When things don’t take as long as you think they should

I have taken a couple of days off work to put together the flower, non-edible parts of a wedding cake that I’m commissioned with.  I’ve got another couple of days booked of to actually make and decorate the cake nearer the time.

I was eager to get on with it but needed the wire cutters which C told me required cleaning.  He still hadn’t finished in the shower before I made a start on covering the dummy cakes, and sorting through the silk flowers to arrange them.  I wanted to get on with it and be sure that I had enough flowers and that they would attach and fit properly. I needed those wire cutters.  Come on.  Get on with it.

The other problem was that the smaller of the cake dummies hadn’t been delivered yet so that might have meant starting, stopping and starting again. 

It seemed to take an age for C to get ready, then find the wire cutters and start to clean them.  Come on.  I wanted to get on with it.

As it happened, it all went smoothly.  The icing went on the larger dummy, to make sure that if there were any visible gaps, they’d be the same colour as the rest of the cake.  There were more than enough flowers so I made a couple of posies that could sit on the cake table at the venue.  It was easy to slot them all together and into the dummy.

It wasn’t long after I’d finished the first one, when the smaller dummy arrived courtesy of Hermes.  That meant I could crack straight on with it, and now knowing what I knew from the first one, it was quicker and easier to assemble the second.

From start to finish it actually only took an hour.  And I had two days booked off for this.  But it wasn’t the only thing that didn’t take as long as I thought it would today.

It is NHS, Social Care and Frontline Workers Day, a day to celebrate the 73^rd birthday of the NHS and give thanks to all those who have done so much to help us during this pandemic, and to remember those who lost their lives because of it.  As part of that event, we were asked to ring bells at 8pm. 

C was on a zoom call, so I went down to chime a bell for five minutes by myself.  (We have guidelines about lone working, and I’d signed in and out, messaged C when I arrived and again when I left).  In order to make sure that I arrived in plenty of time, get parked, get into the cathedral and set up ready to chime, I left home at 7.40pm and drove there.  I signed in at 7.44pm! Now I’d have to wait around for quarter of an hour.

I was just contemplating whether or not to chime before the clock struck 8pm, as its been running three minutes late recently, or wait until it struck, three minutes late, then start chiming.  As I was decided what to do, I heard the mechanism run and the clock actually struck at 8pm on the dot.  Someone had obviously set it right again.  I chimed my bell for five minutes, before signing out, locking the door behind me, and messaging C to tell him I was on my way home.

It didn’t take me as long to get there as I thought it might.  Five minutes chiming didn’t take long, roughly five minutes, I’d say, then it didn’t take long to get out of the building and back home.  C was still on his call when I got back.

I now have a day to myself tomorrow without the worry of trying to put cake elements together.  I’ve done my #bellringing bit for the NHS.  What to do next?