Sandstone Trail

I have 23 days holiday remaining, my work levels during this credit crunch / recession have reached stupidity levels, but I have decided to take a couple of days off and walk the sandstone trail with my cousin.

The trail is 34 miles long and we plan to do this in 3 days so we wont be rushing, but it will be a welcome change to being a desk jockey even if it is just for a few days.

I am fortunate enough to be working at home today, but have got loads to do thanks to an ever demanding client. The client is based in an African country and they have a different work ethic to us. After spending a week with them, they work very hard but the desire to achieve success drives them to ridiculous levels of effort. Unfortunately these efforts are not particularly efficient. I was called up on Friday last week to ask if I could support the Client with some additional work, work that we did not include within our fee proposal, I agreed to help them out as a favour, and stated that I would not be able to complete the work before Thursday, it may be possible to complete the work on Wednesday with a big push, but fee earning work would have to take priority. I was surprised therefore, to receive emails from my directors asking why I had not completed the task on Tuesday! After explaining the timelines I had agreed, they still seemed unhappy with my performance. Oh well.

These situations and timelines all make me more determined to break free from this routine. The only timeline we should be following should be the seasons. We should be working hard all year round, but if we are simply working to sustain our lives, then sewing seeds at the start of spring, harvesting in autumn and preserving before winter are typical deadlines that are not so strongly enforced but more critical than completing a spreadsheet by 5 o'clock!

I watched Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall with his fishing in the Channel Islands last night. I must admit to being a big fan, but his business appears to have grown and his ambitions to obtaining a simple life (in series one of River Cottage) outside of the rat race appear to have diminished. The other side of the coin is the profile of Hugh and River Cottage is doing a lot of good with welfare for animals and good seasonal food for families. So to summarise my opinion about Hugh, Great bloke, great ideas, great business, great shame. Perhaps we need heroes who are not interested in money, or is money the bi-product of being a hero?