Thursday, August 21, 2003

Vacation, All I ever wanted

My work schedule is a nothing close to normal. That's TV for you. I work a late shift (12-9p) Sundays and Mondays and a regular 8:30-5:30p day Tuesdays through Thursdays. Fridays and Saturdays are my weekend. Sundays are so easy, it's almost like working four days a week. Almost.

Well, I've got the rest of my remaining vacation days planned except for one personal day. I can take that at any time as long as it isn't in October or November sweeps. That's another thing about TV - no vacations during sweeps. Anyway, that pretty much leaves me September and December to take this one day. There's no reason to take it in December as I have 10 days around Xmas off. So, I want to take it in September. Specifically, Sunday, September 21st. The plan is to go to the Austin City Limits Music Festival that weekend.

Now, there is the occasion where I get a co-worker to work a Sunday for me and in exchange I'll work a Friday for them. We each still get our 5 days of work in. I could have done this to get that day off, but I really don't want to work an extra Friday. I want to use the personal day - that's what it's for. So, I filled out the required paperwork requesting Sunday, September 21st off.

Miss Management now wants me to do a switcheroo instead. Which is perfectly understandable. Why have someone off and another working extra if you don't have to? Only, that's what is supposed to happen when someone takes a personal or vacation day - someone has to fill their shoes.

On one hand, I get the day I want off AND still have a personal day to take. But, on the other hand, it's not like I have any other reason to take the personal day at another time (besides having a lazy day off). From a work perspective, wouldn't it be easier to have one person work this extra day - a day that, in truth, there's about 3 hours of work to be done (a person could walk in at 3:30p and leave at 6:30p)? Or would it be better to switch people's schedules around and still have a day that needs to be looked after when someone takes a day off at another time?

Granted, I'm being a bit of a dick by taking a Sunday off. I'm the only one who works Sundays. Everyone else is Monday - Friday, so when I take a Sunday off, someone has to work 6 days. But, well, ya know, it's my friggin' day to take off. And when we switch, both of us get a 3 day weekend and a 1 day weekend.

So what's a guy (who really feels like being a dick for various reasons) to do?

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