Not really convinced that this is a great idea, but thought I’d at least carry out a work day. I can’t imagine this being entertaining to anyone. The summary of yesterday was: I went to work and then I went to bed.
And if you are on some sort of reconnaissance mission, I should note that this is not representative of what it’s like for everyone at work, or even for me everyday, so don’t get that impression. It’s just busy right now.
Me at work yesterday
Day 2, Monday
6:00a. My alarm goes off and I’m woken from an incredibly deep sleep. It’s the second time in a while that I’ve slept so well. Probably because I was biking around yesterday and went to bed early. It was a really vivid dream starring lot of people from the past.
6:01-6:40a. I brush my teeth and get ready for work while listening to my audio book. I notice that only have 4 hours left of the 13-hour book, so maybe 2 days. Because I didn’t hit snooze I think I’ll get to make it to the bus without running. I used to live a 3 minute dash from the bus, but I moved to a location I thought was a 10 minute walk to the bus. But the month I moved, they moved the stop.
6:41a. I walk to work and I am lucky that I get most of the green lights. There a scattering of people on the street but I cross paths with only eight. A middle-aged woman with finally coifed hair that I suspect was done with rollers, a man digging in the trash with a pair of white underwear over his jeans, a man hunched over with a cigarette next a yellow bike and two sleeping men, A young man dressed for exercise with earbuds, a young woman who scurries across the street before the pedestrian light has switched, and a young man dressed for a semi-professional job.
6:55a. I’m get to the place where I wait, in front of the over-rated brunch place.
6:56a. The bus comes. The seat on the first floor in the back where I get the headache the least is taken so I sit on the behind the window. There is one more stop before we get on the highway for this bus.
7:04a. I publish what I wrote yesterday and start writing about this morning.
7:18a. The rocking of the bus makes me want to stop. I scan emails quickly for anything from the east coast that looks like it would be short to reply to. Meh. I listen to Snow Crash for the rest of the ride home.
8:10a There was a car accident and I arrive to work a little later. I’m so engrossed in the book, I miss the stop I mean to get off and take the next one in the middle of campus instead. I intend to bike over to the first building, but there are no bikes so I just eat at the nearest cafeteria. When I finish there are still no bikes so I end up walking the distance to my building. this is still ok because we’ve gotten to the juicer bits of the book where Hiro Protagonist is explaining everything he knows to another character. We all know this is a literary device though, to explain it to slow readers ;).
8:45a. Arrive at desk and drop off my stuff before going to make a cup of green tea.
8:50a. Start work. Emails are not too crazy today and I’ve limited my meeting so I actually spend a good amount of time figuring out some the flows on my design project that I’ve had to keep putting off for weeks. Miraculously, I am able to concentrate on this nearly un-interrupted until lunch time. This is largely by not checking my emails.
12:15p. I get lunch with a co-worker at a place about 10 minutes away. We exchange weekends, as you do at work. And talk about work load during this current sprint. I see someone pile a quarter of a basketball worth of sliced watermelon into their bowl and think “this is why we can’t have nice things!”
1:15p. Back to work. Only his time an engineer would like help figuring out the UX for something so I’m trying to catch up on what this setting is by reading the email. And since I’m working out the flow I find another thing I want to fix. And since I’m referencing the email he forwarded to me, I start seeing emails I could respond to. I end up roughly getting out a first draft and start responding to comments.
2:55p. An engineer asks if I want to try out the tutorial I designed. I do, but I feel like I should finish this one thing first, 30 minutes?….
3:02p. An enthusastic user tells me about his experience using our product. It’s a bug, but what a nice fellow.
3:34p. I am invited to a meeting but I decline to go so I can finish something.
3:48p. I am able to corner a PM and ask about the way something works that I don’t understand. He gives me more questions to ask other people.
4:00p. I met with the engineer to show me what he made for the tutorial. So cool that he put it together so quickly! Best team. Suggested some edits and then bounced between my three other projects because I kept remembering things I had to do or someone would comment. I also had a small bowl of cereal because I mostly ate vegetables during lunch and got hungry again.
5:30-5:50p. Meeting with people who only have time to meet now, I usually don’t meet this late. It was a brief and painless meeting, but I couldn’t go to the gym today like I planned.
6:55p. I get a small dinner from the cafeteria and eat it outside, scrolling through instagram briefly. I also look up a Quora post about the spam emails that look like they’re being sent from myself. Spoiler, they aren’t actually, they’re just made to look like that and there’s pretty much no way to stop it. I make a mental note to email my hosting provider (I do not).
7:14p. Back to work. I decide I’ll leave at 8:05. Plenty of time.
7:45p. I finish one of the things I was working and decide on my game plan for the other (after asking a bunch more questions). I think I could leave early because there are probably no bikes this late.
7:47p. Receive a comment from my manager about my flow and want to update them really quick…
8:00p. Dang it. Running late now. Hastily pack up my things and dash to catch the bus. There are no bikes until I get to the first stop and the bus has already gone, but I grab the bike and pedal as fast as I can, in a dress, to the last stop. I get there on time and the area smells like fertilizer.
8:12p. Board the bus, my favorite seat is taken again so I sit nearby. I realize I forget my headphones so I write this post instead of listening to my audiobook.
8:30p. Writing this post on the bus reminded me of an email I needed to send out so I did that.
8:59p. I get to this point of the document and I’m near my stop so I put away my computer…(very meta).
9:04p. I get off at the first close stop. It’s kind a seedier part of time, but I wanted to get off the bus as soon as possible because I was starting to get a headache. It’s pretty chilly because I’m just wearing a cardigan. But by the time I make it down the streets, up the hill to my apartment, and the set of three wobbly wooden stairs to the back door, I’ve gotten pretty warm. I always think about how I’m sure the stairs are going to collapse soon.
9:18p. I am in my room.
9:20p. My housemate thanks me for handling the internet so that it’s actually useable. I take a shower and brush my teeth. I read the revisions my friend has made to her cover letter. Looks good to me!
10:00p. Lay in bed. I thought about doing more stuff, but meh.
People talked to:
Smattering of people at work
Sarah, Katie, Igor, Vinita, Dina, Paul
No mention of Pokémon Go at all? Peculiar.
Clear oversight. I downloaded it on Sunday and used it on my mocks literally all day yesterday. Thank you for pointing this out.