I need a vacation!

Watch out! I'm in a foul mood today, and I need to bitch for awhile to get it off my chest.

'Cause here's the thing: I need a vacation. I need a vacation like I've never needed a vacation before in my whole life. I've been working what feels like non-stop for months and months and months. And I haven't had a whole week off since we moved to Airdrie two years ago.

In the first year we were here, we could leave on Thursday and come back to work on Monday, and that was enough for me. But for the last year I've been taking in extra work on the side, which means I work the first part of the week for the newspaper, and spend the rest of the week (including weekends) working for myself.

In the spring, I took on WAY TOO MANY PROJECTS, and in April & May, my day went like this: Get up at 8 a.m., get to the newspaper around 9 a.m., work through lunch, take a quick supper break at 5 p.m., then depending on the day of the week, work on either the newspaper or my extra projects until 2 or 3 a.m.; go to bed, get up and do it all again tomorrow. On weekends I would let myself sleep until 9 a.m., but then work at home until 2 or 3 a.m.

The past couple of months have been better, but I still routinely work until about 9 p.m. on Mondays and at least until midnight on Tuesdays. And then I take half the day off on Thursday because you gotta find some time to clean your house and do your laundry, but then work for myself all weekend.

And now I'm so tired of working I could cry. I get up in the morning, and I just don't want to go. I don't want to stare at my computer all day in my windowless office. I don't want to be mad at the salesperson who never gives me her stuff until 3 minutes before the deadline on Tuesday so I have to work until 2 a.m. to get it all done. And I don't want to listen to her say: "That's your problem," when I ask if perhaps in the future she could give me her stuff a little earlier so I have a Tuesday night to myself someday before I die.

My creativity is zapped, and I can't concentrate like I used to anymore either.

I know that if I just had two weeks in a row where I didn't have an urgent deadline to meet, I would love my job again by the end of those two weeks. My creativity and focus would be back, and I would happily work until 2 a.m. because that's my job and that's what I'm paid to do. But I don't see it happening anytime soon.

I'm so glad I've got such a great distraction from it all now. Whenever I find myself getting way too angry I just take a minute to daydream: Is it a boy or a girl? Will it look like me or Nate? And after that, I've always got a smile on my face.

Maybe I'll start my maternity leave a few weeks earlier than my due date, and spend those days getting ready for baby, and reading as many books as I can before my water breaks. I had planned on working for as long as I could before the baby's born so that I could spend the maximum amount of time with the baby, but I'm starting to think that maybe I need a little time off before I start my NEW stressful job!