t do any work on my book last week. I was doing really great the first week of the month, but then nothing happened the second week. I’m trying to get back into the groove of writing, but it’s hard when I fell out of that habit already. I’m not trying to make up for the time that I wasn’t working on it, but that’s ok because finishing the book wasn’t necessarily my goal this time. I would love to finish it, but there are other things that I can do that would be big accomplishments with the book other than writing the entire thing.

I’m hoping that the vertigo won’t affect my week too much this week. I’m trying to push myself a little bit more every day, but I’m also aware that if I do too much I could have a huge setback. It’s a balancing act and I’m constantly testing myself and seeing what I can do. There are a few things that I’m not even considering, like trying to drive my car or doing some jump rope work during my workouts. But for most things in my house, I’m trying to do more and more of what my normal routine is these days.

I know it’s ok to have a lost week, especially during a lost year. But I don’t want to be in the habit of not accomplishing things week to week because I know that I could do that and it won’t be doing anything good for me. I need to continue to try to be productive and find a purpose while I’m not living my full and normal life.

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Having A Pretty Boring Routine (or This Keeps Repeating)

Posted on October 15, 2020 | Comments Off on Having A Pretty Boring Routine (or This Keeps Repeating)

When the pandemic started, I wrote about how I wasn’t sure how I’d be able to keep up this blog. Honestly, at that time I really was hopeful that the safer at home orders would only last a month or two. I knew it would be longer than we were originally told, but I had no clue that it would last for 7 months with no end in sight just yet. I was worried about how I would manage still writing for those few months I would be stuck at home and thought I might have to change up my blog schedule.

I’m still shocked that I’ve managed to keep things going the way they always have for this long. I don’t have a lot going on every day. I occasionally will have something fun I get to do or I make an effort to go out and escape my house, but for the most part, I have very little to do.

Even though I’m technically not working my customer service job right now, I do log in 3 mornings a week to help out my manager (who is working now) in case she needs it. She did the same for me when I was the only one working, so I wanted to return the favor. And it’s really not a big deal. I rarely have to help her do anything. It’s only if there are a lot of customers she’s trying to help and there is something in our ticketing system she can’t find. Usually, I am logged in but watching random things online or doing other things in my house. Sometimes I’m logged in for only an hour and sometimes I’m working on something else so I stay logged in a few hours. It’s something that helps me keep a schedule and makes me get up on time.

Other days I have a workout in the morning. I’m getting more into making sure my workouts are not boring or too repetitive, but there is only so much I can do at my house. There are more and more options for outdoor workouts and I am exploring those options to see if any of them seem right to me. It would be nice to expand things, but I also don’t want to take risks that could get me sick. I hate that I’m turning into a bit of a germaphobe right now and I’m trying to make sure that I don’t take this to an extreme. But I also know that I have to be cautious and smart and that if anything happens to me that I would have a hard time forgiving myself.

And I have my Netflix Party groups on Wednesdays and Saturdays for a few hours. Technically, it’s now called Teleparty because you can use more services than Netflix now, but I think we are all still calling it Netflix Party. I can’t express how grateful I am for that group because they really are helping to keep me sane and are the best sounding board for so many things.

But those few things only take up a few hours each week. I have so much time that is just filled with nothing. I’ve said it before, but I’m getting very bored. I’m not bored to the point that I want to just forget there is a pandemic and am willing to take risks. I know some people are just over the situation and I understand how they feel. But I am bored and still staying inside.

I’m trying to find things to do so I at least am not just sitting and looking at my walls. I have watched more things online and read more books than I ever have before. But even watching tv and movies and reading books is not as entertaining as they have been before. I’m trying to find more things I can add to my daily or weekly routine that takes up time. Maybe I should look into online classes or something? But besides being bored, I’m also dealing with a bit of a lack of motivation. There are so many things I could do, I just don’t want to. I mean, I could cook super fancy meals every day if I wanted to. But I don’t.

