Yesterday was my monthly hair appointment, and my stylist says, “So, how did that Big Thing you were worried about turn out?” My mind started jumping about… What Big Thing was on my mind last month? A speaking gig? The book? A charity event?

I couldn’t for the life of me remember what I had been stressed about the last time I sat in her chair, in part because I’m worried about a whole host of other upcoming Things this month. There’s the book launch, the logo change, the potential speaking gigs I need to nail down.

Oh, and then there’s this little change I’ve made lately — I’m officially shutting down my copywriting biz and formally making the switch to being an author/speaker. Oh yeah. This is a Big Thing.*

When my stylist asked me about the Big Thing, I had two revelations:

1. Whatever I had been stressed about had come and gone, and the sun was still rising in the mornings and setting in the evenings. If you’re like me, you tend to see a Big Thing as almost insurmountable. It will come and consume you, and when it looms, it’s giant and all encompassing and it’s all you think about. But when it passes, it is over, and you forget about it.
2. My business life is a roller coaster with one Big Thing after another. This is an exhausting way to live. I get bunched up about the enormity of upcoming events and tasks without stopping to breathe, without stopping to plan. What if I planned ahead a little more to see those Big Things coming then recognized the tasks that would make those Big Things less big? I’d probably sleep better, stress less and be more pleasant to be around.

People tend to think other people think like they do and process information in the same way. So, in my opinion, all you guys are living on the same roller coasters with Big Thing obsessions and post-event forgetfulness. But I bet that’s not true. How do you handle the changes in your professional life? Do you live from peak to peak or coast along on a straight road, understanding that the Big Things you pass will come and go? What wisdom can you pass along to those of us who are getting a little dizzy from the ups and downs?

*More on the new career: I have been wanting to launch the author/speaker stuff for a while, but making a living as a copywriter was eating up my work energy. So I took the leap by taking a part-time temporary job with The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, which forces me to wind down my copywriting and let it go. When the part-time job ends, the book should be in full swing, and the transition should be complete. Mixed feelings. Tough transitions. And a few tears and sleepless nights. But change is good. Here’s the new site for the new career: AskBethZ.com.

I love all my little free tech tools and gadgets, but things break. I have a pro version of Xobni that isn’t hooking up with my account, so it only shows the free version. My Live Mesh file system is blocked by an antivirus program on my laptop, so the files don’t update. And I have a tangled mess of keyboards and mice on my desk because I bought some fancy-schmancy systems that use  bluetooth, and then the bluetooth got hosed up.

So I have all these little efficient things in place that are no longer efficient. This has produced a series of complicated little workarounds that are just downright annoying and time consuming. I’m using a wired keyboard and mouse, and I have to plug them into a USB hub that I use for a thousand things. So I’m forever unplugging one and replugging. And don’t get me started on the printer issues. Because we lost the wireless set up for one of our printers, I pretty much have to go to Kinkos to print something in color from the house.

I’d bet money that you have situations like this in your business…. little roadblocks that you’ve learned to work around instead of fixing. It would probably take half an hour to fix the Live Mesh thing, but instead I take an extra 5 minutes to wrangle files from computer to computer each time I need to sync something. If you add up the time I’m spending, it would be 30 minutes several times over.

Broken technology and little roadblocks are annoying, time-wasting and inefficient. So why don’t we feel like we can take the time to fix this stuff? When I go to print something, I sigh and get grumpy. I do my little workaround and promise myself I’ll fix the problem “soon.” Yet “soon” doesn’t come, and I keep cussing and dealing.

What’s on your business get-around-to-it list? I propose we all set aside Thursday, May 26, as Fix-It Day. Add a comment with a list of the little things you need to fix, and we’ll all commit to setting aside time May 26 (or before) to resolving those little irritations.

Who’s with me?

Now that I’ve held an actual advance copy of the book in my actual hands, it’s time to start sharing!

We’re giving away 10 copies of the book on Goodreads, complete with a cupcake magnet and other goodies!

Enter to win the chance to be one of the first reviewers: bit.ly/U2Fgoodreadsgive

Oh boy has it been crazy here on Avenue Z. I’m finishing up a new site (www.askbethz.com), getting ready to release the book (should be out in late May, but you can preorder here ), settling into married life, coaching a running team… Today I’m flying to Houston for my first speaking gig with a book signing, and I had to call the airlines to make sure I’d have wifi so I can get a project finished on the way there.

Crazy busy, I tell you!

But as I sift through my emails from the past couple of months, it looks like “crazy busy” is a new normal in our business world:

• “Sorry it took me so long to respond… things are crazy busy!”
• “I wanted to get to this last week, but it’s been nuts!”
• “Thanks for your patience… It’s just nonstop around here these days!”

And on and on. When I was growing up, I don’t remember my parents coming home and saying, “Wow, kids. Sorry we haven’t been home for dinner much — it’s crazy busy at work.” Both parents came home at fairly normal times, ate dinner with us most nights and retired to the TV room with us to watch awesome ’80s tv (Taxi, Love Boat, One Day at a Time, anyone?).

Are these “crazy busy” times a new phenomenon? Have we created work environments with deadlines at such an impossible pace that we’re all going insane? And has technology — the tools that are supposed to make our lives easier — played a role in causing this chaos?

I would answer in the affirmative for all three of those questions. I think the easier we have made it to access work, information, entertainment and connections, the tougher we have made our workloads. As much as I love technology and the excitement of this world we live in, I’d love it if we stopped answering the “How are you?” question with “Crazy busy!”

So, how do you answer “How are you?” Is your life calm, cool and collected these days, or are you crazy busy, too?

Gotta run… My Roomba robot vacuum just got stuck under the couch, my iPhone needs charging and I have to pack my Garmin Forerunner so I can go for a run in Houston.