Do you allow yourself to have "lazy days"?

I have at least one weekend a month where I really don’t do anything meaningful other than relax. I’ll even avoid cooking and do little cleaning besides putting dirty dishes in the dishwasher.

I had a busy Labor day weekend: my girlfriend was in town, so extra cleaning, picking her up at the airport; going out to dinner, a hike in Marin County on Sunday, another dinner out, brunch on Monday and takin her to the airport. And the week has been busy: doctor yesterday, haircut and running race this evening; Giants baseball game tomorrow. I have a feeling Saturday will be spent on the couch.

So many, these days! Sometimes I have very busy weeks, then I revel in days and days of lazing and reading and goofing quietly. I thought I would go nuts during the pandemic, but instead, the forced quietude was a delight.

Now I am recovering from a fairly mild case of Covid, and enjoying the excuse to read and order in food and chat on the phone with my buddies. I’m not even sure if this is Covid fatigue or laziness. Maybe a bit of both.

I spent so much of my life doing and moving and producing that these days are lovely gifts.

And a rebinge of the entire Call The Midwife series with my kid before we watch the newest season.

Now that I’m retired, every day is Saturday.

You got that right @CyanoticWasp !

I have what I call “stay home days.” Sometimes I am totally lazy and sometimes I try to be productive, like putting away clothes and organizng, etc. When I’m home and lazy, I try to do a little something, even if it’s just unloading and loading the dishwasher (it doesn’t get unloaded until it needs to be loaded hahaha) or throwing in a load of clothes into the washing machine.

I try to have a few “stay home” days every week. It saves on gas, for one thing. I used to wear makeup every day at work and now I may not wear it, and if I’m home I’m definitely not wearing it, so that is a savings, as well. I may spend the day on the deck in nice weather, under the umbrella with a book or magazines, and I may tend to the plants or do a craft project, or bake something, but it’s all enjoyable for the most part.

When I’m lazy and feeling guilty, I remind myself that for my entire working life I was running around crazy, especially the times for over 25 years working fro local government. I always had at least an hour commute each way. When I had my daughter and had to take her to day care or school, it added to the commute. If there was an accident or construction during the commute, that added to the time and stress. My last position, I would sometimes have work meetings at night and sometimes there were parties which I would attend at night, which sounds like fun and it was but it was also time away from home. I remind myself of all that, and how I’d have to take time off work for doctor, dentist, doctor and dentist for my daughter, hair appointments and car repairs would be on weekends. It was totally run run run. Now it’s time to not feel guilty (even though I do feel guilty on occasion).

I’m fortunate that thanks to the government job I retired at 55 with a pension. If I am feeling totally bored in the future, I can always get a part time job. I have no desire to do so right now. I do volunteer three hours a week nearby (local history place).

Lazy days? More often than not.

I try really hard to have such days but inevitably feel guilty if there’s not, at least, one productive thing accomplished.

I’ll sit around catching up on movies/tv shows — but am doing loads of laundry in the background.

I’ll go out for the day by myself — but take my car in for maintenance too.

I’ll sleep in one morning — but then clean the house later.

I’ll make plans with friends — but be willing to cancel at a moment’s notice if my daughter or wife need something.

I can’t remember I took an entire day to do absolutely nothing. Gotta be decades ago.

@cookieman Well, yeah, my “lazy day” today included two loads of laundry and changing the sheets on the bed, going to the library and food shopping and….But the relaxed unstructured nature of it was delightful.

I suspect you have more family demands on your time than I but do remember to take “me” time.

To me, taking the car for maintenance or repairs is not a lazy day. It’s unstructured and it’s not as stressful as working, but it’s not on my list of days of doing totally nothing. Same with doctor appointments or hair appointments – it’s not lazy, to me. It’s gotta get done.

I should add that in the 22+ years I’ve lived here, I’d only maybe once or twice gone to my local library, maybe during a fair or two. There’s a great library in the next town over that I’ve since been to a whole bunch of times, and have attended their events and classes. It’s so nice to have the free time to enjoy these local resources and appreciate them.

