A Typical Work Day

Not that today is a typical work day. I’ll be in a library retreat the whole day. But I’m always interested in seeing what typical days are like for other people, and I thought today might be a good day to discuss that. Basically, I’m going to outline what a usual day looks like for me. I’m a creature of habit, and so the things I do from day to day are often the same things, right down to the time of day I do them. If you’d like to play along, I’d love having a similar run down from anyone else. Just a chance to see how other people run their lives. People can have all sorts of jobs and lifestyles, but in the end, it comes down to the same typical days. How different are they really?

Here’s mine.

• Wake up at 5:55am. Shower and eat breakfast (cup of raw oatmeal, uncooked, with milk and some raisins). Read scriptures while I eat. Check social media after that’s done. (I check FB and Twitter, my email, read Dilbert, check Slickdeals for anything I might want to buy, check my fantasy baseball team’s performance, read up on the Yankees game, check the Amazon deal of the day, and maybe the news. All on my iPhone.)
• Get to work at 6:45am. Catch up with my co-manager on what’s going on in the library and touch base on any important things that are coming up. I then head into my office and get my computer going. Two days a week, I have to open the building–turn on the lights and computers, check that everything’s in order, etc. While the computer gets going, I’ll check some news sites on my iPad. CNN, Deseret News, local papers, Gamespot, Magic the Gathering news, the weather.
• Work is a variety of tasks. I usually have a fair bit of email that needs answering, phone calls to make, and paperwork to get finished. I might have classes to teach or things to plan for the library or campus changes. I check technology and library blogs to see what new trends are upcoming. I usually have 1 or 2 meetings each day as well.
• 11am–Eat my snack. Almost always a banana. Exciting.
• 12pm–Lunch. I jog in place for exercise for about a half hour, then lift weights. All in my office while I watch Netflix with the door closed. (Yay for no windows to the main part of the library!) I blog around this time, as well, or at the very least I try to post whatever I blogged ahead of time.
• 1pm–Back to work. Other stuff I do includes library statistics, prepping for the classes I teach, communicating with faculty, answering technology issues that arise for staff or students, advising some students, helping staff the library desk.
• 4pm–I leave work to go home. I park as far away on campus as I can, in an effort to force myself to get more exercise. With walking and driving, it’s a 15 minute commute.
• 4:15pm–Get home and work on my writing for about an hour. If I really have my stuff together, I might have gotten to work early and gotten some writing done at work. But these days I typically haven’t.
• 5:30pm–Eat dinner with the family. We’re almost always all there. Half the time we eat at the table, half the time we eat while we watch something. Movies, Cutthroat Kitchen, Amazing Race. Whatever we’re all in the mood for.
• 7pm–I play with the kids some, or we keep watching something, depending. Minecraft, Magic, read to someone. Sometimes I’m just wiped after work, and I spend a while lying in my bed and cooling off. If I don’t get that time to wind down, I can be a bit of a jerk sometimes in the evening. I don’t like that about myself, but there you have it. Working on that.
• 8pm–Watch something with Denisa. MC is in bed, the other kids are reading and getting themselves ready for bed. We’ll fit in a movie or an episode or two of something. Sometimes this doesn’t happen until 9.
• 10pm–In bed, reading until I’m tired enough to go fall asleep. Lights are off, and I’m just reading my Kindle. As soon as I’m sleepy, it’s Kindle down and eyes closed. It doesn’t take me long to fall asleep if I’m in this rhythm.

And then I repeat the same thing the next day. There are some variances for weekly events. Denisa gets bread ready Tuesday and Thursday evenings. She sometimes goes out on Tuesday evenings to church activities or Wednesdays to church meetings. I go and play Magic with Tomas on Friday evenings. But for the most part, that outline above is my day, Monday through Friday. It’s nothing too thrilling, but I’m quite fond of it, personally. I like the routine, and I love the fact that what I do feels like it’s contributing to society. I’m helping students get degrees and be prepared to have successful lives. It’s nice to remember that when I’m frustrated with things that might pop up.

How different is my typical day from yours?