April 7th, 2024
One week into April and I feel so much better than I did in March. Is March hard for other people, or am I just jinxing myself every year into having a bad month. Nevertheless, here's a little recap of my first week of April
Personal updates
Work was super intense this week. By the end of the week I felt that good-old freeze response kick in as the sound of Teams chats and emails made me want to cry. It started with preparing for a stressful meeting where I proposed a project to my boss, then a public meeting that went a little sideways, too much work that I can fit into 8 hours, and a couple of passive aggressive emails from a coworker (as expected).
This was also a week of great news too! My husband got into grad school!! Which we have been anxiously waiting to hear back about since last December. I am very proud of him and excited for our move. Thankfully we aren't moving far, and I should be able to keep my job! We both started to feel a little bit of anxiety now that reality is setting in and we've got to start planning for a pretty big life change.
I also started learning Japanese this week! I feel like I already have a good amount of the hiragana alphabet down, and I was able to recognize a few vocab words in the Tokyo Vice dialog, which was exciting! I can't help but notice that people don't say "thank you" very much in that show, lol. We are hoping to do a trip to Japan this summer, which I am very excited to start planning for in earnest!
Putting time into this blog this weekend was such a nice escape from all that work stress. Especially because the nastiest email came in at around 4:45. It always feels so bad when you put a ton of work in all week, but there's always that one thing that you didn't get to. It just wasn't a priority for me this week, and I communicated that! Ugh, I'm ranting about work again!
I feel like I should be thankful that work is always busy for me around this time of year, because the reason makes me feel a little proud. It's Earth Month! We joke on my team that every day is Earth Day for us because we manage a lot of climate adaptation projects at my workplace. Between organizing activities, giving talks, and keeping up with my daily work, it just turns into a bit of a flurry.
I am so excited about this blog though! It's only two days old and already feels like home.
Reading: The Garden of Seven Twilights by Miguel de Palol
The Garden of Seven Twilights is such a cool book! I actually started it over this week because I got sidetracked and forgot what was happening. I picked it up in a bookstore in Ann Arbor when we visited for Thanksgiving last year. I was just drawn to the thickness of it and the semi-post-apocalyptic setting. I'll be sure to update as I get further in!
Listening: The New Beyonce, duh!
I am loving Cowboy Carter! My favorite song is bodyguard!
Goals for this week
- Spend less money
- Learn the numbers in Japanese
- Have a better week at work
- Do a new moon wishing ritual, and continue to follow the lunar cycle