I had a day off today, or more like a 'day off'.
I don't often have days off - my standard schedule is as now as follows:
- Mon/ Tuesday - Land clearance - it sounds about as bleak as it is - clearing out brash
- Wednesday - post office/ water run/ food shop/ tidy - somehow a trip to Fundao up and down the mountain seems to take at least three - four hours, then marking/ blog day.
- Thursday/ Friday - Land development - at least supposedly I'd put down to build stuff/ plant stuff, although recently this has turned into burning brash, which is soul destroying
- Saturday/ Sunday - chores/ marking/ Revise blog/ Hive catch up.
For the most part it works out pretty well, as the physical chores (Mon/ Tuesday, Thursday/ Friday) balance out the intellectual (Weds/ Saturday/ Sunday), so I don't really need days off, as I've kind of got my weekly schedule worked out so I'm doing what I want anyway, just giving my body and a brain a break on alternate days or pairs of days.
However I think it must have been the brash burning on the land recently that just prompted me to wake up this morning and think 'Fuck it'! I just couldn't be arsed to go to the land and do anything, or really do anything, rather I just spent the day catching up on various stuff, but even that entailed quite an active day....
I've basically just spent it catching up (without rushing) on a few chores that needed to be done!
Spring cleaning
Is there a better use of a 'day off' other than to do some spring cleaning ? (I think the answer is 'NO'). The flies have just started here, and I'm told they get bad, so this was vital - I gave the cabin a good tidy and hoover to make sure any scraps were out and not attracting the moscas.
I also just generally moved and sorted stuff out in the cabin - I'd put some more shelving up last Saturday and wanted to put this to optimal use. I've finally got enough space now organise everything nicely, it only took me six months of being here to get it this way!
I also gave the car a quick once over.
Sorting out my new desktop
This has been on my to do list for months - I've got all my back ups on an encrypted USB that doesn't work with my Mac, only a desktop, and so I needed a new (well, refurbished!) one - I had ordered one back in December, but it never arrived, then I put off ordering another one, finally got around to it last month, but I've had it sitting in my cabin for about three weeks, in its box - I HAD to get this up and running today if for no other reason than it wasn't working and maybe needed to be returned!
Sorting out my water tank
I've got this blue tank that supplies my washing up water (also a handy shower in the summer) but the flow has clogged up recently, meaning it takes about 2 minutes to fill up one small washing up bowl, which is kind of irritating, so I got up on the roof of the shed where its stored and jiggled it about and got the flow back to 'reasonable' again.
Marking
Friday isn't a marking day, but I'd gotten a bit behind so I thought I'd crack on with a few of these - I got through three in total, I usually do two a day, so thumbs up for this!
I even made a start on doing my invoice for the last four months, got a bit behind, so that's a little more wad to look forward to!
Trip to the vets/ shopping
One of the dogs had a problem with her paw and a 'grass seed' issue so I had to drive her to the vets for 16.00 - up a mountain, down a mountain and then back again. Took two hours!
This was something of an unplanned trip, so I used the opportunity to look for a few odds and ends in the local agricultural shops.
Final thoughts - going backwards to go forwards!
I think I've made the right move trading in a day on the land for a day just sorting my shit out.
I've got no real deadline for building or planting on the land and I honestly can't see the point in rushing ahead with this is I'm all over the place in life in general, and after my 'day off' I feel much more together!