Converging Tasks

FB sent me a memory reminder from two years ago.  At the time, I had been making preparations for Thanksgiving, but several other projects needed some juggling at the same time.  For some reason the latter half of November might emerge as my busy season in retirement. My Thanksgiving menu has taken form, ingredient list available, with next step to confirm what I have and what still needs purchase. But before that I committed to a medical presentation, now completed except for the thank-you notes.  My monthly Jewish donations come due.  Monthly financial status review precedes Thanksgiving.  I have a Medscape column to compose and submit, a few more OLLI classes before the semester concludes.  Right after Thanksgiving we have Hanukkah with my wife's birthday and daughter's visit during that interval.  And then a somewhat overdue vacation that still needs preparation.  Somewhere in that interval I need to establish a new safe deposit box and decide what goes in it.  

No single project seems daunting but their accumulation in a short time definitely alters the time flow of retirement.

Partially Done

On transcripts professors had the option of deferring a grade in favor of designating a course Incomplete when a make-up exam or paper had not been completed.  That almost never happened.  Yet it frequently happens as I juggle my semi-annual initiatives with my ongoing daily or weekly chores.  My newest writing project for the New England Journal Fiction Contest took multiple stages and revisions, now ready for editing and mandatory word reduction but won't be complete until submitted within deadline.  Making my home's lower level suitable to invite guests also comes in stages.  Intermediate steps are vital to the outcome though disruptive.  Laundry gets done by type of clothing, never really fully done but often close.  Most of the things I pursue, from reading the  Quran to learning my next Torah reading require increments of effort, eventually completed where there are firm endpoints, never really completed when, like fishing or exercise the end target lacks definition.

On my daily task list I try to designate those items that are finite, even when part of a larger purpose.  I know when my blood pressure has been taken or when the herb pots have received their day's attention.  Other projects are designated as completable, they will not return to the list once checked off.  Things like getting the car inspected or making travel reservations, those one and done items.  They may not be the most important in any day but the satisfaction of completion without return enhances their priority.  I could use more of those but the big projects that prove most gratifying nearly always come in additive stages.

Accomplished

Soreness has overcome my large muscles.  While I probably could do a reduced intensity treadmill session, maybe even should do, I opted a second consecutive recovery day following two days of driveway snow removal that maybe would have been better delegated.  Yet getting the snow cleared by hand with a shovel over several paced sessions gave me a significant measure of accomplishment, one worth some soreness that will run its course.  I produced some other achievements.  Apple Walnut Pie takes some organization.  I have acquired enough experience with this by now to take out all ingredients, separated by crust, filling, and topping.  I measure what I will need for each, combine what I can to minimize containers that need washing later, then make the crust in a food processor.  Adding liquid sometimes goes well, sometimes leaves me with a sticky blob, but always better when chilled for a bit.  This time it rolled out easily on a granite pastry board, transferred to a porcelain pie plate more easily than usual, and I remembered to prick the crust after it was in the pan and trimmed to size.  Preparing the apples has also improved with practice.  I know to use five moderately large ones, peeled and then cut one at a time before going on to the next.  I halve each, as it lets me see where it needs to be cut to avoid the core, then slice.  Add to premixed custard in my biggest bowl, then dump all into the crusted pie plate.  Then high oven for ten minutes, followed by moderate oven for 35 minutes.  This time I checked the crust halfway and shielded it with foil, as it typically overcooks.  For the topping I usually use my minifood chopper but decided to take a chance with the larger food processor instead.  All ingredients except walnuts just get whirred a bit.  Walnuts placed in sandwich bag, then pounded with a heavy can of tomato sauce.  For the final fifteen minutes it gets distributed atop the partially baked pie.  It came out just right this time.  

This effort creates a few racks of milchig dishes, which I also scrubbed in pre-determined portions.

Snow removal and baking are usually started and completed on the same day, this time over two days.  That is not true of larger projects that progress one stage at a time over weeks to months.  Without an end point, they become impossible to fulfill.  I set a reading schedule, allotting six months but always completing before that.  The rules have been and still are one audiobook, one e-book, one traditional book distributed over a novel, a book of Jewish theme, and one of general non-fiction.  All done.  What Retirees Want by Ken Dichtwald as an audiobook which I used for a lecture, The Great Partnership by Rabbi Jonathan Sacks as a traditional book, and O Pioneers by Willa Cather which I secured as an e-book from the public library's hoopla service.  All completed five weeks into the calendar year.

