Schedule

A semi-typical daily schedule (so called because no two days are the same, but this is a decent look at an average)

4:45am: Wake up to do breakfast shift (I’ve discovered I really dislike doing lunch or dinner, and we’re encouraged to sign up for at least 5 meal shifts a week).  I’m always up before my alarm goes off though, closer to 4:20-4:30.

5:00am: Start “first breakfast”, which mainly entails preparing fruit, some sort of protein, and putting on water for coffee and tea.

5:30am: Eat.

6:00am: Start on morning chores.  If I’m on the breakfast shift, this includes filling the solar shower, emptying and cleaning the compost buckets, sifting the leaves out of the pool, and, my personal favorite “caca”, which is cleaning out the “composting toilet”.  Fun stuff.  After those are done, if it is before 8am, I find some other chore to do, like peeling turmeric, doing farm laundry, making butter, or the like.  If I’m not on breakfast, 6-9am is time for chores such as morning rounds (checking the water system and watering a couple of the gardens), rabbits and chickens (probably my least favorite chore.  Entails finding and chopping copious greens for the rabbits, and stomping all over hell’s half acre to feed and clean the cages of and replace the water for the various rabbits).  This time can also be used for working on projects like weeding, pounding rocks, harvesting things, etc.

8:00am: If I’m on breakfast, this is when we start prep for “second breakfast”, which is a lot more complicated and a lot larger than the first.  I should mention meal shifts are 3-4 people strong, so I’m not cooking for 21 people all on my own.

9:00am: Second breakfast.  Yum.

10-1:00pm: Time for either more chores and project work, or time for things like doing personal laundry (BTW, when I get home I am giving my washing machine a big, wet, sloppy kiss.  Laundry using the bike powered machine is so much work).  I generally find myself something near the house to do, like riding the bike powered grinder to grind dosa, because I’m a giant pansy, and don’t enjoy working out in the glaring sun during these hours.

1:00pm: Lunch!  The food here is awesome!

2:00pm: This is generally a down time for people.  Time to jump in the pool, run over to the bamboo house to get online, take a siesta, and things like that.

4:00pm: Afternoon chores start happening, such as the afternoon installation of the chickens and rabbits (which you have to do both morning and afternoon is you’re on that chore for the day), afternoon rounds, the horse (probably my favorite chore, difficult though it is), or milking the cow (cow is also milked at 5:30am, but those are two separately assigned chores).

5:30: Dinner!  After dinner people hang out and talk, it is a good time to plan projects for the next day, play a game, etc.

8:00pm: If you’re me, this is about when you head towards bed.  I may read for a while, I may journal, but most of the time I’m unconscious by 8:30pm.