Sick Days
It’s funny, the way one’s concept of entitlements changes when one becomes one’s own boss.
When I worked for large companies, I strove to take as few sick days as possible, and never for frivolous purposes. If, however, I awoke one morning and was legitimately sick, I did not hesitate to make proper use of my paid sick leave. I never felt guilty about it; taking a day to recover so that I could return to work as soon as possible made sense.
Now that I am self-employed, however, I detest taking sick days. I think of them as “lost time,” “wasted days” that interfere with my ability to meet my deadlines. Sometimes I try to push through my discomfort and write anyway. Every now and then it works.
Today was not one of those days. I awoke sick to my stomach, my head throbbing with pain. All day I’ve been taking pain relievers and antacids, trying to calm my gut and clear my thoughts enough to work. No dice.
Midnight approaches. I’ll have to accept today as a lost day. And I hate that.
5 Responses to “Sick Days”
Millie
Hello again,
thank you for your reply the other day (it made my day)
Hope you’ll get better soon, i guess it’s hard when you try to concentrate and have to cope with the pain.
Reading about your point of view on the “burning” books remind me of something happening in France this days. The government wants to forbid the musulism to wear burqua (it’s the cloth where the women are completly hidden) in the street… I’m an agnostic almost atheist so to me this is not a question of religion but of rights. If someone WANTS to wear a burqua i don’t think a government should forbid it! That being said IF the women are forced to wear them then it’s exclavagism and it’s punishable by law.
Did you see the aventine in the 2010 ship of the line calendar ? Looks good i think…
About the movie, thank you for your notes, i respect and understand one can have a good time watching this movie. And as you said i really hope they will made one better next time.
A french writter wrote a 12 page article (in french) about why the movie is NOT Star Trek… (it’s quite interesting) He calls it Star Trek babies. !lol!
I have another question… This might not be the place so if not i’m really sorry… Is there anyway to (after buying them) have you sign the destiny books ?
I’m not a ‘sign collector’ guy but a friend of mine is really fond of your work too and his birthday is coming in september i thought if i could buy the books from you (?) and if you could signed them, it would be a cool gift. (Warpath would also be another option since he is very fond of Taran’atar)
If it possible just let me know how.
Thank you, sorry it got a little long…
Try and get better (selfishly said so you can write more good books that we could enjoy !)
Thierry
David Mack
^ Hi, Thierry.
It can be difficult to weigh the needs of the state vs. those of the individual, especially in cases such as the wearing of the burqa. I believe that in their day-to-day lives, citizens should be free to dress as they wish (within the bounds of propriety, given local cultural norms). However, I accept that for photo identification, the state has a legal and practical interest in documenting the full face of a citizen, including their hair.
Re: the new Ships of the Line calendar, yes, I saw it, and I am very fond of the work that Mark Rademaker has done on the Aventine. She’s a real beauty.
As for how to go about getting signed books, I’ll drop you an e-mail offline….
Millie
Hello, thank you for your mail i’ll answer it later on today.
I hope you feel better today.
In France we have a laic state . Which means that at school (wich is obligatory to attend until you are 16) or if you work for the administrations or on the pictures of your identity papers, there is a law saying that no “ostantacious signs” are allowed. Do you have the same kind of law in the united states ?
For fun here is a cartoon about the burqa debat that is happening in France this days.
http://vidberg.blog.lemonde.fr/2009/06/22/faut-il-interdire-les-burqas/
The title is :
“Do we have to forbid the Burqa in the class exams?”
out of topic but i meant to tell you, even if it’s really no big deal, but in Destiny Picard speaks french (i can not find where but i’ll seek), don’t take it the wrong way but i think there is a small mistake. Picard says ‘Tu aussi’ if i recall correctly. I think you meant to say ‘you too (my son)’ isn’t it? which is from roman emperator Julius Caesar to his adopted son?
If that’s the case it translates “Toi aussi (mon fils)” (“you” is either TU or TOI but in this case we use TOI and not TU)
I thought i’d tell you because if there is a reedition (omnibus) of the books you might want to correct it.
Thierry
David Mack
^ I don’t know what the law is in the United States regarding photo identification for government employees. There might be one standard for federal employees, and then other standards at the state and municipal levels.
If you’re referring to the scene in Lost Souls between Riker and Picard, I think that either you are remembering incorrectly or someone altered the foreign editions of the book. In my manuscript and in my copies of the book, Picard says, “Et tu?” It is a reference to the famous line in Shakespeare’s play “Julius Caesar,” when Caesar realizes that his friend Brutus is part of the murder conspiracy.
Millie
Sorry, i thought it was french because Picard is french and you were right “Et tu” is a poetic phrasing in Latin (not French i checked)
Sorry about my mistake. That’s mainly because Latin and French are sometimes close… (when i read it i didn’t know about the formulation obviously i didn’t read enough shaekspear but being french doesn’t help…)
Sorry to have doubt you :p
(We all did in my group of friends… so you see it’s a very “english” reference… associate with French like words and a captain that is French… so please forgive my mistake)
Thank you for the clarification.
Thierry