Today is the last day in another one of these staycations and I’m pretty exhausted. Here’s a brief rundown of what I managed to accomplish on this staycation and some discussion around each one of these points. I’m also going to talk, briefly, about those things that I was not able to accomplish this time around that I’ll have to fit into some more time off coming in the near future.
- Quality Time at the CSA Farm: In the next day or two, I’ll be posting some pictures of our recent takes from the local CSA farm. Spending time at the CSA farm is fun and a great way to be out there in a beautiful, rural area of New Jersey.
- Asbury Park Boardwalk: One of my goals during this vacation from work was to spend some time laying on the beach. Well, I didn’t quite get to lay on the beach due to a rushed schedule, but I did get a chance to walk up and down the Asbury Park boardwalk, which was a lot of fun. Hopefully, we’ll have another warm day before the leaves change and I’ll be able to get to the beach for a final time this season.
- Personal Planning: I’ve always wanted to take a week off from work to spend that free time focusing on me and what I’d like to do with the next X months/years of my life. I managed to squeeze in some time to consider those thoughts on Tuesday of last week, but I didn’t want to rush the situation, so I let it go for the time being. My next full week off from work is after Christmas, so that might be a good time. What I did come to a personal conclusion about, though, is how I need to start working out again with the same vigor that I had back in 2004 and 2005 (when I dropped 125 pounds before gaining 100 back). More on that one of these days.
- Went to a Baseball Game: Going to a baseball game was high on my list of “do this before the summer ends” activities. This past Thursday night I went up to a Newark Bears game and had a really good time. So check that off the list!
- Begin Teaching: Another reason why I wanted to take this time off was because it was the first week of school at the local college where I teach a political science class. This semester is the first time that I’m teaching at 8:30am instead of 7:25pm (big difference, huh?) so I wanted to give myself some time to get used to the campus atmosphere at that time of the day. Plus, I wanted to spend some extra time preparing my classes and reviewing my previously prepared presentations. I also began teaching three online courses at the local online university, too.
- Say Thank You and Fundraise: Another reason why I opted to take this particular week off was because the Chief Operations Officer of the foundation where I serve as a Board Trustee and the Board Treasurer was in town this week. I was happy to host him in my home and travel with him around New Jersey on Wednesday through Saturday to say thank you to some of our donors from New Jersey. In addition to saying thank you, we were also able to host some meetings to educate some of our foundation’s volunteers and raise some additional funds around some of our initiatives. By my quick count, we raised about $22,000 in commitments and first-year pledges. Not too bad for three and a half days, huh? Plus, one can never be sure about any additional funds that may come in due to folks simply being excited about hearing “thank you” regarding their previous donations.
- Worked with Local Chapter: I’ve noted numerous times on this blog how I work with the local chapter of my fraternity. In short, I act as a mentor to some of the undergraduate leaders and provide them with insight on how to operate their chapter in an efficient manner. Anyway, this was their first week back at school so I had dinner with some of their leaders, attended one of their meetings, and met with the entire chapter for lunch on campus. What’s even better is that I met with a young alumnus of the chapter that wants to do this job in my place – so I’m providing him with some training so that one day he could take over and act as the local chapter’s advisor. Great stuff.
Unfortunately, though, I was not able to accomplish all of the things that I planned on accomplishing during this staycation. For example, I wanted to renovate the syllabus for the class that I designed and taught for the first time last spring; just didn’t have the time to do that in the past week. Also, I wanted to finish up at least three of the books that I’m in the middle of reading at the moment – didn’t even pick up any of the books that I’m reading (too busy running around the state). With respect to JerseySmarts.com, I have some material that was sent in from some young writers and musicians that I wanted to review during the last week, but I’m going to have to push that off for another 10 – 14 days. And as for Usable Web Solutions, LLC, there were two major projects that I wanted to complete during the last week and I didn’t have a chance to start on either one of them.
But all of that is okay – I’m ready to get back to work and focus on hitting a couple of home runs in the office before the end of my company’s fiscal year on September 30, 2010! As for the rest of today, though, I’m heading over to a former roommate’s house to watch some football!
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