lost hour

Tags

clocks go forward, Dublin, Ireland, lost hour, summer-time, timekeeping

At one o’clock this morning summer time arrived and made us all skip an hour to make the evenings longer and brighter. And while this may sound like a great idea as someone who tends to be always ten minutes late losing an hour can cause all sorts of havoc with my timekeeping.

Of course I wake up much later as my body clock has no idea that summer has come and just as I finish breakfast I realise lunch isn’t too far off – which means I’ll skip it.  So as I sit and correct the sun outside my door beckons me out and I know I won’t be able to resist, meaning I won’t get everything done today – the lost hour at night claiming time during the day.

I know of course in a day or two things will be back to normal and the lost hour will disappear until we regain it again in October, that one hour of extra sleep we all enjoy so much when the days grow darker and colder. But until then I play catch up on myself and  abandon my desk to enjoy a lovely sunny Sunday afternoon.

summer time tells me it’s one hour later than yesterday

summer schedule

Tags

Annie Dillard, quotes, sheduling, summer, summer-time, work life

As someone who has a very irregular schedule I am use to variety in my day to day life.  And I like it that way, I enjoy being flexible and allowing some days to take me where they wants to go. However since the summer has started and my regular blocks of teaching have dropped out of my calender for a while, I am finding too many days running away with my time and it is a little bit difficult to get some sort of schedule going.

My days are filled with bits and bobs but with very few deadlines to mark time passing I seem to have let whim lead the way. Now I love being whimsical and enjoy spontaneity and  chaos, but with the days dropping through the hourglass of summer too fast for me to catch, I need to ‘fess-up’ and get myself a little bit more organized.

I recently read this wonderful quote by American  author and Pulitzer Prize winner Annie Dillard, that made me stop and rethink how I have been scheduling my summer:

A schedule defends from chaos and whim. It is a net for catching days. It is a scaffolding on which a worker can stand and labor with both hands at sections of time.

I have never considered a schedule as a safety net, a scaffolding to balance along, a defender against procrastination. So now I am staring at my desk calendar and have started scheduling next week with more structure. I am making sure that I calculate enough time for each activity to give me some flexibility, but not too much to let me while away my summer.

finding my way back

Tags

Battle on the Bay, Bloom 2013, Dublin, Journalist Charles Bowden, photography, photos, quotes, summer, summer-time

After getting caught up in the exciting feeling of no commitments, warm sun in my face and sock-less shoes I skipped happily down the path of freedom. Somehow along the way I got lost in my hedonistic pleasure and pure joy of keeping my own time that other things got lost in the mix.

And before I knew it April turned into May was has now passed, too. But my lost five weeks have been filled with relaxing ad exciting ventures. I’ve been to a few exhibits, celebrated birthdays, met up with friends, learned how to make candles, wandered around Bloom (Dublin’s Garden Festival), participated in Dublin’s Writers festival, seem a few movies, fixed my bike, replanted my windowsills, bought a Berlin travel guide and been to Battle on the Bay (Kite-surfing competition on Dollymount Beach). Overall a successful, relaxing and wonderful few weeks.

But now I have found my way back to my desk, my head filled with ideas, plans and hopes of making them happen. So with four weeks left till I head out to Berlin I am back at my keyboard excited to follow my inspiration and hoping the sun will keep shining, enticing me out of the house and into the wonderful summery world of Ireland.

And with that said I am going to paint my tiny back yard today, turn the grey wall I see from my desk into a white wall reflecting the light. Hopefully it will inspire me to spend a few hours at my desk each day and encourage a few plants to grow, and my ideas as well.

For today I leave you with a few photos of my weeks gone by and the wonderful words of American  journalist and author Charles Bowden:

Summertime is always the best of what might be

Battle on the Bay

Kites in the Sky

Beach Bug

Knits for trees at Bloom

I found the Yellow brick road at Bloom

And they are here … or at least in Bloom

Beautiful poppies

losing time and water

Tags

Dublin, Dublin City Council, hot water bottle, inner clock, miscellaneous, photo, poet w h auden, quotes, random, summer mode, summer-time, thoughts, W.H.Auden, water

Tonight the clocks are jumping forward and we are all losing an hour of precious time.  And while I know we will get it back in October I do wonder where the hour goes in the meantime.

Does it take a break and relax for half a year or does it wander around the equator wondering what do to with its time? Or maybe this lost hour hoovers near us and makes things we don’t like seem longer. But where ever it goes I know I’ll be missing it tomorrow when I have an hour less sleep and a week ahead of me trying to get my inner clock adjust to the one on my wall.

But at the very least our time will be in summer mode unlike our weather that has decided to stay wintery for a little while longer. But the promise of our clocks will hopefully soon be fulfilled and the sun will be shining down on us in full force.

The other thing that I have been losing over the past few nights is water. While we have had lots of rain, sleet and even some smatterings of snow Dublin’s water reserves seem to be at an all time low. To counteract this issue Dublin City Council has been turning the water off over night, leaving me standing  in front of empty taps and waterless kettles.

Why DCC has decided to limit the flow of water over Easter is beyond me but every night at 10pm my tap runs dry and my hot water bottle stays cold and leaving my glass more tan half empty.  So tonight I will try and stay on top of my watery needs and fill a bowl or two. After all as the wonderful poet  W.H.Auden  once said:

Thousands have lived without love, not one without water

My tap is still lowing over … for now

summer time and home invasions

Tags

Dublin, family, German, humour, kids, love, mess, summer-time, travel

The Germans are coming and that in full force. In three hours my sister plus her two kids will be landing in Dublin airport and my homes invasion will begin. For four days the four of us will share my tiny home and that does scare me a little, I am still not even sure how and where we will all sleep and I think I will have to devise some sort of shower schedule! I do have  a tiny guestroom that doubles as a study,  but all it fits is a build in bed and a plank of wood attached to the wall disguised as a desk, and for the next few days this is where I think I’ll hide when I need a moment to myself.

I love my sister and her kids and am looking forward to spending time with them but the whirlwind of things that seem to clutter up everything in their wake is a complete other matter. As my niece and nephew have grown up the mess that they make has expanded. My gorgeous niece is now a teen and lives a life filled with accessories, fashion and those twilight dudes. My lovely, cuddly nephew is, unlike Pinocchio, a real boy… smelly runners, stinky socks and electronic stuff hover around him, filling the air with that very special boy flavour. And I know my sister has a few shopping trips planned, as there is not much that can beat the prices of Penny’s, so if you add in all those additional items, chaos is sure to ensue.

But not being able to see the floor for a couple of days and being unable to sit without having to remove obstacles first, is a small price I (at times begrudgingly) am happy to pay to spend time with the people I love. And I am sure they will be carrying some liquorice and other German goodies to lull me into a happy mood. Now all I need to do is get over my summer-time-jetlag to be able to enjoy the experience in full.

PS: If you don’t hear from me by Friday please send in the troops to check if I’m still alive