January 21, 2010
I’m taking one today, sort of, because I’ve got the worst sore throat and set of aches and I still can’t help but feel like I’ve got to get some work done today. Even in the freelancing life, I feel guilty not working.
This suck-it-up attitude isn’t rare, unfortunately, and rarely serves us well except in an environment where taking sick days is institutionally frowned upon. No joke, I’ve worked in offices where the rule was: “You can go home if you feel sick, but I don’t and the big boss doesn’t, we’re always here no matter what, so I don’t know why you’d feel the need to.” Even then, it’s not good to bow to that unreasonable culture.
I’ll tell you why you should use those sick days!
Full time employees with benefits have sick and vacation days, and a defined set of ways they can use them. ie: You should take a sick day when you feel ill, or have a doctor’s appointment. Part-timers and freelancers do have to worry about not getting paid for taking a day or three off, but that’s another argument for saving your pennies against a rainy day.
1. INFECTION Caring is not sharing. When you’re feeling sick, especially when you’re at the beginning of the illness, you’re likely to be contagious. This means you’re very likely to pass along the germs to your colleagues and keep the sick cycle going. Even if you’re conscientious about washing your hands, there are usually communal eating/gathering areas and you’ll leave them teeming with germs. Gross. It’s even worse if you don’t have a desk job and have contact with lots of moving parts that are subsequently handled by others.
2. PERFORMANCE (short term) Who does their best work when coughing, sneezing, sniffling, and feeling run down? Show of hands, anyone? Don’t kid yourself, people, if you can’t even sleep in that state, you can’t do your work effectively.
3. PERFORMANCE (long term) It’s a set-up. What’s worse than sucking it up and trudging to your desk through your day of misery? Having it come back to bite you. You may make mistakes, poor judgment calls or just plain forget to follow through on the commitments you made. And two weeks later, what people remember isn’t that you were sicker’n’ a dog and showed up anyway, they’ll just see the aftermath of your Sickie performance. And be ticked off because they’re sick now too.
4. HEALTH “If you haven’t got your health, you haven’t got anything.” The Princess Bride was right about many things, and this is no exception. Even if you don’t have a compromised immune system, routinely neglecting your health repeatedly takes a toll on your body and triggers untold stress long-term. If nothing else, the habit of ignoring your minor health issues can lead to missing important changes that may indicate greater problem than chronic colds or flus. My junior high math teacher ignored a persistent cough for months, and it was months before she went to the doctor and was diagnosed with end stage lung cancer. They might have been able to treat if she’d come in for the cough almost a year earlier.
If you have sick days, use them. If you’re saving them for a payout (Funny about Money did), use other days if you have to, but don’t save your days and sacrifice your well-being.
So how many sick days do you get? And how many have you used?
February 10, 2009
Status: Miserable
But am seriously glad I’d the luxury of deciding at 6:30 am that, no, the hour+ long train ride to sit at my desk and be miserable, possibly a little productive and a whole lot irked was just not worth it. With plenty of sick hours on my account, there’s no financial reason to be torturing myself.
And thank heavens for my FSA and that stop at the CVS over the weekend: I picked up two boxes of Nyquil/Dayquil combo packs which I’ve already gone through half of, and will be set for a few more days.
I only wish that I were coherent enough to use this time to get better and apply for more jobs. Drat. No multitasking for me today.
November 27, 2008
Is it really Thanksgiving? Happy Thanksgiving, all!
I took to my bed on Tuesday evening, and have only just emerged for a short spell today as my fatigue permits. This is the first time I’ve really been able to form cohesive thought in any sort of linear pattern. Mutant virus, indeed! Whatever this is, it hasn’t let up its grip so I’ll likely pass on all but the most superficial examinations of the Black Friday ads. (Except for the laptop sales, friend keeps calling me with new updates and I can’t resist peeking, at least. But do I really have $600 to spend right now? Before tax? It’s not an impressive bargain but the machine is really quite nice and it’s not likely I’ll have a better deal popping up before next Turkey Day. Well, that’s a debate I haven’t the energy for, and pretty soon it’ll be a moot point.)
