I've meaning to write about this since Valentine's Day, and I figured this blip of chaos was still worth telling.

So, Valentine's Day was also Magazine Deadline Day for me, fumigating the love in the air with intense pressure. I didn't see how I could possibly focus on the attention my kids and my sweetie deserved on a day they all saw as special.

Had I planned ahead a little better (ha, ha) I would have already had in my possession little tokens of my affection for them. But, as many readers know, that would be out of character -- not because I'm not thoughtful, of course, but because I'm constantly on crisis time management.

Coupled with my lack of preparedness for Valentine's Day was the fact that I had no room in my day to think about or feel very loving feelings. There were so many loose ends to tie to get the March edition of Spirit of Saratoga magazine to the printer by the end of the day, I was coming completely unraveled.

I had been up and working at home since about 5 a.m., when everyone else got about 7. My daughter excitedly brought a basket of valentines around the house, delivering several to each of us.

"I'll have mine for you later today," I told her, a twinge of guilt in my gut.

Upon seeing his sister's valentines, my 11-year-old son said, "Oh, it's Valentine's Day? I guess I should get some cards soon."

My eyes widened. As it turned out, though I thought my husband took both kids to get cards one afternoon, only she got cards that day. I apparently was the only one who saw my son's class list for Valentine's Day in the bottom of his backpack, and my husband assumed our son didn't need them.

I immediately Googled "free kids Valentine's cards," found something decent and hit print -- only I realized when nothing came out that I had accidentally printed it to the computer in the newsroom. Oops. My husband and I laughed at the reaction people in the office would have when they saw Spongebob Squarepants rolling off the printer.

After getting the kids out the door, I got back to work, electing to work from home free of the distractions at the office. But things were not coming together as well or as quickly as I'd hoped, and I just grew more freaked out in the quiet of the house as the hours wore on.

By the time the kids were coming home from school, I was packing up to go finish the magazine at the office -- and I was at a breaking point in my stress level. The kids were buzzing about their days as they barreled through the door, one of them carrying a vase overflowing with red roses. "Here, Mom. We all got these for you!"

I busted out in tears. "Oh, thank you" I blubbered. I read the confusion on their faces. "But Mom, it's supposed to be a happy day."

"I'm sorry guys. It's just that the magazine work isn't going well today, and I have to finish it by the end of the day."

They were so sweet trying to console me. And I took off to the office ready to conquer what remained to be done and determined to get home with Valentine's treats in hand.

Several hours later, I was hitting the final button to send the magazine to the printer. It was nearly 9 p.m., and I was exhausted. One of the guys working in the sports department asked if anyone wanted a couple heart-shaped Reeses peanut butter cups because he had consumed too many already. "Ooh! My kids love those," I told him.

I still didn't have a card for my husband, though. Then I saw -- still sitting on the printer — two sheets of Spongebob Valentine's cards. I giggled as I cut them up and stuck them in an envelope.

Grabbing my coat and running out the door, I noticed a nice array of treats someone in the Advertising and Classified departments had left out (thanks, Meg!). I took two heart-shaped lollipops and shoved them in my purse with the other treats.

I made one stop for a bottle of wine to go with my Spongebob cards, and headed for home.

The end of the story: my kids were happy to get a treat, my husband got a good laugh out of his cards, and we both enjoyed a lovely glass of wine -- celebrating a quiet moment at the end of a crazy day.

Deadlines here at work don't care that my husband is out of town and I'm on my own with the kids or that I have to be at church for Christmas production rehearsal or that the dirty laundry is piling up or that the leaves need to be raked or ...

Deadlines have no mercy for the other aspects of your life that also are important.

I went into this past weekend with a burdensome load of work to do for both the daily newspaper and the monthly magazine, which was going to press Monday. With my husband away on his annual hunting trip for the next two weeks, I was heavily relying on the fact that I can access The Saratogian's network from home so I can work from. Bringing my children to the office all weekend was not a workable option, so you can imagine my dismay when I discovered Friday night that the program that allows me access to the system was malfunctioning.

Dismay doesn't describe it, actually. Panic ensued. And that doesn't happen too often with me. I'm the optimistic type that will generally assume things are going to work out, that this must just be a little hiccup. Not this time, though. Nope. I pushed the panic button at the first sign of trouble, first making a call to the IT guy, then following with a desparate e-mail laying out the situation.

He assured me it would get fixed, and indeed, by the next morning, I was able to get into the system from home and work without any problem. I managed to push the daily newspaper stuff off my plate by mid-day Saturday, and in between my daughter's last football game for cheerleading on Saturday evening and and raking some leaves and running errands Sunday, I worked on the magazine. By 2 a.m., I got to a point where I thought I could (and should) stop for the night.

A few hours later, after getting the kids off to school, I resumed working -- last-minute layout and editing, writing my letter for the signature page, making corrections and tweaks, etc.

Of course, because there are not enough hours in the workday, 5:30 p.m. arrived and I still had a huge chunk of my to-do list left. So, I ran across town to pick up the kiddos, grabbed dinner at Wendy's and set them up in the office lunchroom to do their homework.

That didn't last long, though. Once they finished their chicken nuggets, they were swarming my little corner of the newsroom as I desperately worked to keep them quiet while putting the finishing touches on the magazine. (Unfortunately, working at home wouldn't have been prudent for this portion of the process.)

By the time the last page was converted to a PDF to be sent to the printer in Pennsylvania electronically, I had about a thousand new gray hairs. And it was 9:30 p.m., definitely past bedtime.

We got home and to bed pretty quickly — an end to a stressful stretch in the life of this editor/mom.

Like I said, deadlines have no mercy.

I've got so many balls in the air right now, I just know they're about to start crashing to the floor. I'm on the gerbil wheel, but I can't make it go fast enough. The problem is — everything is a priority.

Though I just sent the May Spirit of Saratoga magazine to the printer last Monday, the June issue deadlines are creeping up. I just sent out a bunch of e-mails to writers with my usual apology: "Sorry for making your deadline so tight because I'm so far behind." I spent a while this morning calling clothing stores that carry men's clothing to see if they would participate in our fashion shoot for the next magazine, but I had no success. As much as the store managers want to, their corporate rules (they were chain stores) won't allow them to allow any unpurchased clothing out of the store. Bummer. So what's the next brilliant idea? The pressure of deadline looms, and I need time to think, be creative. It's such an oxymoron.


Of course, the magazine is just small portion of what I do. And working with reporters and other editors on planning for the daily paper drains major time out of every day. I'm a planner, so I enjoy that part of the job. Truth is though, with everything we have to respond to every day -- directing reporters and photographers here and there — and the hundreds of e-mails, dozens of phone calls, there is little time for actual editing. (That's not good for a control freak like me, and I do have to go home and be a mom, and wife, and housekeeper and cook, etc, etc.)

My routine at work has no real routine, as much as I've really tried for nearly four years. Each day's routine boils down to crisis time management. Each thing comes at me throughout the day, that's what I have to handle first. And in between the raindrops, I'm trying — without a lot of success — to look ahead or catch up, mostly the latter.

OK, gotta stop here so I can get to one of the hundreds of other things that need my attention ...