So, I'm now working from home, taken home from the office by taxi with 2 computers. Desk rearranged to fit them on so next I guess I'll have to find my bed as that's where a lot of things got moved to. Glad work was paying the meter totted up £174!
Anyway, how on earth are we going to stay sane? I've got the bike and smart trainer, but that and Gold aren't going to be enough...
Well, I'm glad work is keeping me very busy(I work in IT Zso our days have been LONG). There are quite a few ways to stay sane. I am keeping a rhytm to my day wich work can't interrupt. I start off with my daily shower and breakfast. Fresh pressed orange juice to go with it. At around 11, I snack a piece of fruit at the beach(15 min walk from my home), and when I get back, I'll work until 1300. Then it is lunchtime(also outside, on my balcony) before getting ready for the last stretch. During work hours, I call a lot with colleagues. After work, I have daily call with my sis to tell each other about our day.
So fresh products, outside air and social interaction through the phone and things will be fine
Welcome to the past 10 years of my life. Aside from stores being closed, no booze, and empty supermarkets, this isn't that different from the rest of my life. Except I have an income now.
Seriously though, Stay at home all the time - check No friends - check Family badgering me for random shit all the time - also check.
I hope the work thing ends up staying like this for awhile. I like saving a fortune in gas.
With great difficulty. Even though I'm naturally an introvert, I am really going to miss the social interaction. We are having daily meetings and teams chats, but it's not the same.
I rechecked the advice and we're still allowed to go out as long as we don't go near anyone, well, with my body clock in time zone shuffle mode, I was out for a nice stroll at 2 this morning... It was fun to complete my days working hours by half 7 too! Had a ride on zwift and I commissioned a fun, cheeky but also useful workout video from Araneae so now have some arm exercises to do in the flat - I think she'll put it on her onlyfans - https://onlyfans.com/xaraneaex
Well it seems it's about 7 days before you start to go wrong, yesterday just after my tea (which was about 2pm as i'm now working to some timezone i haven't calculated yet) I got very low... I seem to be on the way back to normal now (If I ever was normal...) Still at least I'm well up on my weekly step target - I'm at 151% of it! Nearly at the monthly target too, which isn't bad as it was a slow start and I had some low scoring days for varying reasons, at least being up in the middle of the night has some advantages, although I think Dracula has been out more in daylight than me!
Work has been rather busy, lots of getting something done, only for the plan to change and need it re done again. Still I've clocked up some days to take back when (if) we're allowed to actually do anything and go anywhere!
Still not much different. I've found it's more depressing to go out than stay home. There are like a hundred new obnoxious signs at my local Wawa (gas station/cold and hot food deli), along with lines put down to indicate how far back you need to stand. All of the electronic road ways signs only say "Stay Home, practice 'social distancing" a really fucking stupid catch phrase term that I've come to hate.
Gas prices have dropped a ton, food prices have started to spike. People are still binge buying stuff as soon as it comes in. Waiting for all the people at the super market to get sick, especially with people like this around.
To keep myself busy; I do painting. For money I sell them. A sold item is left by the post box. If I have to go down the road to shop I wear a home made HAZMAT suit. It loos like something that belongs at a fetish event rather than popping to the shops for milk and bread but it works.
I started a completely new run on Fallout 4 and I'm going to give Battlefield V another crack.
I still get to enjoy WAM as the only way to really decontaminate my HAZMAT suit is to have a full clothed shower before washing it.
be me be doctor get up have breakfast put on doctor beakie mask go to shops scare peasants mfw collect humours I am good doctor go home repeat next day I am good doctor
Yes, we have no bananas. We have no bananas today.
I'm a hibernator in times of great stress and anxiety, but that doesn't mean I'm not still here if anyone wants to chat. I, like you, find great strength in this community, so keep sharing, keep supporting, keep informing, keep asking questions, keep just being there
That's an interesting one, but not down to the virus, someone annoyed the Saudis who lowered their oil prices, Russia followed and now the US giants are in a bit of a mess as they try to keep up. With less travel, demand will be less too, which only makes the situation worse. (for those wondering, respected motorsport journalist Joe Saward is the source.)
Lisa and I have been chatting a fair bit over the last few days, the beauty of places like this is there's usually someone around whenever you're on.
Vid chat, vid chat, vid chat. Skype, WhatsApp, Zoom and Facebook have allowed me to keep in contact with friends. I've had deeper conversations with some of my pub friends than I ever did in the pub.
Be creative. If you write, paint, do music do them. If you don't? Start.
