Exhausted... utterly

I'm only a few weeks in and I'm utterly exhausted already.

I work so many hours. I work so many days. But here I am on a Wednesday at home because I just couldn't do it anymore. I had no classes, but holy hell I have a lot to do. The irony is that there's nobody standing over my shoulder or even lurking around the corner assigning it to me. I just have to do it, is all.

I took on too much this month. I recognize that now. But what do I do? It's too late. I have two first-time courses (non-negotiable), manuscripts bouncing back for revision (non-negotiable), two conference presentations (could have avoided, but too late now), two courses to begin preparing for next semester (how long can I put it off without hanging myself in january?), two small grant applications (could have avoided in theory, but if I ever want a tenure track position, non-negotiable), and one job application so far (optional? not really, this is a contract position I'm on).

How does a person do all that?

And non-academic people say to me "you only teach six hours a week? that must be so nice!" Yeah. Piss off.

My stress level was so high this morning I was crawling out of my skin. I just had to bail. I took my textbook out and read it with lunch. Then came home. To work. Yeah. I want to sleep. How do I drag myself to my desk when I want to sleep so badly, and I've got these damned fluffy cats purring their hypnotics right in my ear?

That whole work-life balance thing, I need to figure it out. I'm perfectly happy with work being the focus right now, but there has to be enough life in there or I'm not effective at work.

I would be counting down the weekend, but when you have to work all weekend, what's the point?