This weekend has been a bit of a drag, but for good reason. I haven’t gone out of my flat at all, and spent most of it being super lazy in front of my laptop.

One of the most rewarding things you can do when you’re not feeling yourself is listening to your body, and actually giving it what it’s telling you it needs.

On Saturday, I woke up relatively early, feeling tired and with zero motivation to do anything. As I was waiting for my boss to text me and let me know whether I needed to go find a last minute item for the trade show next week, I lay in bed, checking my emails and social media, and began to realise I really needed to stay in.

Last Thursday, I was feeling so tired and so sick, and had such a bad headache, that I took the day off, but it didn’t feel enough, even though I slept almost 24 hours in total. On Saturday, when I received the message telling me everything was good and I didn’t have to go shopping, I felt relieved.

I was tempted to meet with my team’s interns (if you’re reading this, hello!) as they had invited me to go with them to Spitalfields Market, but I felt tired, so I texted them. I thought if the weather held, and if I felt more energetic in the evening, I could always go to Model Market with Oummou, so I stayed in bed.

The whole morning was spent half sleeping, half watching series. My brother came in at 1pm or so asking me if I was planning on getting up for lunch, so I got up and had a chocolate chip muffin. About an hour later or so, we had lunch and watched series together. Later in the afternoon, he went to his room to read or something, and I went to my bed again. I had a nap, and then watched Wreck-It Ralph which, by the way, I really liked.

Oummou texted me she wasn’t going to the Model Market, and I told her I wasn’t really up for it either. So, you could say it was a really lazy day. I read somewhere once that time you enjoy wasting is not really wasted time, and Saturday was the epitome of that.

On Sunday, I decided to do a bit more of the same. I know, I know… what am I doing? I’m always busy and running around… I told you, I’m not feeling myself lately.

At some point, I decided to look at the photos I took when I was in Madrid, and follow some of the tutorials from Phlearn.com regarding haze and stuff (here’s the tutorial), and work on them, so I thought I would share them today.

I’ve also gone ahead and experiment a bit further with the photos, and of course, if you think they’re terrible, don’t blame the tutorial, it’s probably me!

Here are the photos. Below, you can see the “Before” by default. Hover over the images with your mouse to see the “After”. The first time you hover over them, they take a moment to load, but once you’ve checked them once, they go much quicker (or should, let me know if that’s not the case) as long as you don’t reload the whole page!

Streets of Madrid

Puerta del Sol

Tio Pepe Sign

What do you think about these photos? Maybe I’ll share with you the story about how long it took me to get them here on the blog for all of you to see!