This is it: the final countdown. Brandin goes back to work this day next week and, despite the fact that this is all about him and his life, it’s also about me and my life, and I am dreading it. Dreading. It.
We’d got into such a nice little routine where he, er, does most of the cooking and deals with the baby in the mornings and I get up at my leisure and get to work whenever inspiration strikes (and not just during nap times) and we hang out with each other during the day and and and… it was nice.
Don’t get me wrong: it was also stressful! We were paying $450 a month for (terrible) health insurance; a lot of incidentals went on credit cards that will now have to be paid off; I found being the main breadwinner pretty stressful and my sleep has gone to absolute shit (which has never happened before in my life!) but I guess the grass is always greener because now that it’s coming to an end, I’m gonna miss it.
Monday
A tiny, almost silent and totally ignore-able voice in the back of my head was telling me to treat this week like Brandin was already back to work and start getting into the new routine of getting up earlier with the boys on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays; waking Atlas at 7.30am and getting him breakfast and so on… but the lure of the bed is too strong, so Brandin does it and I get up at around 8.30am.
LIKE I SAID, I’M GONNA MISS IT.
Today I’ve a long list of things to do, so I’m pretty much at the desk all day. I start by getting some bits together for a regular content piece I write for Evoke.ie – it’s for their jobs board so each article has links to three current vacancies, which I hunt down ahead of writing the piece – and then at 10am Bea and I record the podcast for this week.
We had, of course, got great plans to record at the weekend but things have been really all over the place lately – Bea’s finding a new routine since being let go, Mum and Dad are still here so that’s taking up a lot of time and (for me, anyway) emotional space! (I don’t know why – I love them so much and we get on so well but all the same I find that I get Very Big Feelings when they’re around) and of course between the two of us there is always at least one sick child. Always. (This time it’s Beatrice’s sick child and it’s strep, which one of my children had before Christmas.)
We get the recording done and I start editing it immediately, which I realise is hard because I just had this conversation! I don’t want to immediately listen back to it!
Once the editing is done, I process the audio through Auphonic (I’ve no idea what this does but Liam tells me it makes it sound better), then schedule the post for Patreon as well as scheduling the upload for regular podcast channels.
Then I make the YouTube video (yes, the podcast goes on YouTube too, for anyone who wants to sneakily listen in the background of their browser at work) and share an Instagram post about it.
Once that’s all done it’s lunchtime and we go back and forth about whether to order anything, until I realise that I put $50 in my PayPal savings account a few weeks ago for a rainy day and what is this if not a rainy day?!
(I’ve no idea if it’s actually raining but you know, proverbially speaking.)
We order Chipotle on Doordash ($57.46) and eat together. (I’ll miss this!) Atlas has yoghurt and some toast and two strawberries and basically I keep throwing random foods at him in the hopes that he’ll eat something! It’s not a great technique but… it works. Ish.
After lunch I finish the piece for Evoke, then start my money diary which, honestly, is a time-consuming process that I find quite exhausting. (Who among us wants to go over the bad decisions of last week?!)
I also message my doctor about a prescription that’s expiring – you can request your prescription online, which is maybe one of the best things ever – and get a new prescription for my antidepressants, of which I have one left for tomorrow. Hopefully this’ll be ready tomorrow afternoon.
Brandin leaves at around 3.30pm to pick the boys up and Atlas wakes up at 4, just before they get home. I nurse him in his room then get him dressed and bring him down, then I go back upstairs to finish my money diary.
I re-emerge for dinner of pasta and tomato sauce and then go back up for one last pass at the money diary and to record the voiceover, before work is done for the day and I head back down to hang out a bit before bathtime and bedtime.
Daily total: $57.46
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