The Weekly Wrap-Up: April 20-24, 2020

I'm really bad at working from home.

Let me back up.

Remember last week, when I was complaining about how busy I was and how I felt jealous of people who were home all the time with nothing to do?

Well.

Guess who is home, but still has everything she already had to do plus a little extra? And also two thumbs?

It's really fine. I just got really thrown off, and I, for some stupid reason, had assumed that the rapid changes in my life were on pause.

Perhaps I should back up a bit further.

Most of my week was normal. We were practicing for our Zoominar next week, which meant a lot of time on video chat, learning how to share screens and create breakout rooms and take notes at the same time. (Ask me anything about Zoom. I guarantee I know the answer.) I've been calling myself the cruise director for this event since I volunteered to kind of run things behind the scenes. I must have spent at least 20 hours on Zoom this week. And when I wasn't on it, I was either thinking or dreaming about it. The good news is that we were able to work out a few kinks, and we have a good idea of how the Zoominar can go when everything is working properly.

When I wasn't on Zoom, I was editing VCP lessons and proofing pages of OMS Outreach. Do you think there will be compensation for doing everything on a screen now? Because it's really hard to edit something on a screen. Not impossible. Just much easier on paper. Also, there's still T&M to do.

So, things were running fairly smoothly until Thursday afternoon. 30 minutes before yet another Zoom call, this one a tutorial for our participants in next week's Zoominar, we were informed that someone had been in the building who had been in contact with someone being tested for COVID-19. Thusly, the building would be closed until further notice. Sarah and I were joking about it being a microcosm of what we'd do in a fire - as in, what would you save, what would you leave behind. I would apparently leave just about everything. I was so thrown by what was happening that I really couldn't think about what I might need for the foreseeable future. My computer isn't exactly portable, and while I do have a laptop at home, the only Internet I have access to is from across the street. It's not the most reliable.

So, in about 15 minutes, we went from feeling confident about next week to wondering if it was even doable. We've been relying on my ethernet connection, 32GB of RAM, and 1TB hard drive. Not to mention my second screen, which really makes sharing screens much easier. Plus, Sarah is acting as tech support and backup since we are right down the hall from one another. (She is the original cruise director - she set everything up and made sure the facilitators got their stuff in on time, so I wanted to support her and not make her have to do so much during the event as well.)

Anyway, we did manage to pull off the tutorial from home, and I spent the rest of Thursday and all of Friday trying to figure out how to do as much from home as possible. We have a possible solution for next week, but I'm trying to cover as many other bases as I can.

But my bed is Right. There.

I realize I'm playing catch up to the rest of you. Most people have been working from home for six weeks or more. (Any tips? I was already snacking too much in the office. Now I have a whole refrigerator at my disposal.) Granted, I was planning to take some time off after next week anyway. Now, it will probably be the most productive thing I could do.

Bye!

The Weekly Wrap-Up: April 13-17, 2020

I had a conversation with one of my coworkers today. (In person, from a safe distance, not online. We're some of the few but proud in the office.) Anyway, she was talking about reading people's letters and feeling jealous at the many mentions of how much time people have now to spend time with God and enjoy the silence.

I could empathize. Silence and time are not things I have to spare right now. I was able to write a prayer letter of my own this week, which will hopefully be out to you soon. I also created the style templates for Vietnamese, so as soon as the transfiles come in, we can start formatting that language. I also finished another group of English F. We had a prayer rally on Wednesday, which was nice because I got to see a lot of people I haven't, but I'm getting Zoombified. And it's not going to stop anytime soon.

Next week, we have four days of testing for the ECC Zoominar. Then the week after, we have the actual Zoominar. Somewhere in between all of that, I have new booklets to format for Mizo Chin and two versions of Spanish. We didn't get them done in the normal flow of things since they weren't written yet. I also got a new assignment for editing VCP lessons. Time management is definitely the current buzzword.

It feels dumb to talk about how busy I am right now. There are people who are certainly busier and doing more dangerous work than I. All I have to do is walk a few minutes to my warm office and wear something halfway decent for video chats. It's not like I had an active social life before all of this began, so I'm definitely not missing much. Now that it's warm-ish outside, I can walk through the neighborhood and smell some literal roses every once in a while.

