If you are a newsletter subscriber and you actually read my updates every week (thank you, seriously) then you know that I have recently been on deadline with my first draft of book two. As much as I complain about deadlines and being on deadline, I honestly love them and need them in my life. I am someone who needs the pressure of a deadline to get things done. I need the fear of being late and/or being a disappointment hanging over me (which is maybe something to explore in future therapy sessions). But even though I know I need them, I’m always very stressed around deadline day, and this particular deadline day came along with the kid going back to school (which normally would be a cause for celebration but now thanks to COVID gives me major anxiety) and a wedding to coordinate (aka my “real” job). And so I thought I would keep track of what my day looked like in case you were curious.
6:30 Drag my already exhausted ass out of bed
6:40 Drag my tired kid’s ass out of bed and get him ready for school
7:10 Walk the three blocks to school, drop kid off with a hundred reminders to keep his mask on and wash his hands
7:30 Arrive back home, check my emails, pack up my stuff for the day, get dressed and ready
8:30 Head out, stop to pick up snacks and coffee
9:00 Get on the freeway for the drive from my house in Anaheim to Los Angeles (about 30 miles and anywhere from 1-3 hours travel time)
9:50 Arrive at hotel where I’ve booked a work room for the day (I did not know this was a thing until earlier this year, but Resort Pass is an app that lets you book work rooms, conference rooms, pool cabanas, all kind of amenities at various hotels and it is my favorite thing ever–in this instance I booked this room to help avoid traffic and give me a place to work that wasn’t out among the masses)
10:00 Head up to my room, get all my stuff unpacked, get settled
10:10 Eat some breakfast
10:20 Begin my final read through of my draft before I send it in to my editor (I had about 120 pages to give one final pass)
10:50 Pause to answer some wedding related emails, while I’m distracted post on Insta
11:00 Attention back on my read through
11:20 Screen break which mostly consists of me looking at my phone instead of my computer
11:30 Write a blog post
12:05 All my attention back on my read through
12:50 Read through finished! Send draft to my agent and editor, along with a doc of questions I already have about revisions
1:05 Scroll through Twitter and stumble on the trailer for the new season of Real Housewives of Salt Lake City!!!!
1:10 Snack break and some reading time (at the time I was reading The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid which was fucking phenomenal)
2:15 Get prepped and ready for wedding rehearsal
2:50 Leave the hotel and head to the wedding venue (which is six miles away)
3:20 Arrive at the wedding venue, sit in my car listening to murder podcasts since I am very early
3:45 Head into venue to chat with my wedding venue friends
4:00 Wedding rehearsal starts
5:00 Wedding rehearsal ends, head back to the hotel to wait out the terrible Friday evening rush hour traffic
5:30 Arrive back in my hotel room, enjoy some more reading time and a snack that ends up being dinner (honestly, I didn’t expect to finish my draft so early in the day so all this uninterrupted, peaceful reading time was a gift)
7:30 Pack up all my stuff and check out of the hotel
7:40 Back on the road, heading home
8:30 Arrive back at home, say hi/goodnight to the kid
9:00 Jump in the shower
9:30 Make some final changes to some wedding paperwork stuff I need for the actual wedding the following day
10:00 Crawl into bed and watch Resort to Love (so good!) on my iPad
12:00 Time for bed!
As far as deadline days go, this one was particularly packed! But I survived, and the wedding the next day went great, and now I just have to deal with the dreaded wait while my editor reads my book and hopefully decides it doesn’t suck! I hope you enjoyed this peek into my life, feel free to let me know if you have any questions!
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