Busy season
You know you’re in busy season when… you have to wade through a sea of dirty dishes to reach your keyboard. If you want to pretend it wasn’t dishes (maybe you’re sophisticated), say it was a forest of legal pads, all extensively filled to the margin with work notes.
You know you’re in busy season when… your meal plans increasingly rely on the microwave. Eventually it just makes sense to build an altar and place the godsend appliance in the middle of your table.
You know you’re in busy season when… you forgo your after work hobbies in lieu of more work. “Life Group happens every week,” you tell yourself, “Jesus can wait.”
I’ve arrived at the gates of busy season. Abandon all hope, ye who enter here. For the most part, during the entire month of March, I’m set to work late nights. A typical work day would start at 8:00 am and end between 7:00 pm and 9:00 pm. The weekends, standing by, sub in at least half the time. In addition to March, busy season bleeds into April. And then, the transition from cut to gash, busy season ramps up in May. Game time, fourth quarter, let’s go!
Why are you so busy, you might ask. Good question. Let me open a window into my daily work life. One of our flagship services at my company is pricing premiums for Medicare insurance. Think insurance for people over 65. (I almost wrote “insurance for old people” but caught myself. My grandparents both read the blog and I wouldn’t want them thinking 65 was a perceived old age. Good catch self.) The premiums for this insurance come due the beginning of June, so until then I’ve got to keep on the busy season armor. The whole process lasts three months for two reasons: 1) A multitude of government regulations, 2) Client input.
At my easily forgettable named company - but still best in the business - we at Milliman consult. Meaning, we help other companies price their premiums rather than pricing our own premiums. My client (not “my” client, but the team I’m squired with) requires a lot of back and forth to get the correct rates. Whether that includes adjusting plan benefits, processing data, or jumping through government hoops, we’d tire to deliver the best quality service. Not an empty platitude, I highly enjoy working with BCI. I interned with Blue Cross of Idaho during college and enjoyed my time there. Helping them is very rewarding. And, would you rather enjoy your work or your co-workers? Yes.
My team speeds the day by; I’m incredibly fortunate to work with such thuggin’, cardiac, whizical individuals (If it wasn’t clear - I doubt it was - I was looking for comical synonyms to: hard-working, kind, and smart.)
Anyways, the main point of this post, I’m communicating that I’m entering busy season. As such, I predict fewer future posts. Over the next three months, as I slowly forget the definition of “free-time”, while maybe writing in spurts during my SAS code runs, with my head now and back arched, I plan to plunge into busy season. At its worst, busy season forces some to raise the white flag, but I’m a young 20-something who can take it. Not sure what age you need sleep, but I’m not there yet. Essentially the same as a Lebron James windmill, smack to the bicep dunk, I can’t be stopped. But ask me again in three months; we’ll see.