I did manage, however, to pay a couple bills and get the CarMax estimate from my dad who took the truck in for the appraisal for me. It’s nothing outstanding, of course, and I’d expected a low amount but actually seeing the appraisal come in at a cold $3000 still took my breath away, a bit. Wow. That little? *shaking head* I’d allowed for the probability. And knew it was likely. That amount will neatly clear the loan with a tenner to spare, or something like that. It may not even be worth the effort of taking it to the dealer for a buyback estimate, but that’ll only cost time, right? If I can muster the energy to leave the house by Saturday, it’d be lovely to have the truck issue resolved.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A few articles I’ve enjoyed in brief moments of lucidity:
Guest post by Living Almost Large at Clever Dude‘s on Thinking Poor?: it’s definitely a mentality that I’ve been weaning myself off to focus on achieving goals and a positive perspective.
Guest post by Jim of Blueprint for Financial Prosperity, also at Clever Dude‘s on Emergency Funds: Don’t know why I never get tired of thinking about emergency funds. Comforting to know it’s there? Just a couple weeks ago I debated creating a CD ladder, but committed to a single, smallish CD to help offset the lowered interest rates on my “high-yield” savings accounts.
I also liked LAL’s post on Moving for a Job: she asks questions that are very important to consider in the course of making that decision.
Frugal is running a fun little series on blogging about PF. Yep, very meta, she’s PF blogging about PF blogging. In Part 2 she asks about the spender/saver split and where her readers fall on either side of the divide. I think we’ve collectively built a bridge, myself!
Clever Dude’s co-author, Shawn, talked about his experience grooming his elderly, thick-coated dog. I had to laugh because my elderly, thick-coated dog has had to endure some similar bad-hair summers thanks to my adolescent enthusiasm and certainty that she’d rather be cool and comfortable, if a little weird looking. Turns out, she’d rather be overheated and not embarrassingly poorly groomed. Unfortunately for her, I really do enjoy the hands-on grooming, shampooing and all of my pets, so even though I won’t try to clip her coat ever again, she still gets bathed at home.
The NY Times runs an article on the New Medicaid rule that would allow states to charge premiums and higher co-payments for services and goods previously provided at no cost (I think) to low-income people. I can understand that states would need to recoup some of the cost of care in order to continue providing it, but I can also see how even nominal fees would become prohibitive. That latter point is actually what proponents consider a bonus, that people would use the services less and reduce the burden of cost and thereby freeing up the services for a greater population, but it’s also a rather cold, bottom line point of view. I can’t argue that it makes economic sense, it just can’t take the premier place in the consideration of how to address the problem.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
And I’m exhausted again, so off I go! Hope everyone has a wonderful holiday weekend!
November 24, 2008
Well, drat, free flu shot my foot! I have a sore throat, headache and achy muscles today, and I’m half convinced that it’s because of that stupid flu shot I got on Friday. The other half of me darkly thinks that my coworker contaminated my work with his germs. That’s clearly the half that has faith in people.
Whatever happened, I don’t feel good. *frown*
February 14, 2008
Tylenol Cold and Cough liquid (Cool Burst, tastes disgusting): $6.99
Tylenol Chest Congestion tablets: $5.89, with a 10% discount
Generic for Nyquil: $8.99
Hall’s Cough Drops: $1.99
(2) 1/2 gallon cartons of OJ: $6
Regular Extra-Strength Tylenol: $7
Halls Defense Tablets: free, supplied by friend, boss, anyone who doesn’t want me sharing my germs
= $36.86
I’m so thankful for my FSA … I’d be pretty aggravated if I were paying for these out of pocket entirely because I wasn’t prepared to be sick for upwards of two weeks.