There is much to be said about either setting a challenge, as the reading or pie, or having one imposed as snow removal.  All create a feeling of having accomplished something highly tangible.  I can drive where I want because of the sessions with the snow shovel, enjoy the pie for dessert with milchig dinners, have ample kitchen capacity with washed utensils, gave a suitable lecture from the audiobook, understood Jewish philosophy better from one of the masters, and focused on fictional character development by reading a classic.  And at least with shoveling, sometimes I need a reminder that I have that useful personal attribute of Grit, the insight to segment a project that takes more than one step and the tenacity to pursue each of the steps as part of a completed whole.

Tackling Projects

Some initiatives are little with no excuse for not doing them.  Each Monday I measure my waist with a tape measure and my weight with an electronic scale, then later in the week record the results and a comment on diet and exercise progress in a bound notebook.  My waist has been static within one-half inch for a few years but I measure it anyway.  My weight varies within a kg for a few years but failure to reduce it and those paragraphs of where I fell short probably helps keep it static when the natural history might be rising.

Some projects are big and have deadlines.  Each month I am contractually committed to present an essay on Endocrinology, submitted the final days of each month without fail.  Approaching the end of the month.  I've chosen a topic and an approach to it, could use some minor research, then write it on time.  I have a deadline for submitting medical expenses for reimbursement.  The process can be tedious but I have the data.  And taxes come due once a year.  My wife has more attention to detail than me.  Once these are done, I have a respite, monthly for my article, annually for taxes and this time forever for health set-asides which disappeared with my retirement last summer. 
Some projects are big and have no deadline.  Stephen Covey in his 7 Habits of Highly Successful People called these Quadrant II initiatives, things that are important, or at least have been assigned importance, but have no deadline, and sometimes no end point.  So my weight reduction goal drags on for each six month interval.  It is important, never achieved, but its pursuit has kept my exercise schedule afloat with some benefits other that weight.  I want to review my finances each month but never have, as I pay an expert to keep up with this.  I will this week now that I have ready access to the data, one of the intermediate steps to this ongoing project.  Each six months I create an initiative for my house.  Remodeling my kitchen got done.  Now I am making a dormant room, intended as our study and later computer room into my retreat.  It has a deadline, self-imposed with no consequences for failure to meet it, meaning it really has no deadline.  Is it important?  Having my dedicated space probably is more want than need.  Pride of accomplishing something may be what is most important about this project.  It is those Quadrant II's, things that have no deadline like health maintenance, retirement planning, periodic vacations, gratifying hobbies that pay off the most but become subordinate to the urgent. 

Today's to-do list, always far in excess of what I can realistically do, has a lot of Quadrant II's, noted with green highlighter.  It has some urgencies which I do not note with highlighter but don't need to be.  Avoiding the negative consequences of missed deadlines usually does not need a reminder.

Semi-Annual Projects

Two weeks to go into the calendar year and I've not really done much in the way of thinking about the next six months and what I would like to accomplish and why.  Traditionally I have six projects, all doable, but only the ones with firm deadlines generally reach fruition.  Same this time.  I finished my ABIM requirements largely because I did not have the option of not completing them.  For the other five projects:  my weight is the same, I did no estate planning, my bedroom sanctuary made some headway but it is a long way from a man cave, my skill with my iPod is the same and I blog less with no interaction.

This time I need to reassess projects in view of better stability where I am now and for some post-career time arising in the foreseeable future.  I do not want to put any projects at work on the list other than to enhance my office environment as well as make some revisions to my work space at home.   I would like to deal with clutter at home.  Usually there is a home project among the six.  Usually this involves a regional approach to the house, selecting one room for upgrade.  This time I would prefer a mixed regional/ systemic approach, decluttering the entire first floor which includes the living room, dining room, kitchen, family room and laundry as well as an entrance hall.  The barrier has always been dealing with paper and with an insatiable need for storage.  The secondary barrier is that the paper is not entirely mine so I cannot make decisions on tossing things into the recycling bin or shredder unilaterally.

What I can do unilaterally is allocate some recreation time on the weekend which I think I am going to do one weekend per month, setting it aside for a day trip or perhaps an overnight respite.  Retirement and beyond needs some attention.  Making more money comes at the expense of my discretionary time so I have neglected financial reviews, estate planning, Long Term Care insurance, settling my father's estate, living wills to say nothing of how I will devote large blocks of time when there are no appointments to keep or assigned tasks to perform.  Right now I have to designate Me Time.  Not that far into the future there is likely to be an overabundance of Me Time with no current provisions for taking advantage of this.

So for the next couple of weeks, the yellow pad will need a few notations, then the final six projects get put into writing to be worked on if not exactly brought to fruition.