So like I’ve said many times over the past 7 months, I’m bored of being bored. I know I’m not alone in this feeling, but it’s hard to deal with it. And it’s hard to think I’m not alone when I see so many people going out and not worrying about things. But I’m trying to stay strong and focus on doing what I can to keep myself busy and entertained. And hopefully, something will click with me that I could add to my routine and will make things more interesting for me.

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Being Ok With Being Bored (or This Is Harder Than I Thought)

Posted on September 9, 2020 | Comments Off on Being Ok With Being Bored (or This Is Harder Than I Thought)

I remember years ago hearing someone say something like “only uninteresting people get bored”. At the time, that made so much sense to me. If you were bored, it was because you couldn’t think of something to do. And even if I had brief moments of boredom, I always knew that it was because I was choosing to not do something interesting. My boredom was always a choice and I knew that I could make a change to fix that. I wasn’t always motivated to make that change, so I accepted being bored and that maybe I was having a moment of not being an interesting person.

I really believed that idea for so long, until this year. Now, boredom is a pretty regular part of my life. I rarely have a day where I am not bored. I am not always bored all day, but sometimes that happens. There are only so many things I can watch or read. I have tried to find new games to play online on my computer or phone, but I’m getting sick of some of those already. Being bored with reading was something I never thought could happen to me. Reading is something that brings me the most joy in my life. I love getting lost in a good book. And there have been some books lately that have made me feel that way. But when I’m going through 4-5 books in a week, they start to blend together and don’t spark my imagination the way they used to.

And I know I’m not alone in this one, but I’m even getting bored with watching things on various streaming services. Again, there are occasional things that get me excited to watch them and I have a great time watching a movie or going through a series. But there are so many things I’ve watched lately and not everything is that interesting. I am trying to find a tv series that I might have missed before that I could binge-watch now. And I have found a few. But because I have nothing happening all day long, it doesn’t take a lot of time to get through a series, even if there are 3 or 4 seasons.

Even when I have been bored in the past, I have always been surprised by how hard it is mentally when you are bored. And this level of boredom is a new level and it’s really a struggle at times. I have tried so hard to find things to keep me busy and life interesting, but there is a limit to what I can do. I don’t know if anyone before would have said that it is so hard to be bored all day because it seems silly to complain about that. Even now, I feel weird complaining about how bored I am. I know that so many people have it harder than I do. There are people working themselves crazy with their jobs and being stressed that they might be putting their lives at risk. I bet most of my friends with kids would love to be bored for a day because their kids are driving them nuts. But just like with other things I’ve learned since the pandemic started, just because other people have different struggles doesn’t mean that mine aren’t important too.

I’m hoping that soon I’ll figure out something else to make life a bit more interesting for me so I don’t feel as bored as often. But if that doesn’t happen, I know I can survive through boredom and I’ll be ok. I just have to make it through this time and eventually, things will be better.

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Being Grateful To Have A Bit Of A Schedule (or Trying To Not Waste My Days)

Posted on June 23, 2020 | Comments Off on Being Grateful To Have A Bit Of A Schedule (or Trying To Not Waste My Days)

With everything pretty much being shut down for the past several months, my daily routine and schedule have taken a serious hit. While I didn’t necessarily love my schedule before, it kept me busy but allowed for a decent amount of free time. I had an idea of what to expect day to day and it allowed me to plan. And in some ways, I have been lucky compared to some of my friends. Many people went from having fully scheduled days to having nothing happening at all. I had a bit of a step down from my schedule, but it was still a shock to me.

The one thing that I have going for me right now is that 6 out of the 7 days of the week I do have something to do. It’s usually not much, but it’s better than nothing. 3 days a week I work for an hour. 4 days a week I have a workout at home. Only one of those days has both things. So I usually have either work or a workout and I do both of those in the morning. It helps to have it in the morning because it prevents me from sleeping in. I’m still struggling a bit with my sleep schedule, but I am getting better and at least my wakeup time hasn’t been affected much.

