There hasn't been much of a social life in general. I've been largely self isolating since 2020. I was just starting to get back out into the world as I began this remote role, then omicron hit and I decided to stay home and wait for a booster.
In about a week, I plan to start going to the gym again and sign up for a dance class, so we'll see what the social life looks like then. The three main meetings I have in the week are pre-scheduled, so it should be possible to schedule these things around them. Sometimes surprise meetings pop up, but 99% of the time they're closer to the evening. I believe it should be possible to take a longer lunch to meet a friend or go to the gym, considering I'll end up making up the hours (likely many times over) anyway. The only thing stopping me would be purely my own workaholism and inability to switch off.
Scheduling-wise, the time zone discrepancy might give us _more_ flexibility since we'd know there won't be a surprise meeting for several hours in the day. Some convenient scenarios I've considered:
* Visit the gym during off-peak hours and have the equipment to ourselves.
* Take a long weekend in another city and work from the train there/back instead of having to book time off. You could schedule the trip in the beginning of the day where you know you won't have to hop into a meeting mid-transit.
* If meeting a friend in the city, could work from a coffee shop before/after (same as above, might be especially convenient if you know you have a chunk of the day where you won't be taking a meeting in the coffee shop).
I could even easily work on the way to a social engagement on the bus/subway and not worry about missing "work time", although after two years of no public transport I've been getting very carsick (I'm betting that'll pass).
So I _suspect_ that once one gets into the swing of things, this kind of arrangement could actually make it better in terms of social activities.
In about a week, I plan to start going to the gym again and sign up for a dance class, so we'll see what the social life looks like then. The three main meetings I have in the week are pre-scheduled, so it should be possible to schedule these things around them. Sometimes surprise meetings pop up, but 99% of the time they're closer to the evening. I believe it should be possible to take a longer lunch to meet a friend or go to the gym, considering I'll end up making up the hours (likely many times over) anyway. The only thing stopping me would be purely my own workaholism and inability to switch off.
Scheduling-wise, the time zone discrepancy might give us _more_ flexibility since we'd know there won't be a surprise meeting for several hours in the day. Some convenient scenarios I've considered:
* Visit the gym during off-peak hours and have the equipment to ourselves.
* Take a long weekend in another city and work from the train there/back instead of having to book time off. You could schedule the trip in the beginning of the day where you know you won't have to hop into a meeting mid-transit.
* If meeting a friend in the city, could work from a coffee shop before/after (same as above, might be especially convenient if you know you have a chunk of the day where you won't be taking a meeting in the coffee shop).
I could even easily work on the way to a social engagement on the bus/subway and not worry about missing "work time", although after two years of no public transport I've been getting very carsick (I'm betting that'll pass).
So I _suspect_ that once one gets into the swing of things, this kind of arrangement could actually make it better in terms of social activities.