I've been putting my musical skills to the test and done some video editing.
Recreate normality. I enjoy karaoke, so I've been getting people to send in their vids and smashing them together like the end of the night singalongs we do. Every Tuesday I have a coffee with my mum. Now I just have a coffee over Skype. And ive shared a vid chat with a drinking buddy where we both had a tinny.
I have been spring cleaning old junk out. Looking after my self. My part time class is now done by video chat. And I have been working on growing medicinal flowers, just been trimming lately. Got a good yield growing in coco coir with a home made DTW (drain to Waste) hydro system.
I'm keeping a routine. Parts of the brain can shut down in times of incarceration or isolation. With added stresses/anxieties it can send folks into low moods, ruts and all sorts of mental health issues. Personally I am treating this as no change from the norm and keeping a routine. I wake the same time for work, I eat breakfast and I have set work hours. I give time to myself for my 1 exercise/shop a day (I make sure it is in a quite area, fortunately I have a wood near me) In this time I can switch off and chase various animals with my camera. At 1700 I stop. It is the evening and me time for fun and projects. I go to bed at 2200. No internet while working, get everything done and be disciplined.
I know this may not work for everyone due to types of work. There are always little jobs that need doing and we can do things that are "like" work e.g. learn music, be creative but do it in the same time-frame as your 'normal' job (should you have one pre-lockdown).
Basically don't go sedentary or you will end up like those bored big cats in the zoo that pace around getting anxious about doing nothing.
Find what works for you. I know once I finish my scientific work I have a lot of work to do in the garden (a whole summer's worth) and that is next on the list.
Good to hear what others are up to. Been trying to meditate more. When I get back to work going to be busy catching up so now is my opportunity to hold that inner peace and rediscover my self. We can tend to loose touch with the self in daily routines. I knew it before, but now I'm "unplugged" realize how much of others fears and beliefs are in me, that no longer serve me. We all carry around some sort of baggage. What am I really afraid of when I find the real me in there? Maybe that I will be well, successful and happy? Not that I'm not, but it could be so much more. Maybe I fear loosing it. That's just the ego, the animal. It serves a purpose of self preservation, to protect the body from harm. However it can hold us back. This has been a time as well for me reassessing emotions and letting go of past pain. Go with the flow. This is an opportunity to find your passions and creativity.
So kinda spurred on by my week of posts in the WAM Games group, I took a look at the photos from my first few sessions over at Sploshagirl - I've put some up on my profile, along with some from more recent visits to the Mostwam studio. Anyway, that brought back some good memories going back more than a decade! I was involved with Scarlett's first splosh shoot and had one of her last sessions before she retired from the scene. It was through her that I met Ari and we've been good friends for years now. Indeed, Scarlett is probably responsible for bringing out a lot of my kinks, I wouldn't say i was normal before I met her but...
I'm in one of the fitness groups on Fetlife where they have a monthly tracking/motivating thread so might as well share this week here as well.
I managed 117% of my step target last week, considering I did 4 times the daily cycling target last Saturday and exceeded it every day and did a daily walk of a reasonable distance it actually feels quite low. I am two thirds of the way to the monthly target. I'm still eating pretty healthily thanks to the recipe boxes, although have now had some cheese delivered.
Keeping motivated to do things is hard going, I've let the arm workouts slip this week, so I need to get back into doing those and I've just received another video from Araneae, this time aerobics and to give you an idea of the level, she's wearing a strapless latex dress!
So I managed to beat my weekly step target again, although it was close this week, had a couple of bad days when I was low on energy...
Didn't exactly do well today either, was up for my pre-dawn walk but just didn't feel up for it so went back to bed... I did however do something productive and have put together two photo montages in big frames (had the frames for several months) place your bets now on how long it will take me to actually hang them... It's also London marathon day - through the day job I normally work this weekend, so its a novelty having the day off, maybe I should maintain usual practice and not work tomorrow! Today also had the various charity events going on based around 26, I joined the Porn pedallers ride on zwift who are raising money for the Terence Higgins Trust, 52km on zwift's Watopia with just shy of 900m climbing today. Anyway if you'd like to chip in to the appeal it's here: https://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/PornPedallers26
Looking forward to a couple of things arriving in my inbox this week too.
Been having a couple of bad days, just feeling down a lot of the time... Not helped that I'm supposed to be on a weekend break at the seaside just now (and probably spending most of the time indoors...) and instead I've been clocking up lots of work... Oh well, at least that tots up to give me time off at a later date, not that I'm going anywhere anytime soon. I'm clocking up the KMs on Zwift, I've joined their Tour for all so clocking up some KMs on group rides there. Nice getting out for a walk in the morning, it's been starting to get light a couple of the days!
