Praise God and all the Saints, I am out of hibernation, Hallelujah!
When I held back from taking any vacation in the first six months of 2009 in order to accumulate 2 weeks to take them over christmas and new year, I had no idea I would be spending them chained to my work computer every day, day and night. Heck, had I known, I would have taken one friday off every week for 10 weeks straight! Or for 20 weeks, if you count the fact that I already get Friday mornings off.
I spent the past 3 weeks programming in Java to create scripts that would automatically fill out 3 or 4 thousand forms, which is what it takes to update our ordering catalog. The programming part was easy, and even fun. But running the scripts was taking everything out of me. I spent all day and all night monitoring to make sure they were still running right. I couldn’t even postpone my vacation, either, since it’s a use-by-year’s-end-or-lose-it situtation.
While I was in Texas visiting my family for the holidays, I set up my computer in the back of the room and continuously monitored it. New Year’s Eve dinner, playing Settlers of Catan board game, exchanging presents, watching my niece and nephew play, and even going to sleep, these are all moments tainted by the dreadful memory of my turning/running to the computer to make sure the scripts were still working right.
Like a wise friend said to me: they don’t pay me enough to be this stressed out.
The scripts are done with for now, although it’s hard to get them off my mind.
Now I’m on the train going to the office. I probably wouldn’t have come in at all and would have taken Friday off if it wasn’t for the untimely visit of the Big Kahuna to town these couple of days.
Needless to say, I need a vacation. "Welcome back to work, Ina! Hope you had a great break!" Yeah, whatever.
ina