I’ve been at my second job for just over a week now, and working two jobs has exhausted me. But the exhaustion is only temporary. My second job is something I’ve done before for years, but it’s labour-intensive, and I’ve been sitting and standing at desks for the last two years … and I haven’t exercised properly since before then. So I’ve got to build that muscle and stamina back up.

Though, I have been writing! Granted, it’s not much, and I’ve been fumbling to find time in between working and commuting and sleeping, but I’ve started making progress on what I said I would around the start of the month: DWF. And so that’s fun. I wonder if, now that I have half as much free time, my brain is like “oh, but we can do other stuff now”. Too often, I don’t appreciate my free time until it’s gone. Once I settle in at the new job and home routines become stable, I should be able to find those slots of time for writing, reading, blogging etc.

It feels good to be working with my hands and feet though, which is something I knew but am still surprised about. Manual labour? Eugh. But, it actually helps me feel productive. Task lists can give that air of productivity, but I was always doing things with my hands and feet growing up and so it just feels good doing those sorts of tasks. Maybe I’m just conditioned to like it then? My father was a boilermaker and a miner, and my mother … well, she didn’t work, and didn’t want to. Maybe I just find gratification in being able to hold my work. That’s probably why I prefer physical to-do lists over the digital ones.

I do have to be mindful of my physical health. I’m bad at abiding by my own limits. It’s something I always try to reinforce in the trainees, “just because you can, doesn’t mean you should”—don’t pick up as much as you can, because your back might not actually be able to take it. That’s something I was punished for ignoring my first time around in this job. Just because I can lift up to about 60kgs in boxes, doesn’t mean that’s my repetitive lifting capacity. Especially now. I lost most of my upper muscle once I left this job the last time, haha.
Hopefully, now that my mental health is miles ahead compare to the last time I worked for this company, it’ll be easier to take care of myself. I’m not as driven by anxiety and fear nearly as much as I once was, and that gives me time to do things properly for myself.

I’m hoping, over the weekend during free time, to get some writing systems up and running that I’ve been wanting to (intending to but forgetting, really) set up for a while. That can be my goal for this weekend. Stay tuned to hear about how it didn’t happen. I have a full day shift today (I’ll be at work when this publishes) and tomorrow I’m meant to be DMing the last session of the campaign. Haah … let’s get into it.