I’ve thought about this a lot in the last three or four weeks – and every time I go to write it, I realise it’s difficult to pin down my ‘average’ day. But Chris Brogan outlined his day, so I thought I’d give it a try 
There are a couple of commonalities, but it’s been difficult to tie everything into each other lately. But I thought I’d give it a try.
My ‘job’.
I am a full-time writer. So I copywrite, and if I’m not copywriting, I do other content for my blogs, or write fiction. I’ve been off fiction for a while, but I’m working on most of it with a vengeance again.
The morning:
7am – if he doesn’t wake me up at 6:30, I wake up mostly naturally sometime between 7 and 7:30. My first thing I do, and I hate, is check my email for messages overnight from my clients/the team I sub-contract with. It means my morning might be started on a good note or not, depending on edits and stuff that have come in overnight.
I tend *not* to check in on Facebook unless I really need to. I get the kids ready for school – and if I’m not feeling sick, I grab brekfast. I’m trying to teach myself to do that more often, because I think my body confuses nausea with hunger first thing and it has a knock on effect.
8:30am – Kids are normally out the door by now – so I do email, and blogging and anything else I feel like. Right now, in the morning I’m doing fiction writing and writing until lunch. Today, and for the last six days, I’ve been working on my dissertation. Next week, the kids go on holiday and I’ll be working on my novel for its final work through before handing in.
I do Facebook quite a lot during the morning, between writing, in snatches.
If I’m blocked, I blog.
Lunch
Lucky to stop for lunch – working from home means that I can do it whenever, but I normally forget.
Afternoon
In the afternoon, I’m a great copywriter. I don’t know why the difference exists between morning and afternoon, but it is. I write until around 4pm, when the kids get home.
Evening
In the evening, I’m on Facebook, I’m interacting with friends, I’m doing my best impression of a meerkat and listening to the world, with my head stuck above my ‘burrow’. I collapse into bed around 11pm, after a hot bath, one last check on Facebook, and either games on my iPad, or one last bout of writing. If I can’t sleep, I knit.
And Tuesday nights, I game with friends – we’re currently roleplaying through a 40K Rouge Trader game, where I’m the Captain.
Intermingled with all of this, I keep an eye on several self-publishing support groups on Facebook, and put the finishing touches on a lot of the things that I’m setting up for launch post dissertation (this Thursday to hand it in!)
Today’s tasks
- 2 Blog posts for my client’s equality blogs
- 4 blog posts to get my blogs ahead – including bi-polarbears
- 4k of my dissertation (2k writing and 2k editing)
- Press release for DarknessPD.
- Set-up for new community site for self publishers.
- Chapter edits on two books for clients
And anything else that comes up
My ‘takeaway’
One of the big things I’ve learned from Chris over the last years is there’s always a ‘take away’ – an underlying message that comes from what I know now versus what I knew the last time I did this. The last time I did this I was signed off with a mental health disorder – and had just quit Uni for the year, and going back into the classes later in the year to try again.
I’ve come *a long way* since my last ‘day in the life’ post. Seriously. Things have changed so much – I own two limited companies in the UK and our last year’s turnover was great.
The takeaway? I’ve come a long way – and I’ve got a lot to be proud of but there is no such thing as a regular day in the life of a fiction/copywriter.
Not for me anyway.
How about you?
