The English Maximalista

Behold, a fascinating insight into the typical daily schedule of the English Maximalista.

7:00am

Get up between 7:00-7:15, ablute my hands, face, and teeth.

Make the bed. The unwritten rule in our house is that the last person out of bed is the one who makes it. And quite frankly, that person is usually me.

Mr Maximalista will already be in his office, which is down the hallway from my office / boudoir, so I walk through the house to our offices.

Say good morning to the Mr, have a quick canoodle, then go through to my room. This is where I spend the next hour or so whilst I wake up. Imbibing caffeine and catching up with messages, scrolling through my socials, then reading the news: I always go to The Guardian first, BBC.com, followed by my MSN newsfeed.

This past month has seen Fashion Week in NY, London, Milan, and now Paris, so a lot of my most recent scrolling has been to see how The Fabulous Folk are dressing.

Don’t get cross with me when I tell you this, but I don’t usually eat breakfast until MUCH later in the morning, if at all. Although sometimes, my husband will bring me a plate of scrambled eggs, which is what he did this morning, actually. Usually though, I subsist on water and caffeinated beverages until late morning. 

Do NOT leave any comments telling me off about this. Thank you.

8:45am

Take a shower and get dressed. This is honestly how I woke up, this morning:

Clearly, Mr Maximalista is a very lucky man.

9:00am

9:00 is The Official Start to the English Maximalista’s Work Day, Mon-Fri. Depending on whether Mr M is on a conference call, I will head back to my boudoir to do some work online; otherwise, if he’s talking in his office, I will take my iPad downstairs to our family room, and work from there.

Side Note: it’s funny hearing my husband when he’s talking business on the phone, because I can always tell from the tone of his voice if he’s talking to his Work Bestie, his boss, or one of his colleagues. Listening to the person you are most intimate with, when he’s speaking to others professionally, is endlessly fascinating. And mildly alluring. 

Mr M is a diffident kind of chap, so I find myself studying him with anthropological interest, whenever I hear him talking with his corporate hat on.

Sometimes I will give the door the side-eye, in order to better eavesdrop. I occasionally stroke my chin or tap my nose during these audiological observations.

10:00am

Mr M likes to play loud music in his office most of the time, which is great, because we both love a lot of the same music. However, music is an enormous distraction to me: if it’s really good, I cannot concentrate. Likewise if it’s really BAD… thus, by the end of the morning, I will have made my way downstairs for some silence, in order to concentrate properly.

Of course, I am also frequently distracted by the dog, or doing menial jobs around the house such as laundry or wiping down the kitchen counter, etc, etc, etc.

12:00pm and onward…

Yes, I’m aware that noon is traditionally the time of luncheoning, but in this house, lunchtime is whenever I damn well feel like eating. Could be 11, could be 3. We are pretty casual about it, over here.

It depends, too, on my schedule for the day. If I’m deeply involved with a DIY project, I often lose complete track of time, and it’ll be supper-time before I know it.

For instance, I have earmarked tomorrow to do some decorating (I shall tell you all about that, next week!), in which case, I shall have a more fractured day whilst I wait for paint to dry, etc. 

5:00pm

By now, Mr Maximalista will have finished his work day, unless there are fires he needs to extinguish in the office. Both of us like to take a second shower after work, before pajama time… which I have to admit gets earlier with each passing year.

Also, if the weather has cooperated, one or both of us will have taken the dog for walkies at some point before supper.

I like to set out my outfit for the following day, so I’m not scrambling in the morning if I have to be somewhere; I usually do this whilst our food is cooking.

6:00pm

None of our meals are at a set time of day, although it’s safe to say that supper is roughly around 5-6pm. Otherwise, one of us (not pointing any fingers at myself) starts to get hangry and loses her sh!t.

Except for maybe once or twice a week, dinner at our house is not usually a terribly sophisticated event [read: eaten on a proper dining surface]. Yes, we DO eat every single meal off Wedgwood or Spode, and we DO only use cloth napkins in this house: the English Maximalista has a lifelong aversion to paper plates and plastic utensils. But truthfully, we usually eat dinner on our laps in front of the tv, in the room we pretentiously call The Media Room, in the basement.

For about half hour or so over dinner, we like to watch our favourite YouTube vlogs before putting the plates in the dishwasher and spending the rest of our evening reading.

During COVID, we became addicted to watching Escape to the Chateau off British television. This turned into an addiction to Chateau DIY, which further fueled our addiction to the YouTube spinoffs, namely The Chateau Diaries.

So every evening we watch The Chateau Diaries, and Escape To Rural France, whose content creators post videos most days; we also watch Bordeaux Life, The Pethericks, and our new favourite YouTube channel, Richmond Made. Check them out!

9:00pm

Again, our schedules dictate what time we turn out the lights. Generally, Mr M falls asleep before I do, as I will often stay up reading in bed until late, if the book is any good! Otherwise, I might go on Pinterest until I get bored and fall asleep.

*****

And so you have it! THAT, my friend, is the rundown of a typical day in the life of the English Maximalista. My big secret is that Mr M and I are just an ordinary happily married couple, still crazy in love, laughing a lot, and enjoying our simple life together.

Lots of love,

M xo