The loneliness of command

"I didn't get where I am today by...living at the behest of a stupid electronic calendar!"

Oh dear. I think I realise now why I've avoided management positions for so long. Taking on a new job has hammered the crap out of me over the last month and a half. Doing the job because I was forced to, then being stupid enough to properly apply for it when it came up was probably one of the daftest things I've ever done.

Being in a position of authority sounds great in principal, right? But when you're the sort of person who does a mindless and dull job for two reasons - one to pay the bills and two, because it leaves your imagination enough wiggle room to soar once you cast off the shackles of work and come home at the end of the day, sometimes you find that work leeches into your home life and undoes all that careful planning and forethought.

Being a manager actually sucks. It's not the added level of responsibility so much as inheriting someone else's messes constantly, having to unpick the equivalent of a huge ball of crap-covered string with no fingernails while in a dark room, being badgered by crocodiles. OK that's a poor analogy, but the bit about inheriting someone else's mess is spot on.

I did that and it's had a direct impact on the blog (now I have to spend even more time in the evenings ensuring that our ReadItDaddy reviews don't suck). It's turning me into a grumpy bugger (which I REALLY hate more than anything else about the job) as my line managers constantly lump more and more work onto my plate because I'm too willing to just sit there and take it like a loon. Worst of all is the feeling that though stress is great for the diet (no, it really is - Being in a high stress situation completely knackers your appetite, trust me on this - as does not having 5 seconds in any given day to actually sit down and eat your sodding lunch before someone else drops another pile of steaming crap on your desk).

So moan moan moan (see I told you it turned me into a grumpy bugger).

And yet...my wife and daughter are still brilliant, and though they're the main reason I was stupid enough to do this in the first place, I know they're always there to back me up, to make me laugh and smile (and of course in the case of Princess C - to tell me to sit down, read a book with her and instantly  feel like someone's applied a soothing balm to all the stress and horse-crap from work). If I've come across as snarky on the blog or on Twitter, I definitely apologise. As one of my wise sage colleagues keeps reminding me - "One day you'll look back on all this and laugh!"