It’s Fucken Monday. I don’t quite get up at 6:20 to write, but it’s close enough. I get 700 words of editing done, which is a pretty good effort.
Since I didn’t end up roasting the lamb yesterday, I’ve decided to stick it in the slow cooker today. The last thing I want to be doing on a Monday morning is preparing dinner, but I know I’ll be glad I did it in the end. However, it takes up way too much of my morning. I’m late dropping the kinderbesten off. I’ve naively and optimistically arranged to see my lawyer at 9am (I only need to see him to get his signature on a piece of paper, which he has offered to do at no charge) but it’s already 8:50. I phone up and they’re fine with me getting there at 9:30 instead. Of course, the traffic is slow on the freeway, and of course I get into the city and take a wrong turn and end up back on the freeway, going the wrong way. This does nothing for my Monday Mood. I get to where I’m going at last and park, and then the parking meter keeps declining my card. I’m about to give up on the whole day. Luckily the next meter works just fine.
It’s all worth it in the end: the lawyer even runs me through the rest of the impending process (for free). On my way out I attempt a brief hunt for coffee, but there’s excellent coffee to be had at work and I decide I’m well ready to see the back of the city this Monday morning. But, the city still manages to have the last laugh, and sends me to the wrong exit onto the freeway, going the exact opposite direction to where I want to be going. I manage to get myself going to the right way, and I feel the tension sloughing off the further I get from the city.
At work I go straight into a meeting before I have a chance to get coffee. Then my afternoon is four solid hours of meetings. I realise now I should have stayed in the city.
When I get home the slow cooked lamb is as delicious as expected: even the kinderbesten enjoy it. I decide to move around some more furniture, trying to get the ‘secondary TV area’ a bit more organised. I engage the kinderbesten to help, and they do manage to help a little bit, in between making the job even harder and more painful than it should be. I’m not convinced by the end result, but I decide to leave it and see if it grows on me. After that I do something I’ve been putting off for weeks: I phone up my car insurer about my renewal quote. This year’s price is more expensive than last year’s. Also, I’ve managed to find a better quote by visiting their website as a new customer, which leaves me even less impressed. However, they prove to be awesome and give me $60 off my renewal quote, plus the Roadside Assist service that I’d included in my website quote. I’m put the phone down very happy with the world at large.
As it’s Monday I want to settle on the sofa and catch up with some TV. It’s already pretty late and I want to be in bed soon, but I figure one episode of something, at about 45 minutes, should be fine. Wrong. Turns out the first episode of American Gods is 60 minutes. Season 3 of Fargo starts with a 65 minute-long episode. The Handmaid’s Tale bows in at 57 minutes. Westworld debuts at 70 minutes. I consider Wayward Pines, which is short enough and has been high on my watch list for a long time now, but I’m already over the idea of watching TV. I decide to drink tea, eat ice cream, and catch up on my diaries instead.
Which, of course, was the right choice all along.