TIME MANAGEMENT

My time management is terrible right now. I'm so tired. I'm working ten hours today and I have been exhausted all week. After getting home from a full time job, making and eating dinner, an hour walking the dog, feeding the animals and getting a basic level of housework done, I don't have long before I need to drag myself to bed for less sleep than I'd like every night. I haven't been able to get anything done all week.

Obviously, as someone without children, I don't know how easy I have it. I should try and remember that.

Then there's all the cycling. My cycling commute is great for keeping me out of the crowded trains, but 20 miles a day is exhausting, plus the bike maintenance this week has been really time consuming (punctures, swapping tyres, idiotically causing a hydraulic fluid leak from my brakes).

Diana's mother is with us for a little while, hence the recent house re-organisation and wardrobe building that has taken up a few weeks of spare time. The "editing suite" is now her room and the recently repaired iMac now resides in the living room on the dining table near the TV (our house is small and crowded) which isn't the best location. I can still get some work done, hunched over it's blue glow with my headphones on while Dee and her Mum try and watch television in the evenings and Mugatu tries to snooze on the warm keyboard. Hopefully soon we can pick up a cheap desk from Ikea so we can relocate the "editing suite" into a dark corner of the bedroom and I can hide away once more, dragging timelines and drinking tea with bags under my aching eyes. The unfortunate effect is that we will be displacing the cat's play towers. Mugatu - I'm so sorry. Digby - you never cared for them anyway, you smug little guy.

Add to all this that money is just falling through our fingers. We account for every penny but for a long time now our outgoings exceed our incomings. Things will get better, we have some debts that will be clear by the end of 2013 and then we can finally balance our books. Just got to hope we can keep going til then!

It's been an especially tiring two weeks. Trying to elevate this hobby to the point where I can start getting paid work while also holding down a full time job at the moment seems imp.. improbable. Nothing is impossible. It's just about motivation. Strangely, writing down how tiring I find everything is motivating me to try harder and find more time for it. This blog has become some strange text-based self-administered talking therapy. Working hard and sleepless nights are part of the package, aren't they? I'm obviously expecting too much for too little effort. Come on Dan, step it up a gear!! I just need to make sure I can get at least half an hour of video work under my belt every day. That shouldn't be too hard! Let's do this!!

But not tonight... tonight I get home from work at 10pm and I'm going to curl up in a ball and sleep. Look at this, I'm relapsing already, one sentence later. Hopeless!