I took a week off, actually 10 days in a row off. The motivation is complicated. My office is changing the policy on accumulating vacation time, reducing the number of hours I can accumulate, and changing from a carry over cap to an accrual cap. Meaning I not only needed to use up hours to get below the lowered limited before the end of the accounting year, I need to take enough time off to stay below the limit, or I don't earn additional hours until I have used hours to get below the limit. I need to schedule a couple of days off in September and October or I will stop accruing time.
What did I do? I bought another camera. There are still a few things I would like to have. You can never have too many. I have been diving deeper into the menus and settings on the cameras. They really are computers that capture images, and can do amazing things. I am continuing to play with the large format photo printer. I am thinking about covering a wall in my office with 11 by 17 inch photo prints from the 15 months away from the office.
I have finished a year of morning walks in the Dyke Marsh National Wildlife Refuge. I started fourth of July weekend of 2020. It has become a habit, something I feel incomplete if I don't do it. My pre-covid office clothes fit, it has to be the 45 minutes to an hour of walking almost every day that explains why the clothes still fit. I have a ton of photos, and about 20 pages of text written for a personal book about a year of mornings in the marsh. Now that I have completed the year, I may mix it up with walks at Huntley Meadows, and long walks in the District when I am coming and going from the office. The longer I have lived here, the less I see of the city that I love. I can change that.
I have been cooking, I love to cook, and being off gives me time. I just need to find inspiration. I have been sleeping, long nights, and afternoon naps. I have been watching the Tour de France. The live coverage is on early morning here. When I am in the office, if I am lucky I catch parts of the replay later in the day. Being off, has allowed me to watch live. Something to look forward in retirement is three weeks each summer of watching the live coverage of the Tour. Someday, I am going to France to watch the peloton thunder by.
I have finished travel plans for Nevada in October. I am speaking at a conference in Reno, then we are staying at the south end of Lake Tahoe for a few days - just across the state line in California.
We did a little shopping, took a run to the electronics recycling place to get rid of a couple of old printers.
I have been reading, I will likely have finished book number 31 for 2021 by the time this posts on Saturday. I had finally figured out how to fit reading into my daily routine, and bringing back my subway commute adds at least an hour of reading time to each day I go to the office. My plan is to return to the office three days a week starting next week.
Well that is kind of the most of it. What have you been up to?
You could call your office wall filled with photos the COVID Wall and once COVID has gone, if it does. Your COVID Memorial Wall.
ReplyDeleteFor some reason I stopped reading about a month ago. I am not sure why.
Once after returning from overseas with my body clock out of whack I started watching Le Tour when it was broadcast here in the very early morning. I really enjoyed it, but it is too hard now for me to stay up so late.
The Tour start is early morning here, then most days it is replayed.
DeleteOne thing I used to love about my train commutes was the opportunity to pleasure read. I never in my work life had unused vacation days, even during university years when I had 1/6 of the year in paid time off.
ReplyDeleteWhen I left Kentucky, I wrote off, over 800 hours of accumulated paid time off. I could have asked to be paid for two weeks of it, I didn't I felt bad about leaving.
DeleteThe UC system added unused vacation to your retirement years-in accumulation (but there was a limit enacted finally to how much vacation could be carried over from year to year; you were forced to use it).
DeleteI always say walking is the best exercise; easy on the joints, meditative, and your clothes fit!!
ReplyDeleteMy family used to rent cabin for the summers at Lake Tahoe, North Shore, California side. One of the most beautiful places on Earth,
Lake Tahoe, I have been to the north end for a nasty board meeting, hotels were easier to find on the south end.
DeleteBeautiful blog
ReplyDeleteI have friends who just came back from Lake Tahoe and loved everything about their stay. They even did a hot air balloon ride.
ReplyDeleteA hot air balloon ride is on my list of things to do
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