Working, working…

Phew!! The first couple of weeks of the year have been busy… moving house, getting ready for a new baby… oh yes, and then there’s work.

The latter has largely consisted of BOS admin. Early year account mount up and it’s a question of getting to the bottom of the renewals pile whilst also dealing with helpdesk enquiries. Fortunately, this is just about done now and, although I need to get to grips with next month’s renewals and get them sent out, the air is clearing slightly.

More problematic has been making time to write grant proposals. I’ve got two on the go, with another one just about ready to surface… they have to be done in addition to normal work though, which makes things quite a stretch. They also require mental focus which is tough when there’s lots going on at home and elsewhere at work.

In some ways, though, the big problem has not been focusing on the proposals, but focusing the proposals themselves sufficiently to allow me to write them. My interests are polyvalent, and it’s quite a challenge to pin down exactly what it is that I want to know in a given situation (you can’t just write ‘everything’) and then justify it on paper.

The learning curve is still near-vertical, and I could do with getting them in before the baby arrives at the beginning of March…