Voice of the DBA

Tag: vacation

  • Recharging and Cooling Off

    A couple days with my wife in the mountains is just what I need.  We’ll be out of touch the next few days, just us and the dogs, doing some hiking and relaxing.

    I’m trying to meet the goal of having used up 60% of my vacation by the end of Sept. I think I’ll be a day short, but I’m busy enough that it’s tough to find enough places I can get away and still manage the workload.

    Part of that’s my fault, as I was delaying booking days off, thinking we might go somewhere. Finally I decided to just book time away. Thur/Fri this week and next. I’m a little jammed up Mon-Wed, but it’s worth it to not take a laptop and get away.

  • Taking a Break

    A week’s holiday. Something I took for granted in 2019, and something I wasn’t sure would happen a month ago. However, some places have reopened, and we’re going camping.

    I’m spending a week in the Keystone, SD area, not likely near people, but enjoying the outdoors with family.

    See you next week.

  • Taking Quarantine Holiday

    On one hand I’m tired of writing about the challenges of working under this pandemic. On the other, it’s not going away quickly, and I know there are many people struggling much more than I am. I don’t in any way want to minimize the hardships that some of you are going through. I know there are many more important things than this topic for you.

    That being said, I wonder what some of you are doing about holidays and vacation this year. For many of us, any plans we might have had for a flight, a cruise, even a drive, might be derailed by closures and limitations. My wife would like to take a horse and go ride at a park, but many are closed. Other plans I had are completely up in the air for now, with no real idea of what to do instead.

    My employer has asked all employees to take 60% of their vacation allowance by the end of September. It’s a decision made for two reasons. One is that people need to avoid burnout and they need to get away from work, even if they can’t go anywhere. Employees need to find some way to recharge.

    The second reason is that assuming the world opens back up this summer or fall, we might have a large number of people wanting to take a few weeks off during the fourth quarter. Most businesses do expect more vacation during holidays, but they can’t function well if too many people are gone at the same time. We have very liberal and generous policies at Redgate, but I’m not sure we want most of the company trying to take the entire month of December off.

    I know I need to get a break, and I’m looking at starting to take some long weekends most weeks across the summer. If I can make plans with my wife, I might try to get a week or two off in a row and go somewhere, anywhere. We have a camper we can use, so if there’s a place to park, we’re thinking of just packing up and disappearing for a bit.

    Let us know what you think about vacation during this pandemic. How will you handle it? Or can you just bank holiday time until next year? Maybe nothing changes for you if your normal holiday plans are still possible.

    Whatever you do, be careful of burnout when your home and work lives are this intertwined. It can creep up on you if you are not careful.

    Steve Jones

    Listen to the podcast at Libsyn, Stitcher or iTunes.

  • Getting Downtime

    It’s been a crazy year, as are many of my years. I tend to like that, because I prefer to be busy rather than idle. That’s good, but I am aware of the dangers of doing too much, especially across time.

    Most of my travel comes from May-October, and I’ve had a lot this year. In that time frame, I’ve had 4 international trips already, with 2 more to come. To help deal with that, I know I need some breaks between trips.

    Last week I was in the UK for work, but I knew that I would get a little break this week. You might have seen that I’ve republished a few editorials as I was in Custer, S.D. this week. It’s a camping week with the family, and a chance for me to unwind with no real connectivity or responsibilities. A good break for me after a bit of travel.

    I decided to take off August this year from travel. I’m sad to be missing a few events (Louisville, Baton Rouge among them), but I need the downtime. I also take my daughter to university in  a couple weeks, so I’ve got a long weekend helping her move in and then touring New York state a bit with my wife.

    Like lots of IT people, I struggle to get away from work at times, so I’m making an effort to get better. You should as well.