My writing has taken a hit during these three months owing to office work. Yes, if you think I am over working, no I am not. I am working on time. But there are multiple causes which make me spend less time on writing.
1. Meetings run into hours. Listening to meeting makes you sick in the stomach. Listening to people speak meaningless stuffs - definitely is not my cup of tea. We had so many meetings in the last 2-3 months that, each time the day gets over, I really do not have sufficient energy to go back and write more. So I have avoided writing.
By the way - today completed a 3 hour meeting today - from 10 30 to 1 30 - Imagine sitting and listening to people speaking for this much time. Luckily, for me, I was cleaning my room and shelves on the side, it was bearable. I cleaned up so much of stuff and re-organized stuff that made me so happy. and for the three hour meeting- yeah - I had to speak few lines in the middle - but do I care - if people keep on speaking and I just roam around my room doing my stuffs.
If anyone asks me a question, when I am not in my seat, its their headache :), I politely ask them to repeat, once I hear my name, few times, I just ignore and hesitate to un-mute - again, its their headache :)
2. Seeing computer screen through out the day itself is an activity in itself. Well, yes, how much ever the monitor is good, it is a pain to see monitor for longer duration, so writing post work seeing monitor took a back seat. Today, I had to write, so forcing myself to come out of my shell :)
3. Microsoft Teams on the phone - I recently installed Teams application on the phone and I get freedom from my PC. If there is a meeting, I just lay on my bed with the phone and let people talk whatever they want :)
4. My writing set up is gone so bad that, I do not have a personal computer to write or blog. I am now writing on a borrowed laptop, whose keyboard layout my fingers are refusing to accept. The placement of keys and size of few keys are very crucial for longer typing.
People like me using Lenovo laptops might find it difficult to adjust to HP laptops. It might take time, but I do not have the luxury of training myself on different keyboards available at home :).
I have a desktop which has Windows Vista operating system which unfortunately is outdated and I am unable to update my browser. Without an updated browser - I cannot browse websites - even blogger. So my hands are tied with my personal computer.
With my laptop, well, it is making beep noises, indicating some fault, I have ordered a laptop repair kit, hopefully, I can open it up throw away the faulty keyboard - and try to re-use it to my satisfaction. It has served a good 10 years.
5. My writing has also taken a back seat - because - I have been taking time off to cook. There have been many dishes which I have cooked, may be sometime later I shall tell.
6. I have been interacting with people more (be it official or unofficial), that I have failed to interact with myself. So this definitely has hampered my writing, as you end up listening to people more instead of listening to yourself more.
One of my favorite shows on Fox Life - was "Tales from the Bush Larder" with Kiran Jethwa. On one such episodes, he introduced one of his fellow colleagues, I guess his name was Sam or Sammy. This scene was shot in his hotel at the end of a particular episode, where he gathers stuff from his place and cooks a variation in his restaurant.
So what is special about this scene is that, Kiran the anchor speaks about food, flavors, spices etc while his colleague Sam stays silent and watches on. Kiran later asks Sam a question and Sam replies with minimal words for which Kiran says - "Sam is a man of few words".
I think this was one of my favorite scenes of the whole series, because - I wish to emulate Sam. I feel, I am a man of few words, and I wish to remind myself of the same again and again.
Over the past few months, I have ended up speaking so much more that, at one time, my throat just went dry and the other time, I ended up getting frustrated in a meeting, because of the stupidity of few people :)
Wait a minute, recently, someone lectured me on not judging people :) - Let me get the facts right,
I have judged people stupid, the anchor Kiran calls his colleague man of few words right on television, isn't that judgement? I have even called out someone as dumb :)
The heart of the matter (which again was told and asserted to me again by someone else) is that, you cannot let someone else change the way you behave or make you think.
At the max I can do is to reduce spending my time with people who try to overpower my thoughts, and continue to behave my own self :) and regarding getting lectured on not to judge people, well, that's for another day!
Meanwhile, I have to watch few stuffs on youtube, which I will write down in my next post.
Cheers,
Attaching a pic of my borrowed laptop - and my setup, which I am really proud of. Listening to Don Henley - Boys of summer with a good bass thump!
If you think the chair is new owing to the polythene cover - you are wrong - its almost 2 year old - and the setup desk itself is 2 year old. I had a good WFH setup prior itself, because, there was a point where in, I knew I could be better productive at home itself, if I had a good arsenal :)
