No 40 winks for 40 hours

It's been a pretty busy month. I came home for Bs birthday at the end of March and as usual tried to do way too much in one week. I am back again (4 weeks later) and this week I am trying to keep things pretty relaxed. I find these weeks at home tiring - I still have masses of work to get through, often with evening calls to dial into, and yet I feel obliged to pack one month's worth of socialising into them. Some of my friends are dating new people (or even getting engaged!) and I haven't met them yet. Friends are having babies who are walking and talking when last I saw them they were crying and burping. My brothers and sister are growing up too fast and a couple of hours each month doesn't really let me stay connected to them.

I guess this comes down to the trade-off - I wanted the adventure of a new place, a new job, new people. For every new friend I have in Singapore, I am drifting quickly away from an existing friend in Sydney.

And then comes the decision - do I manically try to see everyone while I am home for 1 week a month? Or do I just appreciate the friends I do manage to see and the time I have with B? So this week I am going for the latter. No pressure, no obligation - let's just wait and see.

My main stressor is not the above social consideration, but the masses of work that I have to do combined with the little motivation that I have. More and more I think I am not suited to this project management stuff - I don't work well in chaos. Or is it just the chaos of this project and will a different environment make all the difference?

I had a shocker (Aussie slang) of a week last week - with a big meeting on Wednesday and some late running devlierables causing an all-nighter. I then had my team coming over for dinner to farewell some team mates heading back to India. At 11pm I calculated (albiet with difficulty) that I'd been awake for 40 hours.

To brighten up this post, here are some photos from a Sunday morning kayaking and walking with some guys from work.