Scrap the plan

I had a great plan for today. It's C's long day at creche and the big girls have after school care; husband wanted the family car, so had offered to do drop-off and pick-up, which left me an empty house from 8:30am til 5:45pm. (That's just over 9 hours, which is unheard of in the extreme). I have truckloads of work to do on two different projects - my big one and a new, smaller one - so the day was going to run like this:

8:30 Family leaves; I do breakfast dishes & boil the kettle.
8:45 I commence work. I work consistently and productively, without interruptions.
11:00 I take a 15-minute break to blog.
11:15 I work again. Go me! Look at all the work I am getting done, in my head!
1:00 I take a well-deserved hour off for lunch, laundry folding and to read a book
2:00 Working again. I am a powerhouse, I am.
4:00 Half hour break to prepare dinner and get it in the oven.
4:30 Finish off the beautifully written and massive work items I've accomplished.
5:45 Stop working when family comes home and enjoy a pleasant, relaxed dinner.

Sounds brilliant, yes?

Here's how today has *actually* gone done, as at 11am.

8:15 3yo is protesting about being taken to creche by Daddy instead of Mummy. I make a snap decision to come along in the car and walk her in. I figure I can walk home easily enough from school (it's only 1km away) and start work at 9:15 instead, which isn't tragic.

8:45 Creche run done, I am walking into school gates with elder two when 7yo spots her friend, all dressed up, and wails, "Mum, it's 100 Day! You forgooooooot!" Cue much wailing and gnashing of teeth.

8:50 "Don't worry", I say to 7yo. "I can fix this." I turn on my heel and jog the 1km home, pausing once to suck down some Ventolin. Home in 11 minutes, I grab some stickers, some dried pasta shells, and head back to school. The return trip takes slightly longer as I'm a bit winded.

9:20 I arrive at school and pelt to the assembly area, extract E from her class (which, thank heavens, hasn't yet had their turn at parading) and wildly apply 100 stickers to her jacket and pants, and hand her the pasta box. She is smiling so I think I may be out of the poo.

9:55 The parade has dragged on, and on, and ON, but finally it's finished. I take a photo of E with my phone and walk home more sedately.

10:20 I arrive home to find an urgent family message on my home answering machine. Returning that call eats up 30 minutes.

10:50 I turn on the computer, but it won't boot.

11:00 It has booted on the fifth try.

11:05 I feel the need to log this before I start working, so here I am!

So much for my luxurious 9 hours of work time ... I'm going to have to do what I can with 7 hours instead, and probably do a little more once the kids are in bed tonight. But at the end of the day, I couldn't have let E be disappointed; I'm not about to let work start to be the top priority, when I'm primarily doing it so I can make our family life more comfortable (and keep myself skilled up enough to be employable, too). I'll get the work done, but this morning, making C comfortable and fulfilling my commitment to E was more important.