I think there would be something wrong if you weren't feeling it..... Not that, that is very helpful... I mean, you are not alone! I think just no expectations, no pressure and just be kind to yourself is all I can suggest?
As I said on twitter on Saturday, I've been so snowed under with work that I've barely looked at any of my usual things, from the forums to Mostwam and even youtube. I had been keeping up with the vlogs i subscribe to, but now I'm over a week behind. I had to take Saturday off work because I'd worked 13 consecutive days and I'm straight back into it. Since I started working from home I've been keeping a tally of my hours and where I can taking time back that I've done over my normal hours, but currently I'm owed up just shy of 15 days... I'm really feeling it now, I took Saturday off and didn't really do that much, went for a walk before dawn, watched T***** online (probably can't mention it) and did a bit on zwift but that was about it, a few concerts on youtube were about the limit of my viewing ability. The Mostwam.tv gunge tank girls update is normally something I watch on the Saturday it goes live, I'm a week behind with that! With the situation so fluid (I'm working on 2-3 weeks from now, based on information no one knows!) that it's hard to know when the workload will return to normal levels and I'll be able to start eating into my owed time. the only good side is my boss is great so there won't be grumbles over taking the time, but with so much holiday to take as well (and I've used more than usual at the start of the year), it will be hard to take it all. Having a break from work this morning as I've a supermarket delivery due... I could have got another half hour of work done by now...
What do you do Iain? Are you able to tell your boss "Hey, you're literally killing me, I NEED some me time"? Do you get overtime or are you salaried?
I get being swamped, but I've not had to work 13 consecutive, that's insane. Today is a holiday for us but if I didn't take some overtime Friday night, I was going to have to be on call today.
That's the daft thing, my boss is fine, I'll get the time back (don't want paying overtime as payroll are so incompetent that they mess up the tax so we end up getting robbed, I'm still paying off their cock up from 3 years ago...) I create the timetable for one of London's most reliable transport modes, so if I don't do my work, the trains won't run. Anyway, I've got a couple of days "off" (very loose as I'm still responding to emails and have a conf call tomorrow, but that should be a couple of hours)
iain-ecgunge said: That's the daft thing, my boss is fine, I'll get the time back (don't want paying overtime as payroll are so incompetent that they mess up the tax so we end up getting robbed, I'm still paying off their cock up from 3 years ago...) I create the timetable for one of London's most reliable transport modes, so if I don't do my work, the trains won't run. Anyway, I've got a couple of days "off" (very loose as I'm still responding to emails and have a conf call tomorrow, but that should be a couple of hours)
Oof...comp time. I prefer the overtime, but I get it. If you're one dollar/pound over a certain mark, you'd have made more if you just worked less because of the damn tax brackets.
Well the work 100 day step/cycle/swim challenge has begun, well at least that pushes me to do a bit less working and more zwifting!
Time to sneak in a shameless plug:
After completing one of their charity rides earlier in the year, I joined the Porn Pedallers cycling club and as part of the Pride events, they have a pride ride on Saturday evening on Zwift - I think Tindra Frost is the most well known of the gang but more people are coming on board. There is talk of streaming the ride, whether that's individuals who are set up already or the zwift view, I'm not sure.
It would be great if people could join us on Zwift, donate to the appeal or just love and share tweets and posts.
Porn Pedallers (@pornpedallers) tweeted at 0:29 am on Tue, Jun 09, 2020: #VirtualPrideRide #OurPrideRide PPCC meetup on @GoZwift - Sat 13 June 18.00 BST Ride with @TindraFrost & special guests Follow Chris Ratcliff on Zwift for invite Celebrating LGBTQ+ inclusivity in cycling & raising funds for @THTorguk. Kit - Pride On jersey #RideTheRibbon4Pride https://t.co/HvhoXEs6cQ (https://twitter.com/pornpedallers/status/1270135959531765760?s=03)
Well I think I've still not gone totally crazy... I've not been on here, or anywhere really for a couple of weeks... Today is my 100th day of working since I started working from home 116 days ago, can't imagine why I might be a bit tired and more than a little bit narked with stats like that...
On the plus side, I've completed the first two Virtual Etape du Tours and both times made up lots of places along the way - I'm nowhere near the pros. Mont Ventoux next weekend is going to be a hard slog.