grumble.

[valis2]

I was given a task yesterday at the day job, and I pushed through a third of it. Last night I had an "a-ha" moment--I realized I could use the VLOOKUP function in Excel to cut off about a third of the remaining time involved in the project.

This morning I spent an hour and fifteen minutes fiddling with LOOKUP, VLOOKUP, and even INDEX/MATCH and could not get the bastard to work properly. (I have a feeling that it's because I absolutely have no choice about storing numbers as text in the document, and somehow, when it's trying to match them, it's either a) thinking the numbers for the array aren't "sorted" and therefore it balks, or b) the reference to a cell is making the texty-number all sad and useless.)

So I was thirty pages short of finishing. I volunteered to come in tomorrow, thinking that they wouldn't bother with it, but they want me to. Sigh. (If I had just not spent that time trying to work smarter, lol...)

My two options:

1) Go in and work a half day, which (theoretically) leaves me time to do my errands, like going to the post office, working on Etsy/eBay stuff, packing boxes, buying pads, and going to the grocery store. However, then I have to drive in by myself (my sister is working a full day) and that's a big gasoline draw. And I'm so damned tired and sleepy because I've been writing (er, Riptide stuff) and I'm all full of story thoughts and I can't sleep, and my period started today, so I'm even more tired, and I don't want to get up and go in.

2) Go in and work a full day to save on gasoline and make some $. House, after all. But I'm so tired. And then I wouldn't have time for the errands. Poor Husband would have to do the post office stuff and he's already been running ragged this week. Plus, I'm on my period and I don't want to sit there all day during the worst day of my period. wah.

I've decided on 1. Plus, I can run and drop something off to a friend whose store is very near work, and I think she'd be pretty geeked about it.

*yawn*

Comments

[drusillas-rain.livejournal.com]

um, this may sound a bit odd, but, how do you schedule your day? I've been at home for 2 months now, trying to start-up my consulting business, and I've worked a day or two (or week) here and there since, and I've been meeting with a lot of people, and I feel like I'm spinning in place not getting stuff done. I'm still not getting any writing done, I'm not really reading very much. So, it could be just me needing to learn to work better, but, if you have any advice you can share, or if you have a particular method of organizing yourself that you use that you wouldn't mind sharing, I'd very much greatly appreciate the advice!

(heh, sorry for the run-on sentences O_o)

[valis2.livejournal.com]

Y'know, I asked that question myself on LJ some time ago, but now I can't find the entry.

I'm still trying to work out a happy balance, but at this point I'm still flailing. Generally it works out like this:

*get up, bathe, get dressed
*eat breakfast and read LJ/catch up on stuff
*work on phone calls or things that need to get done during the day (photography, ordering supplies, appointments, that sort of thing)
*go to post office at 2 pm to do my post office run, and combine it with picking up bubble wrap/trip to the grocery store/whatever
*snack and a little LJ
*either craft at the desk while watching TV/DVDs or talking on the phone with friends, or work on listings, or scan stuff
*dinner with Husband
*continue whatever I was doing before or jump to a new fun thing
*after 9 pm--that's my time to write or whatever

I feel weird about giving advice, because I'm so bad at this stuff, but to me, the most important thing is the ratio. I'm still working it out, but there has to be a ratio of fun stuff/administrative/networking/appointments/creating/shipping/etc. Once you have a good ratio in place, it's helpful. Deciding to work during certain hours is a good thing if you're someone who likes a set schedule.

I have weekly Excel spreadsheets that show a strip of cells at the top that correspond to the days of the week. In each box I write the main event(s) of that day, such as appointments or working at the day job, or shows.

Under that is an eBay checklist, with spots where I can write in the ending day and the listing day, and places where I can check off that I've scanned the items, or transferred the pics to my website. Under that is a similar Etsy list. And another bar for packaging and shipping.

There's a bar containing a checklist for shows, in case I'm doing a show that week.

Then there's a mundane bar with things like laundry and Paypal transfer.

There's a bar for phone calls I need to make.

Then there's a big box full of blank spots where I can write all the weird little tasks I have left to do. When it gets closer to the end of the week, I transfer the things that are left to next week's list.

Please feel free to ask me any questions! :)