A Time-out A-Z

What does a lexicographer do on her day off?

That's not the start of a corny joke, but a real question I found myself asking last week. After working flat-out on back-to-back projects for the past 5 months without a day off, I suddenly realized I was absolutely shattered and really needed a proper break from my desk. With some form of lockdown here in the UK since last autumn, it hasn't seemed worth taking time off because, well, what would I do with it? You can't go anywhere, nothing's open and you're only allowed to go out for exercise locally, which for me means as far as I can walk from home.

I enjoy walking and with my mileage dropping off over the past few weeks, I resolved to spend a lot of my week off getting some fresh air and exercise. But I've been stomping round the same handful of routes for the past year. On Monday, I did a long loop of Ashton Court Park, one of the few accessible large green spaces on this side of Bristol. After a slightly grey start, the clouds cleared and it was a lovely, sunny, 6-mile amble with a longer than usual (takeout) coffee stop and really nice not to be thinking about getting back to my desk:

On Tuesday, I had a lovely socially-distanced walk-and-talk with a friend around Bristol harbour in the morning, then with rubbish weather forecast for the rest of the week, went out for a wander around Leigh Woods - the other accessible green space - with my partner in the afternoon:

But what about the rest of the week? With all my usual walking routes already ticked off, I had to get creative ... and what better for an off-duty lexicographer than a city A-Z. I planned out a route that would take me along streets starting with each letter of the alphabet in turn, photographing each street sign as I went. I started out with two streets I've previously lived on and spent the next few hours squiggling my way around Bristol in a mix of sun, rain, wind and a massive hailstorm! This was the result ... and yes, I know I cheated a bit on J and X, but hey, my game, my rules!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The full A-Z was exactly 9 miles and lots of fun despite the weather. Many of the streets were familiar, but I went down a few I'd never explored before and just generally enjoyed doing something completely frivolous for nothing more than the satisfaction of completing it. And well, you gotta love an A-Z!

Total walking distance for my week off: just under 40 miles (64 km)!

My coronacoaster II: underemployed and restless

Back at the end of May, I wrote about coming to the end of a stretch of work and not having anything more lined up as publishers froze projects and pulled work in-house. Since then, things have been kind of mixed.

Ups: On the plus side, I seem to have a number of projects lined up for the autumn. If everything comes off (which admittedly is far from guaranteed!) I should have a fairly steady stream of work from the end of Sept through into next spring. There’s a nice mix of projects; some corpus research and some writing, some vocab-focused materials and some more general English. It’s a relief to know there’s work coming up, although I’ll be happier when I get some more definite confirmations, schedules and contracts in place. As ever with freelancing, a lot of initial offers are tentative and it can seem to take an age before they’re confirmed, leaving you in an awkward planning limbo.

Downs: On the downside, it’s been a very quiet summer. Since the end of May, I had a few odd hours in July and August on one on-going project. Which was good – and a nice project to work on – but only added up to something like 25% of my usual working hours through June-Aug. That project’s had a (planned) pause since the middle of August and was due to start up again last week, but has now been delayed.

Restlessness: Like most freelancers, I’m not good at being underemployed. I can cope with the odd quiet patch if I know I’ve got something coming up, but especially with not much else to do at the moment (because Covid), I soon get restless and grouchy. Thankfully, the UK’s had a surprisingly good summer this year which has made things a bit easier. When the weather’s warm and sunny, it’s easier to potter in and out of the garden, go for nice long walks and as things have eased up, meet friends for socially-distanced, outdoor coffees. Last week was tough though. First, I had the let-down of expecting work to restart then finding out it wasn’t. Plus the weather was rubbish – grey and rainy and positively autumnal. I’m generally pretty good at keeping myself occupied, but after more than 6 months at home, I admit to getting distinctly bored. I’ve done plenty of walking, but as I don’t have a car, I’m tied to only walking from home and having done the same routes a thousand times, I’m really starting to crave a change of scene now.

Time for a break: Thankfully, this week, the sun’s back out and on Friday, we’re heading off for a week away – woo hoo! - our first holiday for a year and my first night away from home since February. We’re not going very far, just a week in a holiday cottage on the Isle of Wight, but it’s right by the sea and I’m sooo looking forward to just being somewhere different.

So I just have a handful of days to get through feeling restless, unsure whether there’ll be any work this week or not, and not 100% confident that the projects I have pencilled in for when I get back will pan out as I’m hoping. It feels a bit odd to be taking a holiday after doing so little work over the past few months, but boy, am I ready for it and the chance to properly switch off.

