Unwelcome news... and incitement to stop procrastinating

I have about two weeks' vacation stored up (a little over a year's worth of accrual) that I'd been saving for a mammoth friend-visiting trip all over the US, but had been putting off due to work, work, and well, work. Since October fell through, my next plan was whenever Willy Week is in 2007.

Then at work last month they told us that since we merged with another part of the company, we had new benefits, and one of the changes was that our vacation would no longer roll over. So I have until 1 Jan 2007 to take 10 vacation days... in the six weeks with the highest density of company holidays in the year.

And, not surprisingly, each of those few free weeks is filling up quickly... just today I heard about two "absolutely necessary" happenings at work during my only possible vacation week.

The reassuring thing is that we will get paid for our unused vacation in salary equivalent.
But I don't need the money.
I need the time.