A (Thurs)day in the life

4am: Wake up. Check the time. Wonder what I was dreaming about...? Zombies? No... But there was something. It escapes me.
6am: Wake up again thanks to alarm. Stretch a couple of times and finally get up after about twenty minutes of procrastination and bleary thoughts.
6:20am: The shower's still out of use (there's a leak somewhere that means water is getting through to the floorboards, and hence the ceiling of the ground floor) and is likely to be for weeks to come.
7:45am: After breakfast, getting dressed, making some lunch and catching the breakfast news I leave the house for the local train station (less than two minutes away, but I had to run). On the train I think about the day ahead and read some more "Tales Of The Dying Earth" for a bit.
8:35am: Arrive at uni after walk from Lime Street station. The rain only started as I crossed the edge of the campus, so I don't get too wet. First order of business on entering the office is to login and perform my daily ritual of checking email, reading blogs (quite a few these days) and completing the daily puzzle.
9:10am: Start work before I can procrastinate any further. Only have a little more work to do and then will have two chapters to hand to my supervisor for comments. Want to get the work done before teabreak (at 11), so all I have to do then is write a covering paper with some points that I think need addressing and any questions I have.
10:30am: Going well, almost done, and then my officemate arrives and I turn my back on the computer to have a chat.
11am: Oh look at that! Time for a break! Over tea and plain chocolate digestives we talk gossip, intrigue, moan about university red tape and admin and then finally concede that we should get back to work.
11:30am: Takes only a little while to finish the changes to the chapter, and then about a half hour to write the letter for my supervisor. The rest of the hour and a quarter before I hand it in to him is taken up with more small talk, sharing of news stories, some more departmental gossip and discussion of specs for laptops.
12:45pm: Print off work and hand in to supervisor; eat the tuna and spinach wraps I made for lunch and check the 17 webcomics that I have bookmarked (praise be for Firefox's "open all in tabs" button!).
1:15pm: Go to café with officemate for caramel shortcake and to talk some more about stuff. Then back to the office where I start my next chapter. It's an extension of the one I just finished, so it should come fairly easily. Aiming to have a draft complete by next Friday.
3:30pm: Have managed to get quite a bit done, but then my attention starts to wander. I check to see if some blogs have been updated through the day. I dash off a couple of emails, and start to think about what I might blog about.
4:30pm: Remember that my mum wanted me to pick up something from the art shop, and that I also have things I want to pick up (OK, comics). Leave early.
4:33pm: On the way to the art shop remember that I forgot to blog, forgot some emails I had to write and still didn't get to writing down the definitions for another chapter that I had intended to do last week. Sigh.
5:20pm: After picking up Chinese style stamps from the art shop, and comics from Worlds Apart, read comics on the train home.
5:45pm: Home. Finish reading week's comics and wonder how come the new run of the Ultimates can have turned into a fan-fictionish parody despite having one of the best writer's in comics and jaw-dropping artwork.
7pm: Dinner. Keep out of family disputes whilst enjoying salmon steaks and wholegrain rice, then wash dishes. Family go out to Tesco for something or other; in their absence I make a CD of music for a friend on my computer and sing along loudly to Tom Jones.
8pm: Watch a couple of episodes of Buffy whilst thinking about what I did during the day (and, a little guiltily, what I didn't do). Friend texts me a couple of times and I reply; remember that I am meeting them for lunch and smile.
10pm: Turn off TV, see what family are up to now and decide to call it a night.
10:17pm: What will I dream of tonight?

More soon.