Kia ora! Long time, no see, folks.
And there’s a bit of a reason for that. Some of you may have noticed (or maybe you haven’t!) I haven’t been as... well, let’s say “prolific” with my writing output over the last month or so.
That’s because Matty Flatt (yeah, let’s embrace the spirit of Fitzie) has taken a little bit of a step back from writing duties temporarily as Real Life FC™ gets in the way of the things I really care about: Spurs and you guys (family be damned).
I’ve mentioned before I work in the tech sector, and for the last couple of years have been working across a very large, very expensive, very intense tech project. We are now a month out from go-live, and needless to say, the pressure is high and we are in crunch time.
That means I am working 60+ hour weeks, and any spare time for writing is really spent on mental rest. When you sit down to engage in creative endeavors, you need a clear head - and it’s hard to say my psyche is open to any sort of creative muse right now, nor are the performances we’ve seen from Spurs over the last little while particularly inspiring.
It’s weird though how normalized crunch has become. It started (as far as I know) in the gaming industry, where developers would work all hours to hit deadlines in the delivery of a game... wellbeing be damned. Honestly, it probably existed in other industries as well, but it’s become pervasive across different business spheres.
The funny thing is when it comes to a project of the scale on which I’m working, it feels like no matter how well you prep, plan, and resource, you somewhat inevitably get to a point like this - everything becomes a mad scramble to line up all the different pieces and personnel.
So is it avoidable? What do you think? And have you experienced crunch in your line of work? Discuss in the comments; I sure won’t be, as I’m headed back to work... and hopefully I’ll be back to properly writing for you all (as opposed to rambling here) very soon.
Matty Flatt’s Track of the Day: Once in a Lifetime, by Talking Heads
And now for your links:
Tottenham Hotspur officially announce the freeze of season ticket pricing for next season
Alasdair Gold gives his thoughts on the latest training session in the lead-up to Spurs’ do or die match against AZ Alkmaar