My granny used to say we had our mad half hour after dinner. She had a great sounding laugh. Whooping and chuckling, I can hear her now! After food had hit our tummies my big brother and I would often flip into daft mode and cavort around doing impressions. We would pretend to read the news in different accents and make up the daftest stories. My granny adored it. We fed off her pleasure and it drove us to do more and more and more! Fun days indeed. Sadly, no recording equipment of the time was affordable enough to us to have kept these moments as more than a memory.

Perhaps the Mad Half Hour can teach us all something in our adult life. Typically, this thing we suffer together can eat at us from the inside, drain us and bleed us dry of enthusiasm and energy. We know we're living in a technicolour time and yet we have the frustration of knowing we only have black and white monitors.

We need tools. We need tricks. We need time management. (Or we might be sucked into the abyss of avoidance.) Resting whilst ill is really important. Not over stretching ourselves is a must. Allowing ourselves to be ill can be the nib of recovery. But we must be careful that inactivity doesn't drive another demon. Procrastination and laziness. Knowing the difference is important.

Do you think you have a Mad Half Hour in you today? It's yours! If you are currently not at work, you might use it to make the bed, wash the dishes, parcel up that return, find the stamp, load the washing machine and do it against the clock so you can finish up making a cup of tea and return to where you are now. Or, if you are working and under pressure most of the day, perhaps you will use the Mad Half Hour to nourish yourself. Take 30 minutes at lunchtime to go outside, walk 10 minutes in one direction, on a timer, and ten minutes back again. You now have ten minutes left to eat something, don't share the time. I'll bet you'll be glad you took a little time out. Just. For. You.

Let me know what you do. Keep the mad half hour alive. My granny and I are waiting to hear!

Love from

The room above the garage

A Moodscope member.