I am grateful to have that one hour a day that is scheduled. It does create a bit of a sense of routine and normalcy in my life when so much is not normal. I wish I had more of a schedule and routine, but I just haven’t been able to figure out what to add. I know that my moods aren’t necessarily stable right now so I don’t want to force myself to do something if I’m not feeling up for it. But it does mean that there are a lot of days that I haven’t really done much.

I have learned not to judge my productivity based on what I used to do, but it’s not easy to always remember that. I also try to remind myself that sometimes it is ok if I waste a day or two. If I need a lazy day before getting back to doing more, that’s ok. Being gentle with myself is a constant struggle and being in the middle of a global pandemic hasn’t made that easier on me.

I guess I’m also in a bit of a writer’s block moment too because I don’t know what else to write. I’d love to hear if any of you have had the same struggle with trying to create a schedule and what has or hasn’t worked. I have no clue when things will change for me (or for anyone), so I need to figure out how to maximize this time as much as possible.

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Trying To Plan Ahead (or Hopefully Things Will Normalize Soon)

Posted on June 10, 2020 | Comments Off on Trying To Plan Ahead (or Hopefully Things Will Normalize Soon)

Everything that I had planned for this spring got canceled pretty quickly once the pandemic started. I think I’m still in a bit of shock about how much I had to cancel and how fast it all happened. I was deleting stuff from my calendar when it started, but I just gave up because it was almost more overwhelming when I was constantly deleting stuff.

We are now about 3 months into this. That’s a quarter of the year where I rarely left my house. It feels like it has taken forever and flown by at the same time. And now as things are reopening, I’m trying to make some plans for things in the future but still be cautious and safe.

I’m not making plans for things in the next month or so. Maybe I’ll do something for the 4th of July, but I really don’t know. But that date feels like a line to me. I don’t want to make plans for things before the 4th. I know that it’s just a random date and it doesn’t necessarily mean that anything will be different or better by then. But it’s just something I have in my head now. Probably because there was a statement by the mayor saying that he felt that LA could be reopened by that date.

I really don’t have anything in my mind for this summer. I was supposed to go to Tahoe to spend time with my parents, but now I don’t know. Flying doesn’t seem like the safest thing to do right now, so I don’t want to fly. And it’s over 10 hours to drive there so I wouldn’t be driving. If things feel safer, maybe I’ll be able to go toward the end of the summer, but it’s very up in the air. And I haven’t even started to think about my birthday. I can’t imagine really celebrating my birthday now. If things are different in 2 months, maybe I’ll do something. But I just feel weird trying to plan something when I have no idea if we will be able to do anything in public.

In the fall, the only thing I was planning for was Thanksgiving. As far as I know, we are planning on being together as a family this year. But that also will require flying so I know it will need to be safe to be on a plane then. And with all the talk about a second wave, I worry that it won’t be ok. I know that I will be with some family no matter what, but I really hope that we will all be able to be together by November.

The only real plans for the future that I have made aren’t until the new year. I was supposed to see “Hamilton” last month with my parents. When that was canceled, we got a refund on our tickets. But we just found out that we had early access to buying tickets to some of the new dates that they added to the run. I believe the show was supposed to leave LA at the end of this year, but now they have dates through February (maybe past that, but I don’t remember seeing them). So I checked with my parents and we decided that we should get tickets and if they can’t do the show we would be refunded again. We ended up picking my dad’s birthday in January as the date we would go, and I’m hoping that we will be able to attend and that it will be safe.

And the only other plans I have are also related to musicals. I did renew my season tickets for the Pantages for the next season. But that season doesn’t start until the late spring next year. Some of the shows in that season have been canceled because they aren’t going on tour anymore, but there still is a season. And I’m excited about the shows that are scheduled. I just hope that no other shows are canceled. And at some point either later this year or at the beginning of next year, I should have the last few shows from this current season. There have been some shows that were canceled, but I believe we have 3 more that are being rescheduled. I guess those aren’t necessarily plans yet since I don’t know what the dates will be, but I’m counting them as future plans.

