As most of you had probably figured out, I was on vacation from work this week (sadly, I'm back there today). Mostly to decompress and recharge the batteries, and partly to act like a schmuck with the general public and be uncle-social to the family. But I bet you're wondering just exactly what I did on my vacation.
Well...I did this:
1} Blogged. For a rare treat, I had enough time to actually write three blog posts this week, with two of them being a flashback style post, in which I was both windy and erudite.
2} Facebooked. For an even rarer treat, I had enough time to goof off on Facebook. I gained a friend, lost a friend, gained a page like and lost a page like.
3} Wrote. Not necessarily fresh new stuff, although I decided to make serious attempt at doing that on Thursday (epic fail), but I did yet another round editing (see Monday's post for that), gained another beta reader and basically made a menace of myself with my muse.
4} Read. I caught up on some reading. I finished a short story horror anthology by John Lindqvist called "Let The Old Dreams Die", which was basically contained some hits and some misses. I also finished a big ol' non-fiction book about the hacker group Anonymous, which was pretty decent.
5} Wrote More. Not regular writing or blogging, but took a crack at writing another book review (success!). I have a short list of books that I really need to write reviews on and the longer I wait, the less I feel like doing it, especially since I finished most of these books at the end of last summer/beginning of fall.
6} Work. I took the liberty of checking my work e-mail on a daily basis, at least three times a day. Why? Because the last thing I wanted to do was to wade through 300+ e-mails the first day back. And how did I arrive at the number? On the average, I had at least 25 e-mails waiting for me whenever I logged in, so roughly 65 per day for the five days I was out will get you to that figure, give or take. By the way, on the last time that I had logged in to my work e-mail (around 3p) I had a total of 79 e-mails that I had either flagged or need to print out for future use.
And that, my friends is what I did on my staycation. And no, I'm not really ready to face the toddlers at my job, but it's a living.
(c) 2015 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved.
I always check my work email when i'm off too, for exactly the same reason!
ReplyDeleteOh man, it was never ending. The e-mails really didn't stop until about 2 in the afternoon. It was just one after another after another.
DeleteIn other words, right now is the suckiest part of your day.
ReplyDeleteThat's a lot of emails that need attention. You're right though, better than wading through hundreds at once.
It was extremely sucky as apparently I did a monumental screwup before I left on vacation. Normally, I'm very conscientious about my job, but because of this screwup, I'm now owing someone big time.
DeleteSoldier on!
ReplyDeleteYes indeedie doodie!
DeleteWell it sounds like you had a good break doing what you enjoy. Shame work gets in the way of having fun, but that's life I suppose.
ReplyDeleteI had a great time. In fact, I should answer my e-mails more often from home. Way less stress and I actually sound very pleasant to talk to.
DeleteI left the workplace in 2000. Believe it or not at least half of the workforce did not use email or even know what it was.
ReplyDeleteWhen I entered the office environment in 1996, that was the first time I learned to use e-mail. Back then, the internet was in its infancy and I had to have someone teach me how to send a fax.
DeleteGlad you had some time off, even if you did check email.
ReplyDeleteIt was desperately needed, although it's put me another couple weeks behind (like I wasn't already behind to begin with).
DeleteThat sounds like a pretty good stay-cation. I try not to log onto my work e-mail when I'm away, if I can help it, because it just gets me worrying about work stuff, but I see your point. It is easier if you don't have to face the whole back-log at once on your first day back.
ReplyDeleteIt was indeed. Recharged, refreshed and decompressed. Definitely allowed me to tweak my work attitude for the rest of the year as well.
Delete