And…back

It's been pretty quiet around here, hasn't it? Normally, I get to spend July gently winding down towards a holiday, and kick back through August. Not this year. I was working — late into the night — the day before we left for holiday at my brother's place in France. I've been lucky enough to have had a busy, but demanding, year so far with work. And it left me tired and burnt out by the summer.

That's one of the reasons why this blog has been so very quiet. I just had nothing left in the tank once I finished my paid work for clients. I'm making a few adjustments to my working life (aided by gaining an extra 6 hours a week by my youngest starting school next week… 😥), that should see OM&HB spring back into life — and hopefully stop me getting quite so burnt out again.

I had vague plans to work — and catch up on my blogging — while I was away, but the lack of WiFi in the villa (due in September apparently…) and mobile phone bandwidth at dial-up levels put pay to that. And that was all for the good.

Disengaged Reading Time

I finally relaxed, enjoyed time with my family - and actually got some reading done. Admittedly, it was mainly genre fiction, but it was really nice to get back into the swing of it, and one of my post-holiday resolutions is to read more of the backlog of work-related books I have queued up. Feel free to follow me on Goodreads if you want to see those as they pass through.

In the meantime, enjoy a few snaps from my time in Île de Ré.