“But the relaxed unstructured nature of it was delightful.”

Absolutely. I do enjoy that part of it.

I do, but what occurs to me to emphasize about them, is that it’s usually much better for me to do it intentionally and early. If I really need one and try not to take one, I often end up spending a lot of time not being effective, and also not doing much for myself either.

I like to have a lot of lazy days and I’m so grateful I can. It is a luxury. Most days I try not to schedule more than two things and those things usually last 2–4 hours each with travel included. It can be work or a fun activity. The rest of the days I can be lazy. I still usually cook something or clean up a little, but a few days a month, nothing, just put my feet up and watch TV and a little social media on the computer.

I’d rather have a lot of lazy time every day, but still get out and do some productive things, than be busy all day for days in a row and then get to have two or three full on lazy days. This is why I hated a regular work schedule. M-F 9–5 sucked. By Friday I hated dragging myself out of bed and to work. Saturday was recovery for me not lazy in my book.

When Covid came, I was really appreciative of the time off – half of March, all of April and May, and then in June it was back to work two half days a week. When they said “stay home and don’t see anyone” it worked for me. I’d take walks with one of the moms from school and her kids, and I’d meet another friend at Costco in the evenings, for shopping but other than that I loved the rest and not having to commute to work and the long work hours.

Same as @janbb. My ‘lazy’ days I still get a lot done, I can’t stand to sit still for more than two hours, or just be unproductive.

That being said, I have canned an entire garden plus two apple orchards, so this weekend I plan to only do household chores. Fingers crossed.

I just can’t do it. Sure I have plenty of unscheduled days but I fill them with stuff that needs to be done. Branches on the apple trees need to be cut, pond should be cleaned, fish need food, plants watered, oil change in mowers, rear differential oil change in Subaru.(it’s making noise,) there is a new animal hole at the base of the barn I need to fill, and so on. I can completely piss away a day by just doing stuff as I walk from one place to another.
Now that I have two Garmins on my wrists they encourage me to do even more.
I know it sounds like type A+ personality – always under pressure – but I don’t feel that way.
I just can’t sit and let things pass. If I am at your house I can’t just sit and watch you do the dishes. I am happier when I’m helping.

@LuckyGuy Come on over and help me make supper then!

Wouldn’t that be fun!

^^ Jersey shore is nice in the Fall! (And I have lots of things in the house you can fix.)

I was doing this for a while, but then I got so busy on the weekend that I kind of fell off. I’ve only been in my new apartment for 15 months, and I’ve decided to reorganize a lot of what I had thought was where I wanted it in the first place. But now I’m getting to where I want to be again and I think I am going to take at least one day a week where I can just do anything I feel like. Cross stitch, working on my stamp collecting, reading, taking a nice long nap, it doesn’t matter, whatever I feel like doing. I think it’s important to have some time for yourself like that.

@LuckyGuy – why do you have 2 Garmins? Isn’t that like hooking up two vacuum lines to a vacuum chamber, hoping to get 60 inHg vacuum?

@RocketGuy “A person with one watch knows what time it is. A person with two watches is never sure.”
I’m wearing my old watch because that info is downloaded to a fake account and it has a record of my significant health growth for about a year. The new watch is totally off line and stores the info in the device itself. It knows a lot (and I do mean a lot!) about me and I want to keep it local.
Sometimes I look to see if they are producing the same heart rate readings. They usually are.

Stupid Covid fatigue is making all days lazy days these days. Ugh. Very frustrating when there is no choice.

@canidmajor – it took my mom 14 months to get strength back in her legs after Covid. Covid is no joke!

Aw bloody hell, @RocketGuy, I didn’t need to hear that!!! Ack! I am megadosing vitamin B-12 and it seems to help. My case was pretty mild, I was fortunate.

@RocketGuy Thank you for posting that. I have a friend who feels like she will probably never be back to her before covid state, but your mom will give her hope. I keep telling her some people it takes months.