I thought it might be useful to write down what happens in a typical work week, just before going full-time with Libro. The work level does usually build to a peak just before I drop some Library hours, and then has a terrifying slump directly afterwards. Anyway, this is what I have done this week:

Monday 28 November – I posted a blog post in my Ron’s Rants series first thing – handily, I’d managed to write up a few posts in advance so could just publish them as I went this week. I worked 7.45-3.50 at the Library. Rushed out of the house as soon as I got back with some post as I needed to wait in for a parcel for M on Tuesday. Came home and did 2 hours’ transcribing and some other bits and bobs. Watched Made in Chelsea for light relief.

Tuesday 29 November – a Libro Day. Did another hour of transcribing; spent 2 hours editing a dissertation in pdf format (annotating it with special software but, even though the English was good, it took me longer than if it had been in Word); spent over 3 hours editing a paper for a journal (including ensuring the bibliography was as the journal requires: this was actually the most time-consuming part); did some bits for a translator I work for. I also did some admin – writing and responding to emails, requests for quotations, etc. I had a proper lunch (hooray) but didn’t get out of the house until after dark, when I met M (my Other Half) in Sainsburys to get some bits and bobs. I try to get out of the house during daylight, but this wasn’t possible today!

Wednesday 30 November – another Libro Day. Published a blog post about emotions in business that I’d been inspired to write last week. Finished off the transcription I was doing in 1 hour 45 mins including spell-checking (a two-person Webinar for a lovely client – the topic is interesting to me, which does help, although I will transcribe just about anything!). I edited another article for yesterday’s client, but a shorter one this time that only took a couple of hours and did a localisation into British English for another regular – this time a website for an international company. In addition to all this I found time to do an hour or so of cleaning (we reimburse me the amount we used to pay our cleaners from the household money to do the heavy cleaning: mopping, hoovering stairs, etc.), cook a batch of meals so I have a quicker dinner time in the week, and go for a 35 minute run (in the daylight!). Before dinner, I got most of my monthly invoicing done – most of my regular clients are sent one invoice a month for all the work I have done for them during that month. What I didn’t do was go to the Birmingham Entrepreneurs Meetup, a monthly event in town that I do enjoy. But I just didn’t have the time and had to send my apologies.

Thursday 1 December – a Library day so worked 7.45-3.50 again. I wrote my first post for this blog at lunch time after deciding to launch it during the morning! Came home and recorded the payments that had already come in from yesterday’s invoicing (I like the beginning of the month). I went through the document one of my coaching clients had sent me for half an hour (I am helping them to get down to writing up their thesis) and replied to a request for a quotation. Then I stopped for the evening and went for a run with M before dinner. After dinner, some frantic BookCrossing admin (a hobby I used to spend a lot of time on!) then some relaxation time, watching a bit of telly.

Friday 2 December – woke up early and sorted out some more books, then lugged them into the Library to stock the BookCrossing Zone I set up here. A colleague took over running the Zone a few months ago, but I like to keep it filled up when I can. I published a prepared Troublesome Pair blog post on the Libro blog. A normal day at the Library, worked till 3.50 then home for some Libro bits and pieces … I logged in to an admin site to upload a business feature onto a client’s local business pages (he’d called me on the Libro mobile to ask me to do it this morning but I’d left the phone at home – this is one of the stressful things about my double life) and finished off negotiations on a piece of work for the weekend, polishing some translated English. I took delivery of some boxes of business directories for my local Business Association – I joined a few months ago, will be on the Committee from January, and M has kindly offered to help me put them through letterboxes tomorrow (my friend at work suggested that this might be so he could actually spend some time with me: I fear she’s right!). Off to the gym to get some exercise in and see a friend who goes on a Friday evening and then relaxed for the rest of the evening. This is actually proving to be quite a light week, but you can see I’m still doing something for Libro every day …

Saturday 3 December – I did a bit of housekeeping before breakfast, putting together, publishing and publicising my weekly “Freelancer/Small Business Chat” feature on a small business – this time Purple Dog Network. Then I had a bit of a read in bed – a rare luxury – before we got ourselves together for the day and spent 2 hours delivering the local Business Association directory to 480 addresses on our road and surrounding side streets. Harder work than I thought – lots of exercise opening gates, running up paths and pushing the book through all sorts of letterboxes! After a late lunch, bought at the Farmers’ Market, I put in a couple of hours working on a translation from an Eastern European language into English – my job was to polish it to make it look like it was written by a native British English speaker. I then spent 30 minutes or so working on a few blog posts for two friends who I help out for free (in one case in return for a look over my accounts every now and then). I recorded another payment from a regular client in my spreadsheet, noting that I’d hit the first of my range of 4 income targets for the month (this one was “replace the money from the 2 days I didn’t work at the library”) and then I was free for dinner, a bit of BookCrossing admin, etc.

Sunday 4 December – a billable-hours free day, I managed to work in my usual Sunday pastimes of a run in the morning, and a visit to the local cafe with a friend in the afternoon. I almost always get the run in; sometimes Libro stops me going to the cafe, mainly because I know I’ll be at the day job on Monday. I put in a couple of hours writing blog posts in the afternoon; I like to get ahead of myself, but I didn’t have one written for Monday and I needed to put together a guest post I’m publishing in the week. I also wrote my newsletter as I’ve realised the next edition is due this week. I also, excitingly, wrote an abstract to submit to the Iris Murdoch Society to see if they’ll invite me to contribute a presentation to the IM Conference in September 2012. Something I really need to do once I’m full-time with Libro is give some time to my research project (this is what it’s all about) and I hadn’t really found time to get this done!

Summary – so, actually this wasn’t a hugely, horribly, frantically busy Libro week like some have been. I did 14 hours of billable Libro work (covering my billable work target) but of course also I did a significant number of hours on admin, including monthly invoicing and the writing today. So it’s more like 18 or so hours if you add those in. Plus the 21 hours at the library. Plus two hours delivering those directories … In the weeks previous to this one I’ve done 23, 20, 16 and 18 hours on Libro, which makes it a lot more difficult. But there you have it – a week in the life “before” …