On FORCED Leave, but still WORKING?

Let me share with you a photo of my morning meal ^_^

My favorite combo of Scrambled Egg and Morning Coffee

I am not complaining. I am emphasizing that as a government employee, there are services that we should be extending even if we are on LEAVE. All government employees who read this line will undoubtedly agree with me.

It is expected of us. And I am happy doing it.

I am now on LEAVE, but there are many pending tasks on hand, so I and cannot go home yet to our province. It is a 2-hour drive from this city. Even if I can, I don’t want to do it because I won’t be able to enjoy my vacation if my pending tasks are still hovering in my thoughts.

What I am doing now is actually enjoying my LEAVE. I am still at my place even if I am expecting to be at school at 8 in the morning. It’s already 10 AM, and yet, I am still not bathed, and I am writing this post. Of course, I AM ON LEAVE, hahaha!

There are no URGENT tasks so I want to enjoy this FREE TIME for myself ^_^

You might wonder what tasks I should accomplish first before going home. To give me also an overview and reminder of these tasks, let me enumerate them for you.

1. The honorarium of our invited guests and certificates of our presenters.

We hosted our Research Conversazione 2022 last December 27, 2022, and I spearheaded the activity. Part of wrapping it all up is to settle all the deliverables. These two (honorarium and certificates) are the things I need to work on before this year ends.

I am going to work on them this afternoon.

2. Manuscript checking of my students.

I slept late last night because I was working on the research manuscripts of my students. I had two pending priorities, while the other 11 papers were advised to be re-evaluated by their advisers after they submitted the revised paper to me.

It is part of my job to face all these hassles, hahaha. I hope my students are learning from my input.

Honestly, it’s really difficult to teach RESEARCH. It is frustrating, it is tedious sometimes, and it consumes so much of my brain cells. But if I can focus on it without other tasks to work on, surely I can deliver it well. I can do better than what I am doing right now if only I had all the time I need.

3. Field Study portfolio checking.

I don’t know why, but I am assigned tasks that require so much time to accomplish. Hahaha! My time management schemes are constantly challenged. Yeah, I will be checking the field study portfolio of my graduating students and I am excited to read about their experiences during their deployment.

My inbox is already full of their submissions and I will be spending my entire Holiday Vacation reading their works ^_^

4. Exam score recording and grading for the resigned faculty.

One faculty resigned and as the Program Chairperson, I should be the one to work on his pending tasks. WOAH!!! yeah, I can do this! hahaha! I can’t escape this because it is not practical to hire another personnel just to do the checking and recording of the grades of his students – and he has 8 sections with 3 preparations. I don’t know. God help me hahaha!

5. Research and extension tasks.

And finally, as the coordinator for REP projects and as a researcher and faculty extensionist, there are terminal reports that I need to work on. I need to take a deep breath for this. I CAN DO THIS!

Whenever I am soaked with tasks, I always remind myself of this:

If you have reached this part in this post, I want to THANK YOU and HUG you for reading my works hahaha. Knowing that some people from any part of the world are taking some of their precious time to read my words is so motivating and inspiring for me as a frustrated blogger.

There are no extraordinary things I can share in my blog, but you are with me so that makes this journey special so THANK YOU!

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