Weekend working

January is always hard for me, as I have to work for the first two or three weekends and also put in very long days as the bank puts together its end of year results. I resent every damn minute of it, and each year I make a belated New Year's resolution to find a new job that doesn't require me to start the new year from such a low point. Maybe this year....

So this morning, on a beautifully crisp sunny Sunday, as the rest of the family were still lounging in bed, I was walking to the tube station as the dawn rose.


By the time I came back home this evening the sun had gone down again, and my weekend had vanished.

Various family and friends regularly work one or both days on a weekend, and I really admire their good humour and acceptance. They're not half as grumpy and resentful as I am.

But I don't want to make January unbearable for G, C and O, so my way of getting through it reasonably cheerfully is to make sure I have lots of small things around to lift my mood.

• bars of posh chocolate - either small bars of milk chocolate studded with hazlenuts from Caffe Nero, bought on my way into the office and savoured with my afternoon cup of tea, or pieces from a large bar of Green & Black's as a restorative pick me up when I get home late in the evening.
• plans for a new sewing project, to be finished once work calms down a little - this year its going to be a patchwork lap quilt from Amy Butler's In Stitches with nice big pieces, that I will be able to finish in a couple of days.
• a good book or two on the go - at the moment its The Memory Garden by Rachel Hore and The Savage Garden by Mark Mills - and a pile of even more books waiting to be read.
• nights out - yesterday I went round to old friends for gossip, champagne cocktails and fancy homemade party food. I gulped down the champagne and G nobly drove me home later in the evening. There is another big evening out being planned for next Saturday as G and I celebrate our 11th anniversary.
• a holiday booked - we're going to one of these log cabins in February to blow the cobwebs away with a week's hiking and mountain biking.
• bunches of pretty flowers. I've no idea what the ones below are but I saw them at a florists on Friday and just had to have them - they look like paper flowers, all tightly bunched up. So lovely!