Do You Map Your Week Out on Monday?

I’ve dubbed Monday, Monday Map Day.  The first thing I do Mondays is map out my week of To Do’s.  This is the beginning of the list that will probably grow as the week progresses.  

1. Pre-write and schedule Blogposts for the week. Very important as I’ve committed to blogging daily for the BlogHer July Challenge.
2. Outline or hand draft new essay/query for my Wednesday WriteNow 2-hour session at Lister Hill Library.
3. Finish reading/reviewing Theodora Goss’s ARC of her new book: Songs for Ophelia. Started it Saturday while icing my injured right hand.  Making notes was a challenge.
4. Paint.  Add new layer to paintings in progress. 
5. Add hangers to finished paintings, photograph and post to Etsy.  FU with Genie and Ree for 2 of them.
6. Research markets for essay WIPs
7. Polish 2 WriteNow projects and submit to magazines.
8. Take Mom to Doc and day out on Thursday.

Moving on to Tuesday and hoping this list doesn’t get too much longer. 

What’s the first thing you do on Monday?

Sabbat Sunday

Sabbat Sunday - At the most literal of definitions, we have:

1. A day of rest, and
2. The Day of the Sun.

Latin Sabbatum (literally a day or rest, religious connotations came later), Ancient Greek σάββατον (sábbaton),
 from Hebrew שַׁבָּת (shabát,), from Wicca (sabbat).

Originally ‘a day of rest’,  for most religions it is a day of fasts, of don’ts and other obligations.

For others it is a day of feast and celebration of the cycles of the earth and her peoples, and that is why I prefer Sabbat.

I prefer celebration to deprivation (I always fast on Mondays).  This day of the sun awaits, and I’m off to enjoy every minute of it.

Mañana y’all

Keep It Simple Saturday - KISS

It’s keep it simple Saturday – KISS.  I have no chores to do, no serious cooking to do.

Even when I had a husband, a child and a 5-day a week, 8-5 job, I always kept my weekends simplified down to point that I could:

• Do what I want when I want
• Go where I want or
• Do nothing at all 
• Hang out on the balcony reading and sipping wine

It just takes a little planning and a few rules of the road. Here are mine.

Chores posted on the kitchen calendar and now in my iPhone calendar.

1. Monday – Vacuum/Dust (usually evenings when I get home, dinners in oven on – I can produce a damned good meal in under 30 minutes)
2. Tuesday – Laundry (drop dry cleaning on way to work/wash clothes after work)
3. Wednesday – Clean and mop kitchen and bathroom
4. Thursday – Cook and freeze larger recipes in portions for weekend and following week’s dinners.
5. Friday – Cat box cleaned, Trash & Recycle to alley. (morning before 5-mile morning walk)

Rules to observe daily:

• Put it back – if you take it out, put it back in its place.
• Tidy it up – if the couch pillows are in disarray straighten them.
• Make the bed before leaving the bedroom. (when married, last one up makes bed)
• Put clothes away.  When you take off clothes, hang it up if clean, put dirty in hamper if dirty.
• Rinse and put dishes in dishwasher immediately on finishing meal. (I kept rinsing dishes, pots, utensils as I went in food prep, and we’d clear the table together

Different families have different needs, so you list will be different from mine.  My list is more manageable now that it’s just the cat and I, but I keep to it religiously.  I love my guilt-free weekends of  dolce far niente.

Do you have any shortcuts that make your life easier?

Happy of 4th of July

For my NaBloPoMo | BlogHer participation I’d planned on making Fridays – Foodie Friday as that’s the day I have traditionally decided what I would eat for the entire weekend so I didn’t have to bother with cooking and could concentrate on writing and/or painting.  I’d put on a crockpot of something deliciously fun: white chili, roast, whole chicken.  I’d prepare a triple recipe of tuna salad for lunch and save the rest for later, or a large frittata (quiche w/o the crust) for breakfast and save the rest for the weekend.  You get the idea.

 

This practice began when I worked in that concrete jungle I designated as Dilbertville.  I’ve since retired from that jungle to write and paint and collect my ‘entitlement’, but still find it helpful to prepare food I love and can eat for days for the weekend and longer without thought or preparation other than putting it on the plate. 

 

Ah, but this is the 4^th of July, and I will shortly be off to John and Karyn Stalcup’s wonderfully restored Southside house for their annual 4^th of July party, so I will prepare my ‘covered dish (aka Ziploc container) to contribute to the feast. 

 

I’ve decided on an orzo pasta salad.  I cooked the orzo pasta al dente in salt and a pinch of savory; scalded and shocked a bag of Publix pre-cut bagged stir fry vegetables adding a few of my own (I did chop them into smaller pieces); into the pasta and veggies I mixed in a  simple vinaigrette I whipped up (white balsamic and malt vinegars, 1 tsp, of honey, extra virgin olive oil, spicy mustard, dash of salt, pepper, cayenne.  It’s chilling in the fridge as I sip wine and finish reading a book I started on Thursday. 

 

I’ll be walking the 7-8 blocks to the party.  I never un-park my car on the 4^th of July for a number of reasons.

1. I’ll be drinking there and here and there along the way back home.
2. I have many friends in the ‘hood, and there are lot of places to stop and visit and sip along the walk back home.
3. People come in from all over the city to visit and to watch the ‘Thunder on the Mountain’ fireworks show atop Vulcan’s Red Mountain that go off around 9pm tonight, so traffic is the proverbial ‘bitch’.
4. Walking home is faster and more entertaining that the gridlock of driving with all the suburbanites trying to get back out of town.
5. Many of the drivers on the road have imbibed far too much to be driving and I’ve no desire to run into them nor have them run into me. 
   Plus:
   
6. I like to walk and enjoy every bit of this unique neighborhood on this my favorite holiday.

Happy 4^th of July y’all.