Trying to go on vacation

For those of you in the news biz, you already know, getting unshackled from your desk to go on vacation can be a pain.

My newspaper company instituted a policy this year that we can't roll over PTO (paid time off) days from year to year. Has anyone else's company done this? They told us this in May. It's going to save the company bunches of money, so I have no problem there. But I do have 13 days to burn off before the end of the year.

The fiance and I planned a super vacay. We'll be going home to Texas for a week and up to Colorado for a little skiing for a week. The only problem is getting unchained from this desk long enough to do it. Apparently, it's an unspoken rule that folks only take a week off during December. Well, no one told me. And I worked Christmas last year, so it's time for a little time off.

But I have to do a ton of advance copy to run while I'm gone. Do other industries have this problem? I feel like I'm killing myself so I can go on vacation. Let me be clear, I'm not harping on my employer. These features need to run every week or readers get upset. I'm one of two people at the paper that knows how to put them together and the other guy is on paternity leave.

Well, I'm going to get back to it. I need to compile real estate pages for the weeks I'm going to be gone.