But it's draining. All of this is so draining, physically, mentally, emotionally... My social media is such an odd dichotomy of people. There are those who talk about how bored they are. They've caught up on all of their shows, they've read until their eyes bleed, they sleep until noon and then take an afternoon nap, and they are learning fifty thousand new skills. Then, there are those who are exhausted from looking after their kids, or haven't seen their kids in weeks because they don't want to risk infecting them, or they are trying to figure out how to pay their bills and file for unemployment.

And I'm just ... somewhere in the middle. I'm thankful for what I have, please don't misunderstand me. My paycheck is assured for the moment, I am definitely not bored, and I'm taking the precautions necessary to stay relatively healthy. But I'm jealous of the people who can take the time to relax and spend extra time with God. And I'm feeling guilty for feeling relieved at having so little change from my daily life.

So yeah. That's how things are going right now.

I feel like I need to prove that I do still smile every once in a while, so here's a picture of me and my new purple hair.

Bye!

The Weekly Wrap-Up: April 6-10, 2020

I'm streaming the Good Friday service on KLOVE as I write this. I'm also fighting a cold and attempting to not panic. That's a lot of emotions to sort through at once. But we're all in a similar state, I think, so I can beg your indulgence.

I know things have slowed down for some of my colleagues and gotten harder for others. Some people are surrounded by family while others are on their own. I find myself in this odd place of maintaining status quo. I've been doing my job as normal, then going home alone as normal, and then repeating that until the weekend, when I can't go anywhere and end up not knowing for sure what day it is.

So.

It was another busy week for me. We've ramped up testing for the CMF Zoominar. I've learned things I never wanted to learn about video meetings. I'm hoping at least some of them will be helpful. Meanwhile, I'm trying to be an encouragement to my team and work on publishing more Train & Multiply booklets. I made it through another group of English and learned a great deal about style templates in InDesign. That will be something to tackle next week as I attempt to create one for Vietnamese, our latest language. I will also be doing some VCP editing. And, of course, more testing.

I've told several people that I'm taking a vacation once everyone comes back to the office. It might seem counter-intuitive to leave as all the people I've been missing return. But I have a feeling they'll want to hit the ground running, and all I'll do is hit the ground.

The beginning of Lent seems so long ago. It's laughable now to think about giving something up to feel closer to God. We've all given up so much by now. And it's been a struggle for me to feel closer to God. I feel like if I stop to breathe or think, I'll get so caught up in this panic and fear-mongering that I won't be able to come back out of it. But I need to stop. I need to breathe. I need to let God fill my thoughts. And I need to trust that He will pull me back up again.

I miss you guys. Stay safe.

Bye.

The Weekly Wrap-Up: March 30 - April 3, 2020

Congratulations on making it through another week! I sincerely hope that you are not only surviving this time of isolation, but that you are embracing the opportunity to find new ways of connecting to those you love. We are living in interesting times, and while it's tempting to put a brave face on everything, don't be afraid to reach out if you're lonely or in need of a friend.

I'm still in the office every day. I'm making decent progress on publishing more English, but we're also getting ready for the ECC CMF Zoominar. Yes, you read that correctly. Instead of having our annual CMF seminar here in Greenwood, we're doing everything on the web. It's a pretty stripped down version, but there are still a lot of things to work out. We've never done anything like this before, so I've been watching videos about how to do different things in Zoom. Apparently, I have a reputation for being 'techy' (not tetchy, though I am that, too), so I got volunteered to be part of the backstage team for our Zoominar. That mostly means I get to support Sarah, so I'm going to do my best to learn as much as I can before this thing starts.

This whole mess is starting to get to me, though. I went home for part of the day on Tuesday because I had a migraine. I think all the tension was just building up. But I was feeling better by Wednesday. It's such a weird thing to take sick time during something like this. I don't have COVID-19 (pretty sure), but all the normal illnesses are still ticking away. It makes one paranoid.

In the meantime, we must all find ways to deal with the new reality. Granted, those ways may seem indicative of the loss of one's faculties. But needs must...

Bye!