I've been doing okay at work, changing my work personality to fit in better with the others, but the little annoyances are still there, and still affect me. I was dealing with it fairly well until last week. While the work isn't stressful or hard, the constant distractions are preventing me from finishing (or even doing) the large important tasks. In two weeks, I hadn't finished a single one of those tasks (except maybe reimaging the lab machines - but that was fraught with problems of its own).

The straw that broke this camels back was the constant demands from certain a academic to resolve a problem that they were having with one of their applications. That was okay on its own, but it took one and a half weeks to get done because the academic concerned for some reason didn't want to try the suggestions that I was making. The constant harrasment and mild abuse during this time, on top of all the other petty demands and distractions from other academics that end up taking up so much of my time, finally wore me down on Tuesday. I snapped, and took the rest of the day off. And the next two days as well, for good measure. I came back to work yesterday (Friday) more relaxed than I have been for a long time. I even managed to knock one of those big and important tasks off my list. But during those two and a half days off, I came to the conclusion that I need a holiday.

Excluding weekends (because they're usually busy in their own right), I've not recently had a chance to take some time off and just do my own thing. In fact, if I think about it, I haven't actually had a proper break for ages. I was sick the week between jobs and for the Pemberton trip, and I was stressed over financial matters over the Christmas Break. The last real chance for relaxation came with the trip to Sydney last February. So I'm thinking about putting in for some leave after I've finished my list of Things That Must Get Done.