The Dip

I'm in the middle of a very dreary dip. Work has become a treadmill. I go in, do my thing, and nothing really seems to happen. Organizational upheaval has prevented some changes that may have given my relationship with my job a jolt, but it's hard to say how long that shock would have kept me engaged with the work. It will be nice to get my bonus, but I'm just not excited about my work these days. I'm bored. I'm tired of dealing with the same old things over and over again. I went for change last year and was jilted in both of my attempts. I can keep treading water for a little while longer, but it's getting harder and harder to show up and appear engaged. 

My reading life is in a dip too. I am persevering with Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell. I'm not quite two thirds of the way through the book. It's not boring and hard to get through anymore, but it's not a particularly fast read. I made bad decision when I went with Boy's Life on my phone. I wisely paired long physical books with short ebooks last year. That successful strategy left me with few easy read ebooks remaining in my library (which was why I was hoping to see the Bond books go on sale towards the end of last year). Boy's Life is a mediocre read. I'm very close to giving up on it. I just can't get all that excited about reading it. I'm only about a third of the way through it. Maybe I will make more progress on it once I'm finished with the massive JS & Mr N. Starting a new book with that one unfinished just doesn't sound appealing. I'll probably keep at it. I have to read it eventually anyway. 

Aside from missing my step target yesterday, I achieved every one of my weekly fitness goals last week. Three trips to the gym to lift, two rowing sessions (Wednesday morning and Sunday), three runs (I cut my Saturday run short to save my body, I don't want to ramp up my mileage too fast), ab work five days of the week, and at least 10,000 daily steps. My success in this area is impacting my reading pace. The additional Tuesday and Friday workouts take a big bite out of my reading time. I was expecting this, but it's still kind of hard for me to see that reading time slip by. I will see my reading time shrink again if I can get myself to bed earlier. That's the last piece of getting my fitness plan fully activated. I'm not getting to bed early enough. I'm also not sleeping well. I wake up and have trouble getting back to sleep. This is a new problem for me. I think I know what may be causing it and how I can make it better. We'll see if anything changes once I start addressing the possible origin of my disturbed sleep cycle. 

I've decided to weigh myself on Tuesdays. I was 224.4 last Tuesday. We'll see what the increased workouts did to my weight tomorrow morning. My appetite was crazy last week. I managed to control myself pretty well during the week, but may have been a little too free during the weekend. The scale will tell the tale soon enough. (Why Tuesday? It's my off day.)