If you’re wondering how my day is going, it’s past 8 pm and I’m still at work. By choice. But that’s not why we’re here, I’m here to talk about my morning routine and some related stuff.
I’m usually up early, whether I get out of bed or not depends on what day of the week it is and how I’m feeling. Most of the time, I’m up before my alarm rings so when it does, I just swipe the ‘dismiss’ button with a ‘Shut up my friend’ kind of arrogance. And this is justified because my alarm is a bully. Once it comes on, the first thing my groggy eyes are bound to see is, “Wake the hell up!” Yes, I wrote it but I’m not accepting responsibility for that.
Now, to my routine…
Music on, world off
My earphones are my final piece of clothing, and they help me avoid conversations early in the day. I’m monosyllabic in the morning and music is all I want. Those early hours qualify as my quiet time, such that if I run into a colleague back when I was still commuting, I tend to avoid them. If they’re driving and offer me a ride, I wave them on. Believe me, they’re awesome people but I’d rather not talk at that time of the day, and I don’t want to come off as rude. Plus, if I’m not driving, I’d love to walk a considerable distance since I rarely go to the gym these days. Heck, the last time I went two weeks ago, it was to make enquiries. So…
Minimal contact it is.
Also, music gets me in the zone for work and when I’m not in a meeting or talking, I’m at my desk bobbing my head to whatever playlist gets me in my groove that day. Usually, it’s metalcore or something similarly heavy. Weirds a few people out but almost everything else is too slow.
Coffee!
If I were dating Coffee, she’d be feeling sour right now because I’ve been drinking chamomile tea for the past two weeks. Alex, another friend of mine and a tea advocate would be thrilled that I’m not drinking coffee like a peasant. Tea people are just unnecessarily bougie, so I haven’t told her this because she’d gloat, and I’d rather not have that.
Words
Yep, writing constitutes 8-% of what I do at work and other than music, my day starts with words as well. If I’m not on a book (been a while, honestly), I’m reading an article from the 40 open tabs I’ve got on my browser or saved-up long-reads I’ve got on Pocket.
Sometimes it’s hard to write though because there are distractions around. You can spend two hours on a paragraph because someone interrupted your train of thought for just five minutes. It’s also why I need music badly.
Work is either a breeze or an unwilling participation in CrossFit but the game is the game. Thinking is pretty much the most important part of my job, not the actual writing and in the middle of it all, I’m hoping an upset customer doesn’t mess up my day by dropping a nuke to drag my company on social media.
Sometimes I come up with a bomb idea, or someone in my team does. It could be something as simple as a design idea for Kayode, an event idea with Wonola or something interesting that Kehinde or Deji (miss that guy) has thought of.
Then I blink and find myself still at my desk at past 8 pm, writing this or doing something else. But it’s fine because traffic would be lighter and all I’m going to do at home is sleep.
Then I rinse and repeat, well, in between playing Halo, FIFA and making cocktails on weekends while doing everything humanly possible to avoid public appearances (even if I might end up enjoying them).
Okay bye.
