30 Day Writing Challenge 1 - 1/22/16: SOSDD

My Morning Routine

I'm definitely not a morning person but I can be a creature of habit. So this has more or less been my morning routine for years, with a few minor tweaks depending on when I have to go into work. For the last several months, I've worked 9:00-6:00 mainly to accommodate my need earlier for extended occupational and physical therapy after foot surgery. And for now, it's still working for me, at least right now anyway.

But I decided not to break my waking time from when I had to report at 8:00..... One, I'd already become accustomed to it and two, it gave me some extra time each morning for myself (and things like this)! So here's a rough timeline.....

5:15 first alarm, hit snooze (unless I have to be somewhere at 8:00 -- work or OT/doc appt).
5:24 second alarm, hit snooze again and wait a few minutes. In those few minutes, I get my bearings, try to figure out what's on my agenda for the day, anything I might have forgotten..... Continue attempting to wake up. (When I'm asleep, thankfully most of the time it's a good deep sleep ... Not always but mostly).
5:30ish get up, take daily medicine for migraine prevention, and start on breakfast (protein shake with unsweetened almond milk, almond butter, and protein powder). Mmmm! OH! and coffee. If I'm the first up, I start the coffee. Coffee is a must. Coffee is life. Mmmm.......
5:35ish get shake and go to living room. Turn on morning news, half-listen to weather and headlines (more weather than headlines)..... Grab tablet and start checking email, Facebook, Pinterest, Tumblr, whatever else.......
5:45 Grab coffee at some point once it's ready. Two packs of stevia, one Tbsp of sugar-free vanilla creamer. Mmmmm. Warm yummy elixir of life.....
6:45ish Look at clock and go, "ah crap!!!'" Start unraveling lymphedema bandaging and get ready for getting ready. Grab clothes for the day (chief criteria: clean? match? Good.) Grab tunes. We must have tunes.
7:00 hit shower. Continue getting ready ...... At some point, glance at clock and think, REALLY????? (yes, it is already almost 7:30...).
7:45ish start leaving.... If you leave at 8:00 you're going to hit yuck traffic. Anything between 7:45 and 8:00 isn't awesome but at least you'll have a cushion of time.

Arrive at work sometime between 8:30 and 8:45 (depending in how traffic was, route you took, etc.). Pull in, breathe deep, do the self-pep-talk if you have to, and go in. Face the day. Just do it. One more time around.

And that's pretty much it.