The Type A Holiday

It has been pointed out to me that I am of a Type A personality.

"I'm not a Type A!" I wailed back at Em after she suggested this.
"Yes you are."
"I'm not aggressive, highly strung, focussed.."
"Umm..."
"How about I concede to be a Type A Minus."
"Okay, I'll give you that."

A Type A personality I may not quite be, but I'll put my hand up to being an overachiever. And I know it. And I'm working on it.

So what does an overachiever do for the holidays?
Lots.

I'm off work for ten days - going back on 3 January. YIPPEE!


I left work at 3.30 p.m. yesterday - two hours too late. I popped in at the consultancy barbeque at lunchtime for a beer and sausage, skipping the team lunch with my co-workers. Given the chance to network with peers or sit talking with people I don't have that much in common with, this seemed like the better option. After going back to work, tidying up a bit of doco I left  - and I don't have to go back for ten whole days - YEEEEEHAAAAA.

Okay, so what does a Pandora Behr get up to on her ten days off?

Well, I'm not going back to Adelaide.

Christmas can be one of those awful stressy times for me - and I've discovered that staying away from my family is a good thing. I love them dearly - I just love them more when they're 500 miles away.This year, my sister has her inlaws staying for a month, so there is no room at the inn there. My parents have only just got back from interstate and they're flitting all over the place, so I decided a few months ago to spend Christmas day with local friends and family here in Melbourne. Besides, I'm going over to Adelaide for my sister's 40th in a few weeks.

Tomorrow will see me having breakfast is at Gloria and Gaynor's. Lunch will be out at a cousin's place in Ballan, about 100 kilometres out of Melbourne. My favorite cousin is over from Tasmania to see her grandson, so it will be good to spend time with them. Then it's off to Bernie and Gaz's for a bit around dinner time if they'll have me, then a friend around the corner has asked me over for drinks -which will be appreciated as she's walking distance away  - and as I'm covering about 250 kilometres in the car and will only get a glass of champagne over the day, this sounds good. The sparkling shiraz/durif is in the fridge in preparation for drinks around the corner.

For the rest of the ten days, well, there's the rub. My Virgoan list-making self has a heap of things to do.

I've set myself a 100 kilometre challenge - cover a hundred kilometres in the next ten days. To be fair, this means I get a kilometre for every ten minutes in the gym I spend - so today I've got my ten kms and more- an hour with Pinochet and a lap of the 1000 steps (burned 900 calories - well happy). No drama if I fail it, but I need to get my exercise back on track and this is a great way to do it. I've planned a 10 km run walk in the humidity on Christmas Day - seems a better option to sleeping in and talking to the cat first thing in the morning - he's going to wake me, demanding to be fed at 5.30 am anyway.

There's a deadline looming. I have to finish editing the book I've had on my plate for ages. I've only got about 30 pages of the first cut to do, then it a matter of doing a final pass to make sure all is well. Should be done by the time I go back to work. It has to be done - I'm a woman of my word.

Of course, there's the reading (currently getting through next month's book for book group - Zoe Heller's "Notes on a Scandal" - excellent yarn. I want to get through McEwan's "Atonement", Anna Funder's "All that I Am" and a couple of other books while I'm here.

I've started back on The West Wing as my viewing of choice. The West Wing? Yeah. Everything I know about American Politics I attribute to The West Wing - and the slight Josh Lyman crush doesn't help.

There is, of course, the small fact of the house guest I have staying. He's being a good lad. I've been asked by Blarney and Barney to stick him on a diet as he's looking rather portly at the moment - do date he's shed 200 grams off his 6 kg frame (far too much for a small cat). He's asleep on the bed at the moment. Fantastic company, he is.

And the rest of the time - when I'm not exercising or cursing commas or watching the glorious Josh Lyman or talking to the cat? Well then I can get planning and plotting and pondering. I wonder what the next year will bring. And maybe the odd movie.

And I must to bed now. The cat is about to starting going into feral hour, there's a thunderstorm brewing and there is a song to get out of my head.

I'm going to leave you with it - it's not a bad song like that stupid "Sexy and I know it" dross.

This song has been in my head all day - no idea why.

I've put a version up but Sarah McLachlan - not the traditional Kermit the Frog one.

The song's been an absolute favorite of mine for over thiry years. It always has made me cry and it still makes me cry. It appeals to my well hidden, never seen, inner romantic. (I have a sneaky suspicion that Kermit is a  Virgoan, INFJ too.)
And to all a good night. Keep safe. Remember that goodwill to all men should extend to distant relatives and screaming children - and it will be all over by this time tomorrow.