I’ve been blessed to have had some considerable time off from the burdens of work, and spending a lot of that time getting many things accomplished.

With any slowing of work comes a lighter bank account. I knew this wound happen, but didn’t quite realize when it would happen. Now’s that time. So I have to think about getting back into the steady work routine.

The last time I worked the amount of hours that I need, I was always burned out and walking around like a zombie. Before I embark on being more available for work functions, I would like to work on fixing certain everyday functions of my life to make this experience more bearable.

I recently had a 5-day work stretch from Wednesday evening to Sunday morning. Because I had been out of that kind of routine for a while, I felt beat at the end of it. However, the reward was the next 2 days completely off from both jobs (which was extended to 3 after rearranging newspaper work to later in the week).

Sunday morning was a slow one because of the bad weather. Not quite awake yet, and needing to clear my head of itinerary ideas for the days off, I started my Casey’s shift sitting at the office desk with a blank piece of paper. I made a To-Do list on that paper which had about 40 items on it. Not included in that list was “take a day trip somewhere.” I traveled to Lincoln, Illinois — and I will write about this later.

Personal comfort has lately my No. 1 priority in life, while financial sustainability clocks in at No. 2. Personal comfort does not include waking up to a phone call Monday morning at 8:30 a.m. with a request to come to work for a couple of hours — the worst way to start my 3-day vacation.

One of the things that I would like to work on is to cut the number of chores from my future To-Do lists. This was simply too many things. During the 5 days I was working, I didn’t do a whole lot. This meant that the first day of my 3 days off was spent picking up 5 days worth of stuff.

Dishes will need to be done, but not if I can do them right away after eating.

The floors will need to be vacuumed, but not if I can prevent messes from happening — eating at the dining room table, taking shoes off at the door.

I think the big reason why I am so lax with keeping my house in order is because I have the mindset of the fact that no one really visits me, and I’m not having to worry about keeping up my appearance in front of people. I really should get into the mindset of doing things as if someone — someone special — is coming over. As if people are coming over.

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I also want to provide an update on searching for that big “void” in my life. I’m replacing it with some people.