In spite of my recent Sydney trip, I still have quite a few days of leave to clear for the year. It's typical Little Miss Random style, as I didn't feel it was good to take leave within the first six months of joining my company, and then the overseas work stints came up.

In any case, I asked my boss whether I could take clear some leave next month and was told that he didn't want me to, as I had spent enough time away from the Singapore office already. I had to bite back my instinctive reply, which was, "the five weeks I spent working in the overseas office wasn't exactly a paid vacation." He did admit he wasn't being fair to me, but that doesn't really do anything for me.

Sydney was my first vacation of 2006. My first vacation! In the middle of November. I really should take a leaf from the Australians' book and not work as hard as I've been doing, and really concentrate on getting more of a life.