Isolation Journal 84

Alan woke up at least an hour earlier than we needed to be up and so he went downstairs and I snoozed for another hour and listened to headspace to get back to sleep.  I had two slices of toast and marmite for breakfast and 2 coffees.  Alan is still feeling bad with his ear and lack of sleep, but the GPs are being really careful with who they'll see.

We had a kick off meeting and it was quite productive and then I caught up with Rachel as she was in the office today, but couldn't get logged onto the call.  Alan was on a call and Qubit brought in a mouse and put it in his shoe, so I had to rescue it for him.

I booked a good candidate meeting for tomorrow morning and then I dealt with some of the work for Katie who is off on holiday.  It was a busy day and I made a few calls for myself and then got downstairs and did pilates online.  I've still got the leg nerve issue and so I was taking it easy, but it wasn't too painful.

We had reheated Chinese leftovers from Friday evening for lunch and then I had a peach as a snack a bit later on.

I had a few more MS Teams meetings and managed to land an offer for Katie which was good news.  It got sunnier later on in the day so I opened the window and Maya got out on the flat roof and then climbed next door and tried to get in Ally's window, I managed to encourage her back with some more treats.

As I finished my last MS Teams meeting I then realised I'd picked up another 16 jobs, although none for me, it seems to be a trend.

Good news is that the government has u-turned on the A'level results and so hopefully a lot of the affected students will still be able to go to their chosen University.

I worked through until 6.30pm when I loaded up Zoom and we logged on for a team building activity of a virtual escape room.  I'd chosen one with a rogue CEO who was being investigated, I'd selected "Advanced" and it was really hard!  It took about 2 hours and I had a glass of fizz and Alan cooked dinner which was a hello fresh meanball sub.  

I then watched more Storage Hunters, cleaned the kitchen and mopped the floors and had a bit of cheese and a chocolate ice lolly.

Isolation Journal 83

Again I woke up quite late, but Alan was still asleep so I went into the other room to mess around on my phone until Qubit demanded I fed him, so I did and then he was sick onto the table so I had to clean it up.

I managed to finish Little Fires Everywhere as Alan went to sleep in the other room and it was a great book - It grabbed me through from about 100 pages in and I really wanted to keep reading on.  It now means I can start my new Matt Haig book - hooray!

I decided to get up and go for a run to get it out the way and so I steadily did 9.1K through a Lumby Loop and a few different segments.  My left leg was quite stingy with the nerve thing that I've had for the last few days, but not really whilst I was running, but I took a fairly steady pace.  It was warm, but started to drizzle as I was running.

When I got back Alan had made pancake batter and so made us some pancakes with apple sauce with maple syrup.  We watched some UK Celebrity Storage Hunters and then I tidied and hoovered a bit before having a bath.

We then went over to see Alan's brother and the kids and had pizza cooked in the BBQ oven which was delicious.  The kids were quite hyper and excited to see us and did a lot of running around.  Winston dog was also excited to see us.  I had a glass of prosecco as Alan was driving us to and from.  I also gave some of the spare bedding plants to them as I'd run out of space to plant them.  I ordered some Amazon Prime Now whilst we were chatting as I figured I needed some ibuprofen gel and ibuprofen for my leg, hopefully it will help.

We got back just before 10pm and the order arrived about 30 minutes afterwards and so we watched more UK Celebrity Storage Hunters and cuddled the cats who were being particularly loving.  

I realised I've run about 1010K in my current trainers and I've not used my Vitality half price Runners Need discount yet for this year - my last pair were bought back in November 2019.  I decided to buy some next generation Asics Nimbus 22 and also a pair of Aftershokz headphones.  

Isolation Journal 82

Alan I think had a bit of a sleepless night and moved around a lot and I ended up waking up around 7.30am and then slept a bit more until 8.30am and then woke up and went in the spare room to mess around on my phone and read and I had a message from my Mum as she was worried that the weather would be poor and as we'd be meeting in the garden we worked out that it wouldn't be as much point.  So I decided to drive down next weekend instead.  My Dad also posted a highly irritating post on facebook about basically people not working shouldn't be getting benefits and that you can't tax the poor into prosperity - he's been retired for 23 years and worked for 33, my Mum probably only worked full time for about 7/8 years and then stopped to have children and didn't really work much other than a part time role when I was about 13 and another that went full time when I was at unin, but our generation are likely to have to work until around 70 years old and I don't feel this way.  As Alan pointed out, people can work extremely hard and earn less than millionnaires or indeed billionnaires as wealth isn't a clear indication of work ethic and especially not fairness.  

I stayed in the spare room messing around on my phone and reading "Little Fires Everywhere" until he woke up when the door bell went at around 11.30am and I suggested we should have breakfast or maybe brunch instead.  The door was Royal Mail who had delivered the cool mat to us that I'd ordered for him.

I decided to go to Berts Barrow and I bought some milk, cream, bread, sausages, burgers, lettuce, tomatoes, strawberries, cucumber, cold brew vanilla flavoured yoghurt, broccoli and it was about £25.  There was about the right number of people in the shop, I wore my mask and there was a queue outside when I finished.  