I know that soon I’ll feel more comfortable with making plans to do things again. Once I feel like things are safer, I need to have some things out with my friends. I’m done with being home alone and lonely. I need some social interaction. But I also don’t want to make plans that feel like they might need to be canceled because that is tough to deal with sometimes. It’s a weird mix of needed to have something to look forward to and not wanting to have to cancel things and be upset.

One day, I’m sure I’ll look back at this time and maybe laugh about how worried I was to make plans. For now, the uncertainty is really making it tough for me to make plans. But the few things that I have planned for are making me so happy and ready to be back to a more normal life.

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Trying To Not Be Sad About Missing Things (or This Was Going To Be An Awesome Weekend)

Posted on May 15, 2020 | Comments Off on Trying To Not Be Sad About Missing Things (or This Was Going To Be An Awesome Weekend)

So many people are upset that major events in their lives are being canceled or postponed right now. I’ve had friends who have had to postpone their weddings and baby showers. I know that those in school have had their graduations and proms canceled (or only happen virtually). There are very few people who haven’t had to miss a major event that they were looking forward to.

I consider myself lucky that I have only had smaller things that have been canceled. For example, I have no clue what will happen with the rest of the season of musicals. I do know that some shows have been canceled, but others are just postponed. But postponed until when? I have been sad about missing the shows, but I know that I will appreciate them even more when they are able to come back. The next season is also still a bit of an unknown. Some of the shows that were supposed to be in it have said they might cancel their tours. But they could reschedule them at another time. So maybe they will tour in LA.

This weekend was supposed to be an amazing show weekend for me. Earlier this week, I should have seen the musical “Mean Girls”, which was a part of the season. But tomorrow, I was supposed to be seeing “Hamilton” again. My parents were going to come to LA for a fun weekend. We were going to see the show (and I was planning on taking them to Wood & Vine to dinner). We didn’t have a lot of the other things planned for the weekend, but I had talked to my mom about maybe going to Disneyland together. I’m sure we would have done some projects around my house. It would have been a great weekend. And now, obviously, there is no way for that to happen.

I don’t know when I’ll see my parents again, but I do talk to them most days on the phone. So at least this trip wasn’t my only chance to connect with them. And I know when things are safer that they will plan another visit to LA. I have no clue about what will happen with “Hamilton”. I want to hope that they will reschedule their residence in LA and there will be a chance for us to go see it together. But it did improve my mood a bit when Disney+ announced that the “Hamilton” movie was going to be released a year earlier and on Disney+ (it was supposed to be released in theaters). We are going to do a family movie night where we watch it at the same time and maybe do a video chat after. We’ve got some time to plan that out. But at least it is allowing us to have a bit of what we had been excited about still happen.

I know that there will be more things that I will be missing out on that I was looking forward to. Everyone has to deal with that now. Just the other day, the Hollywood Bowl announced that they have had to cancel their entire season. I hadn’t looked to see if they had announced their season, but I figured there would be a few shows I would want to go to. The Bowl is a tradition for me during the summer and I know so many people in LA are sad about this tradition having to be canceled for a season. But even if they didn’t cancel, I don’t know if I would feel comfortable going to a show. Maybe there will be better circumstances by the summer, but right now it’s still too scary to think about what might happen if you catch COVID-19 for me to feel ok being in a huge crowd.

Things are starting to very slowly open up again in LA. Retail stores can do curbside pickup. The beaches are opening for activities (but not for hanging out at the beach). And hopefully, with people wearing masks when they are out, we will not see a surge in cases. And if there is no surge, then more things can open up. It’s going to take a long time to get back to something even close to normal. But it’s getting there. And slowly we will be able to reschedule all of these things that we had to put off. And I’m looking forward to when that day happens. Even if it’s a year away.

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