week in the life | wednesday

Woke up to discover that due to my working late, I accidentally left the camera on all night and the battery is dead. D'oh. Take a picture of the dead camera with my phone, then plug the battery in to charge. Sit down at the computer to take care of some business and e-mail with my small business group.


Unmade.


Breakfast. Oatmeal with Nutella.


Morning exercise.


8 miles on the bike. I like to watch documentaries on my iPad while I ride. (Learn something and get exercise at the same time = brain and body workout!) Today I watch part of My Run which is about a man who runs 75 marathons in 75 consecutive days. He's 57 years old, has health problems and has never run before, and he runs from Minneapolis to Atlanta in 75 days. Lots of inspirational stuff here, including "Get off your butt and DO something!" and this quote from the opening of the film:

"For A Long Time It Had Seemed To Me That Life Was About To Begin -- Real Life. 

But There Was Always Some Obstacle In The Way. 

Something To Be Got Through First, Some Unfinished Business, Time Still To Be Served, A Debt To Be Paid. 

Then Life Would Begin.

 At Last It Dawned On Me That These Obstacles Were My Life." 

- Fr. Alfred D'souza 

Post-ride stretching and lunch on the patio with my buddy: hummus, garlic naan, pineapple, watermelon, vanilla soy milk. It is HOT out, so I quickly retreat to the shade, and then the air conditioning.


Paying bills. One thing that has changed since the last Week in the Life is my marital status, however, our division of labor remains the same. I'm the family accountant.


Designing Christmas cards for Funnelcloud Studio. One of the challenges I face as a biz owner, is preparing for the holiday season so damn early. I'm always behind on this, but if my cards are done by the end of September, I'll be happy. I'm satisfied with my reindeer concept, but my Santa looks like a pedophile. Back to the drawing board with that one!


Windex the dog snart covered hurricanes in the living room. Another challenge working from home: I am easily distracted by house chores that need to be done. I'm always thinking things like "I should put a load of laundry in while I'm working on these sketches." I don't know why I have these requirements for myself, since I certainly wouldn't be expected to multi-task work and chores if I were working outside the home in a cubicle all day.


Treat break.


Cleaning/organizing blitz with loud music. As I am working on my Christmas card designs and getting distracted by household chores, I realize that the solution is to get my studio organized so I can lock myself in there and focus on Funnelcloud Studio during the work day. Unfortunately, due to house projects and post-art-market messes, my studio has been used solely for storage over the past few months. This really starts to piss me off and I decide something must be done about it RIGHT NOW. So I turn on the speaker and put my iPhone on shuffle - the first song that pops up is Guns N Roses. Thanks, iPhone - perfect cleaning music!


Tackling the studio closet. My studio is a spare bedroom and it has a closet full of crap. The first task is to remove the closet doors that are constantly pissing me off. One of the doors actually swings into the door swing area for the door that leads into the room, so they bang together. I've always had a vision of making this closet into an open organized storage space with built in shelves, so the first step is removing the closet doors.


Unscrewing. Banjo is very curious about this process and "helps" me with every step.


Doors are off! Now time to declutter. The studio closet was where we put a bunch of random boxes when we moved in five years ago. I have no clue what's in some of them, but 75% of the crap in here has nothing to do with my business and also has no right to take up real estate in my studio. ALL OF IT MUST GO.


Distracted. One of the biggest problems I have with decluttering is getting distracted by all the old "treasures" I find. This time, I'm good about it and don't even open the boxes - just clear them out out of the studio. I did find this pair of wire-rimmed mirrored prescription sunglasses that I used to wear in high school and couldn't resist trying them on. Yikes. (Reminds me of Almost Famous.)


Shadow selfie with shaka. Hang loose.


Feeding time.


Expectant.


Waiting for Larry to get home from work.


Tonight's dinner is leftover chicken from last night.


On Wednesday nights we watch Top Chef Masters. Afterwards we start watching a documentary about September 11th on the History Channel - it's still too upsetting to watch the whole thing.


After dinner and television, it's back to my cleaning project. I won't let myself go to bed until all the crap I removed from the studio closet is out of our living spaces and put away. Now our guest bedroom is full of crap, but at least it's out of my studio! And the closet doors are propped up in the hall. Sigh.


Melatonin to ward off insomnia. Goodnight.