The Halfway Point

Well, it's the halfway point of the month, and I'm halfway through my first month in my new job, so I thought I'd do a little post about how I'm faring.

Budgetwise, I'm not doing so great, as already most of the budgets are overspent, some by quite a bit, some by just a little.  I have still got money left for food for the next two weeks though and I'm trying hard to empty the freezer, so am buying as little new food as possible these next two weeks. Hopefully, I might just scrape through and still save as much off my overdraft as I'd hoped (i.e. £150) despite all the added expenses of going out to work this month.

On the job front, I'm two weeks into the temporary contract and am finding my feet a little more at work.  I still find it difficult to manage some of the younger members of the team, but am trying to be a bit better at delegating.  A lot of the time I tend to do things myself, as it is easier than standing around listening to excuses or looking at blank faces, but I know this is unsustainable and I need to get others to help with the jobs that are less popular.  It's a learning curve that I knew I would face from the moment I accepted the job.

On the positive side, the sorting room is looking a lot more organised and much of the backlog in there has been processed, so it is gradually becoming a lot less overwhelming, although the rate at which donations come in and the clothes are replaced on the shop floor is still a big challenge, as many more items have to be sorted, prepared and put out each day than I'm used to.

I find that I enjoy working on weekend days a little more, when there are far fewer volunteers and the commute to work is much quicker on the bus, due to no-one venturing out in London early on a Saturday morning. When I get to the shop I can work without the many distractions of supervising a large number of volunteers and it is the one day that I am able to make a cup of tea and drink some of it. (I never drink it all!) This does have the down side, however, that with less (wo)manpower, fewer items get put out in the shop, as you have to complete the whole process on your own .

On the home front, the cleaning has slipped a bit. I just didn't have the energy to clean the bathroom last Wednesday, so I'm carrying that job over to today, when I will be doing my Weekly Home Blessing.  I don't think rooms will be as deeply zone cleaned going forward, but so long as I keep on top of the main jobs, doing something is better than nothing. I am now beginning to understand that it's not necessarily time, but energy that is lacking when you go out to work, especially when the job is very physically demanding. The mind is willing, (sometimes) but the body isn't on the days when I'm not at work.

On the decluttering and simplifying front, I haven't really done a whole lot.  I did go through the book shelf in the sewing room the other day and pulled out a dozen books I no longer want to keep. I also went through LB's book shelf and pulled out another few books she didn't want too. I can't see there being a large number of items decluttered this month, but you never know, I might get a second wind in the latter half of the month.

With regard to the garden and allotment, I have managed to do occasional visits to water. The rain we had last week helped a lot, as it reduced the need for visits.  I did spend a couple of hours on the plot yesterday, weeding and harvesting.  I got about half way round before coming home.  I'll probably try to get back there again towards the end of the week, energy levels allowing. We've got quite a few vegetables from the plot waiting to be eaten now, which is good. I'll do a separate post about this.

We had a lovely day at Wimbledon last week. We watched a Men's Doubles quarter final and a Mixed Doubles match and then had a wander around the outside courts to watch some wheelchair tennis and some of the youth matches. We tried to get on Henman Hill to watch the end of Johanna Konta's match with Venus Williams on Centre court, but it was just too busy and there was nowhere left to stand, so we went back to our seats in Court One.

We did manage to meet up with my friend from the gym, who had tickets for the same court on the same day and we sat watching with her and her friend for the last couple of hours which was nice. Attending Wimbledon is a lovely day out, but the journey home is a long one for us on the Tube and quite exhausting. We got home at 9pm.

I hope you're having a good month so far.