Week 225 was… not quite what I had in mind.

On Monday, owing to client availability, I rejigged the week to do some Longcrag work. I spent some time working on the site, and running packaging tests.

Longcrag is mainly small electronics kits. They come in a number of bags. What I’ve been doing is the work to confirm how many bags, and what goes in each bag. I don’t want confusable parts in the same bag, and I’d like to keep bag count down, and confirm they all fit in the outer packaging. So I did a dry run for one of the kits. This helped me understand some processes I could put in place to speed up making up the kits later.

It also helped confirm how many bags I’d need, and that yes, the labels I’m using will stick to the small bags just fine. And it helped me work out how to draw up packing sheets, so it’ll be easy for me to make up each small bag for each kit in bulk. A bit dreary, but now out of the way – and much better to have foolproof instructions and references for repetitive tasks, rather than forgetting or getting bored.

And then I went home, and by the time I got home, I was a shivering mess and I went to bed for, effectively, the next three days.

I mainly write about the straight up work of work here; I have a personal site for other sorts of writing. But to write weeknotes honestly this week, I thought I’d acknowledge out loud what happened: I was ill.

Not a bit sniffly, and not tired from overwork; viral and sweaty and no use to anybody. And the only thing to do is to speak to clients, who are all understanding, because they’re people too; remember why we the rates we bill should afford slack both between gigs and derisk time off when we’re unwell (because otherwise, they’re unrealistic); and work on resting properly so we can get back to work.

Back in the studio after the Easter break. Hit the reset button, carry on.