Must have been one of these one-day/two- day bugs going round, but yesterday morning I was feeling like I’d swallowed sandpaper (I hadn’t), felt like I had not slept all night (had at least 4 hours, but am certain I got a good night’s sleep), and generally felt a bit down-in-the-dumps. I’d gone to work on Thursday feeling marginally in a better state than Friday, and saw the shift through.

As a result of waking up one hour (8:00 approx), having some breakfast, and then going to bed for even more sleep (an hour), and not feeling any better, I decided that, under the circumstances, the best thing would be to call in sick. Now I’m not one to just call in sick because I want the day off because it’s a sunny day; there has to be a reason why. And I had the reason why.

When I phoned in, I was made to feel bad for taking a sick day. Hmmm, in all my working life I’ve never come across that before. If you were sick, you were sick, simple as. At least in a largish department where I used to work, you were at least trusted (well, I was).

My line of work means you have to be 100 percent just about all the time.  If not, you’ve had it. That’s not an excuse for taking a sick day admittedly, but if I had gone in yesterday I would have been worse.

As it happens I feel a lot better today (the first day of my “rest weekend”), but am spending the weekend not doing much to make sure I’m at 100 percent when I get back in.

I suppose it doesn’t help when your’re doing important work (as a department, not just me), and your superiors don’t see you in that light.

Oh well.

*sigh*