I made scrambled eggs on toast with sausages and coffees and orange juice.  I had marmite on my toast and some sriracha sauce.

Alan introduced me to the very addictive show of Storage Hunters and I watched far too much of this today!  We discussed going for a walk and thought about going to Malham Cove, but neither of us fancied driving too far and so we went to St Aiden's where we've run a race at before, but not walked around.  As RSPB members we get to take advantage of free parking which was good.  We walked about 5K in around an hour and a half and chatted and got rained on a bit which was actually quite nice.  Alan has been really tired and lethargic and I was feeling a bit low energy today as well.

It was Jenny's birthday today and I'd ordered her some flowers and also some craft stuff, I think she's finding things a bit challenging at the moment, so hopefully it helped to cheer her up.

We drove back and then watched more TV (more Storage Hunters), and I had some toast as a snack and more storage hunters and Alan went to cook the last Hello Fresh recipe which was fish, but the fish had massively gone off so he made a couple of burgers instead.

I'm sort of glad I didn't go today as I've been feeling tired and have a bit of a sore throat, not sure where I would have caught anything from.

Isolation Journal 81

Alan was up until around 4am doing his exam, so sleep was a bit broken.  I had apple, granola, yoghurt and lemon curd for breakfast, but quite late and I also had 2 coffees.  I got the milk and orange juice in.

We had a kick off call at 9am and I also then had a handover call with Katie who is off on holiday, so I will need to work out how to recruit marketing people for the next 2 weeks.

Today was very much a sort out of admin and emails day, but I did also have some good conversations with candidates and clients and will be more organised for next week.

The game that I ordered for Alan arrived and we thought about playing it today, but we were both a bit too tired.

I made some pasta, mushrooms, garlic, onion and courgette with cream for a fairly late lunch at around 1.30pm.  I set off the dishwasher after lunch.  I chatted to my brother as I'd been debating going to see him and my parents this weekend.  It's a really long drive, but I'm not likely to see them all that easily for a while and I'd feel uncomfortable going after I'm back in the office again.  It seems easier to stay with my brother than a hotel or indeed my parents and at least I know he's had Covid, so it's less likely he'll have it.  I'm slightly worried about the flash floods forecast for down towards the south, so I'll have to check the weather warnings before I set off.  

I sorted out some purchase order issues and more admin and got my emails down to a more sensible number, re-wrote a spreadsheet and went through around 30 job applications for a remote working job that had over 139 applications.  I had to sort through them before I could delete them.  

I managed to speak to the letting agents of my flat to find out whether the key had gone missing as they had not got back to 3 emails.  Apparently the tenant had moved in ok and there was some works I'd paid out for, but now that it's been done I should receive a statement update soon.  

I finished work at around 7.30pm and we ordered a Chinese - I had hot and sour soup, chips, crispy beef in peking sauce and some waterchesnuts and bamboo shoots, Alan had a spring roll, chicken in ginger and garlic and singapore noodles and banana fritters.  I am very full now!  

I went out for a run and again was fairly fast, even though my legs ache from yesterday and I did 6K in just over 30 mins including a PR on a segment and came 7th overall.  The takeaway was delivered about 1.5 hours later, but was good, I had to ring up and make sure it was on it's way.

I spoke to my parents who seem worried about me coming, but happy to see me in the garden.  It will be a long drive, so I should really go to bed at a sensible time.

I managed to do a bit more linked in work whilst watching TV, mostly Dave and Taskmaster, 8 out of 10 cats does Countdown and QI and a bit of CSI New York.

I also stopped my anxiety, but finally booking the virtual escape room ready for Monday - we're going to try this one Out of Hours

Isolation Journal 80

 A bit groggy again this morning, quick coffee and then onto the team call briefly before a 9.15am training session on coaching with Jane who is also my mentor and she's great!  

We talked about setting SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time limited) goals.  Then we talked about GROW coaching model where you identifiy the goal the coachee wants to set themselves, discover the current reality, discuss options and then come up with a way forward.  It was a really useful session and left me feeling motivated.

I then had a few calls and went and did Pilates at 12pm which was a very sweaty and warm affair.  2 things arrived for me whilst I was doing the class, my copy of The Midnight Library by Matt Haig that I ordered when I booked onto the Guardian Live event this evening which was an interview and Q&A with him and also my Arena Flowers subscription which this week are lots of pink lisianthus alissa.

I dashed back upstairs to deal with some calls whilst I put some potato waffles and sausages in the oven to cook and arranged my flowers into vases.

The afternoon was a mix of meetings and admin, I hopefully will get more time for proactive calling tomorrow.  We had a good meeting with a client, although I think we'll need to dig a little deeper for candidates in terms of what they are looking for.

I finished up around 6.30pm and had to rush to cook dinner whilst listening to the Archers and I made Hello Fresh tacos with aubergine, beans and feta.  My Guardian Live event started as I finished up tea and they asked the question that I had emailed in when I booked on about what advice Matt Haig might have given to himself 20 years ago.  I love listening to him talk and wish that it was a bit longer than an hour.