And relax ...

Towards the end of last year, I was complaining that I was twiddling my thumbs after a whole series of things I was meant to be working on got delayed. Well, thankfully, most of them did finally get going at the start of this year ... perhaps inevitably, all at the same time! After some negotiation, I managed to stack them one after the other, but it gave me a really punishing schedule that started in January and is due to go through to mid-December with no respite.

I'm not complaining, it's good to be busy and they're all really interesting, challenging projects. But it's very difficult to sustain levels of energy and creative momentum over such a long period of time. I worked out just now that in around 110 working days since mid-Feb (taking out days away at conferences, teacher training, etc.) I've produced 156 pages of material - and it's all been at upper-int or advanced level, so that's quite a lot of text per page. (And of course, that doesn't account for planning, redrafting, etc.) My time is no longer measured in days or weeks, but in spreads and units!!

It's been a long slog with lots of long days, weekend working and no such thing as a Bank Holiday, but I have managed to grab a couple of breaks. Back in May, I had a proper week's holiday, escaping to a cliff-top cabin in the south of Spain to relax and recharge. The setting and the weather were beautiful, but I found I spent most of the holiday grouchy and unable to relax, at points finding myself in tears of frustration because my much-looked-forward-to break wasn't working out as I'd so desperately hoped. Of course, it was the built-up tension from the previous weeks at my desk coming out and it wasn't until the last couple of days that I started to properly wind down and enjoy myself.

My partner seemed to have no trouble at all relaxing!

Then at the start of August, I had an unexpected week 'off' when there was a delay to the project I was working on. I had visions of a week spent pottering in the garden and of sunny days out, but beyond one sunny morning wandering around Bristol with my camera, it rained pretty solidly all week! So instead I worked my way through a long to-do list of work (admin, book-keeping) and domestic chores. Not much fun, but definitely a much-needed catch-up.

Tomorrow, I head off for my second proper holiday of the year, a week in Malta. This time I'm determined not to fall into the 'desperate-to-relax' trap again and I'm going to try really hard just to go with the flow ... if that's not a contradiction in itself!

Extended hols

At the weekend, we got back from a fantastic trip to Madagascar; a real adventure of a lifetime and a proper getaway, with no internet, TV or mobile signal for more than two weeks - bliss! I know that some freelancers struggle with holidays (worrying about taking time off/turning work down/losing income), but as someone who fits work around my life rather than the other way round, I love the freedom to go away that freelancing allows.

Inevitably though as a freelancer, when you go on holiday, work never stops neatly just before you go and picks up again as soon as you're back. You have to plan in a bit of contingency so that you can be sure you've finished off whatever you're working on before you go away. For this trip, I finished teaching a week before I left and just had a few bits and pieces of loose ends to tidy up in the spare week. It was quite nice to have some extra packing/last-minute shopping time.

I'd hoped to come back and get started on a new project this week, but inevitably, there's been a bit of email to-ing and fro-ing to get things started and as of now (Friday afternoon), I'm still waiting for stuff to come through. Again, it was quite nice to ease back in gently, download all my holiday photos and plough through the mound of washing. I'm now starting to get a bit restless though and very aware of the fact that my two-week holiday has actually involved a 4-week break through which I haven't been earning anything. That's a month unpaid and of course, without the benefit of holiday pay. Hmmm ... swings and roundabouts, I suppose.

Powering back up

I arrived back from Marrakesh just after midnight last night after a 10-day holiday in Morocco and washed the thick coating of dust off my feet before climbing contently back into my own bed for a good, long sleep. Today I've been very glad of being freelance and enjoying the luxury of getting back up to speed slowly! It's always tough to switch your brain back into work mode after a break, but I think it takes just that bit longer the further you've been away from the norm. Going from haggling in the souks and avoiding being run over by donkey carts in the narrow alleyways of the Marrakesh medina yesterday afternoon to tackling a bulging inbox and getting my head back around grammar codes and run-ons today has been a rather surreal leap!

In fact, somewhere around lunchtime, I gave up on the idea of doing anything terribly productive today - my brain just isn't ready! So I've been doing a bit of mindless admin, putting on a few loads of washing and just generally settling myself back in. I've managed to deal with most of my inbox, although I've got three offers of new work - all of which look really interesting, but none of which I think I can fit in - that I've rather lamely put off replying to until tomorrow. Why does the good stuff always come along altogether in a flurry?!