Living to work, or working to live?

A few weeks ago I mentioned to my line manager that I felt as though I could do with a fresh challenge, if anything appropriate happened to come her way. Not long after, she suggested that if I was willing to take on some work for a different department that could help both me and them - and since I'm always keen for something new, I leapt at it! I finally got access to everything I needed late last week, and since then have thrown myself at it.

I'm obviously not going to go into details here, to preserve anonymity (such as it is!), but the best analogy I can come up with is that I was presented with a bowl of spaghetti, and have now untangled it and can start plaiting the strands together. Yes, I know that the idea of plaiting spaghetti is where this falls apart, but hopefully you get the picture. It's been a rewarding week, but utterly exhausting.

And alongside this, last weekend Not-Teen departed for three months on foreign shores, Teen is desperately keen to go kayaking at every opportunity, the dog needs walking, and food needs buying! Fortunately Mr B is an absolutely hero and in recent years particularly has taken on far more than an equal share of the household tasks. Even with his help and support, it's been an exhausing time mentally and emotionally as well as physically. Unfortunately everything going on and the desire to spend time with Not-Teen while she was still here has meant that my much-valued bedtime routine has rather gone out of the window - so the priority for the next few weeks is getting that firmly re-established.

So where is that line between living to work and working to live? When I'm particularly enjoying my job and getting such a sense of reward from doing it well and being appreciated it's hard to hold to the lines of stopping on time (or only slightly late!). Maybe I need to keep signing up for evening paddling sessions to make sure I do get away from my desk promptly, helping both my mental and physical health at a single stroke!

I'm still enjoying geocaching when I get the opportunity, so will try and make sure I have time for that at the weekend. On Sunday, Teen and I will be taking part in a kayak race (as a pair in a K2, testing familial love to the limits!) so will see if we can find at least a couple of caches down near the race venue. So although it's been too warm for me to manage much walking through this week, the weekend's exertions should hopefully compensate a bit...