I let my food go down a bit and then went out for a run, I'd not got many particular goals for this run, but I was going quite fast and my garmin gave me a +7 improvement on my fitness.  I managed to get my fastest 5K time for a while of 24.43 and ran 6K at a pace of 8.05 per mile.  

I got in and watered the plants and then had a bath and wasted a lot of time in the bath.

Alan has been busy doing his exam and is likely to be up until 4am finishing it.  Some men came to fix the oil stain on the drive, it was noisy for hours and looks no different.

Qubit managed to get 2 dinners by meowing loudly at both me and Alan.

I completed my Tania Hershman challenge last night by writing it all down by hand.  Will do some more this evening and then I need to definitely try and get back to the novel writing if I can.

Isolation Journal 79

Alan's alarm went off at 7.30am this morning and he seemed in a much better mood and had a much better night of sleep and his grogginess seemed better too.  I wasn't too bad and got up and had cornflakes for breakfast because the milk had leaked.

I had a set up call with Katie and chatted a bit about her being on holiday for 2 weeks.  We then had a BD day set up call at 10am and I didn't make many BD calls, but I found a new contact and picked up 2 jobs...for the property team!  I'm just not picking anything up for myself at the moment.  

I was at least pleased that one of the other girls has filled 5 of the roles I'd passed her and one of the guys in Manchester filled one as well so overall it's like me placing 1 role!  We ate outside which was very warm, Alan made waffles and sausages and some mayo and sriracha and we had a lolly.  

We had a meeting to share permanent candidates with the wider team and then I had a busy afternoon trying to sort out some issues and get up to date with emails, candidate applications and coaching people on their career choices.

Hayley and Flower were coming over to visit and Alan made dinner and I ate a lovely Hello Fresh haloumi curry and we watched the Peep Show Christmas episode.  

The second accidental book that I'd ordered arrived and so I gave it to Flower to have a read and also made him a cappucino and gave Hayley a rocket lolly.

After they had left I tidied and cleaned the kitchen and the rest of the downstairs and earlier Alan had discovered that the Apple TV remote had got smashed.  

Maya kept sneaking out onto the roof during the day and this evening as we were getting ready to come upstairs she managed to get onto the adjacent flat roof of Ally and Pete next door, I had to shake the treats to encourage her to come back in the window!  I listened to more of the "Windup Bird Chronicles"

I didn't run, but it's the first time I've had a day off since last Wednesday.

Late last night I saw on my time hop that it was a year since my hen day and so I was reminded that I wanted to borrow a game from Jenny and Jonny that I thought Alan would like based on the Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, but Jenny said no as Jonny was quite particular and didn't lend out games, but I searched and found it at an independent game sellar/cafe and ordered it and I told him about it earlier to try and cheer him up from his anxiety.

Isolation Journal 78

I don't know why, but I don't like Tuesdays...groggy wake up, got cornflakes and coffee, logged on for the team call and then sorted emails and covered a few calls and sorted a spreadsheet.

I'd managed to place someone yesterday, but I realised I'd completely messed up the rate quote, I worried about this for a while, then spoke to the client and managed to sort it out, but I'm frustrated that I ended up in that situation. It has been very hot today that hasn't really aided my ability to behave coherently.

We then had 3 deliveries, one for Alan - a new extractor fan for the bathroom to replace the one that had broken, he fixed it, a book that I'd ordered direct from my most local bookshop Fox Lane Books and they had wrapped it beautifully and also refunded my delivery which they really didn't need to and finally a shower cable for the shower so I don't have double water spray which I managed to fit with a bit of Alan's help.

Maya managed to sneak out onto the flat roof and looked very pleased with herself.  

I had a temp BD session kick off call at 1pm and then quickly made some salad with lettuce, coriander and radiccho for lunch with a slice of tiger bread and some smoked wensleydale cheese.

I had a meeting at 2pm with a client that was quite productive and I'd found out some really sad news that the partner of a candidate I've placed twice and known fairly well for a few years had suddenly been bereaved.  Her partner had died very suddenly and it's so sad as she's younger than me.

I managed to make some headway sorting through my emails and catching up on admin and then finished work around 6.45pm again and went out for a quick run and managed to do 5k in my fastest time for a while of 25.25 and finished up with 30 mins of exercise.  I listened to more of the "Wind Up Bird Chronicles"

I quickly showered and then made dinner of Hello Fresh Lamb Linguine - Alan was feeling ill with a bad headache so I cooked. 

I then signed onto the Zoom call for the Chalk the Sun reading session and somehow ended up reading an excerpt from my "novel" that I've been writing.  The feedback was generally positive and gave me some food for thought.  I also enjoyed hearing other people's writing too.

I then watered the plants, tidied the kitchen, put washing and dish washing on and ate 2 ice lollies.  I came up to write, but wasn't feeling very inspired so have just managed this and probably my flash fiction challenge and then I'll get into bed.