I’ve set a date for my trip, and requested the time off from work. The date was – in the final analysis – a simple decision to make… because I didn’t have much choice.
At my new job, vacation time is gradually accrued as part of their Planned Time Off program. For every two weeks you work full-time, you earn 3 hours of PTO, to use for vacations, personal days, whatever you want to call it. So I did the math to see when I’d have a full week of PTO, and the answer is that I’ll have 42 hours as of Friday, 7th August 2009. I don’t want to wait any longer than I have to, so that’s when I decided to go.
So I put in the PTO request, and it’s official: I have 10-14 August as paid days off. With the weekends before and after added, that means I’ll be on the road 8-16 August.