The novelty has worn off

It was reported yesterday that big banks JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America are limiting their employees to only working 80 hours a week.

Go them! Heroes!

Working 16 hours a day is very civilized. So generous to be giving their employees eight hours a day to commute and sleep!

I don’t care how much you’re being paid – that’s not living.

Working full-time is a punish at the best of times. I’ve been doing it since I was 17 … almost 40 years … and the novelty has worn off.

I would happily retire tomorrow if I didn’t have so many cruises booked that need to be paid off.

My day job is exhausting. I edit the corporate website, write the corporate LinkedIn posts, edit a weekly newsletter, write media releases and recently – crazily – agreed to edit the annual report.

So. Many. Words.

So. Much. Typing.

After making dinner I switch over to writing Drinks Digest stories.

I hit the wall this week. No energy left for creative thought, just cut, paste and repeat.

But I needed a lead story for my Drinks Digest newsletter, so I threw together one about a viral cocktail at the US Open … as in it being very popular on social media, rather than it causing medical issues.

I woke up the next morning knowing it wasn’t really a lead story. It was also badly written due to how bleary I was the night before. So I tidied it up and quickly searched around for something else. I stumbled across a media release about an Australian RTD company that just scored their big break into the American market.

Ace. Dropped that into the newsletter first thing, pressed send and got on with my day job.

It felt very Groundhog Day.

I am crap at saying no to more work and wearily agreed last week to explore giving up half of my weekends to a drinks project. I am praying that comes to naught.

As for all those cruises on my credit card … You know you’ve jumped the shark when your travel agent wants to take you out for a drink.

Now there’s a phrase I never thought I’d utter: “my travel agent wants to take me out for a drink”.

I mentioned it to my PR friend Shae at Penny’s Hotel earlier this week and she said: “Your WHAT?”

I don’t think young people have travel agents these days. I didn’t have one for many years, I just sorted everything out myself online.

But travel agents are quite the thing among cruise fanatics.

We acquired Annalize at a Ponant information night after running into a group of people who were on our New Zealand cruise.

They raved about Annalize and insisted we meet her, saying she was the best in the business. And she came in very handy almost immediately, pointing out that we’d reserved the wheelchair-accessible cabin on our upcoming cruise. Much as I like a big bathroom, I’d rather my cruising didn’t include a shower curtain or stop someone travelling who actually needs accessible facilities.

(I have form in this area, long-time blog followers might recall me accidentally booking a holiday at The Wheels Resort in Byron Bay in my twenties.)

We now have Annalize on speed dial, as every time I go to a cruise information night I talk DD into booking another one.

Unfortunately for Annalize, we only get four weeks of holiday a year due to having full-time jobs, so our dance card is full until 2026 … although I have a few ideas for 2027 …

So there’s not much point having a drink with us in 2024, but bless her for wanting to get to know us – and our bank account balances – better.

Have a good weekend. I’m really looking forward to winding down.

Song of the day: “Sitting on the dock of the bay”