Ten lashes with a poisonous tentacle

Last spring I put a lot of effort into convincing myself and others that I was perfectly fine with the idea of staying home all summer, not taking a vacation (except a few days to visit my daughter), not doing much beyond the usual round of gardening, writing, reading, preparing for classes. I need some down time, I told myself. I had too much excitement in my life last summer and I need to be still and recover.

Ha!

The lady doth protest too much. Making virtue of necessity is like making bricks without straw: it wears you out and all you have to show for your labor is a pile of bricks.

Now the summer is essentially over and my colleagues are returning refreshed and reinvigorated and ready to chatter about their vacations in exotic places, but I have little to add to the conversation: I weeded the garden, planned teaching workshops, submitted articles to journals. And I went to Akron--twice!

My besetting sin of envy threatened to get the upper hand earlier this week when a colleague kept sending me e-mail messages urging me to perform a particular task that I was unable to perform without first obtaining some essential information from people who were not available because they're out of town at the moment. I decided to try to calm down the frantic e-mailer with a personal visit, but when I went to the appropriate office, I discovered that the colleague in question has not yet returned from a certain tropical isle.

Anyone who wants to crack the whip at me while comfortably ensconced on a tropical island can just go jump in the ocean, preferably while it's infested with stinging jellyfish.

Okay, that's just mean. I clearly need a vacation. Even a mental vacation would help. I'm taking the day off tomorrow: what can I do on a limited budget in one day that will make up for not having a vacation all summer long?