I can admit it – I’m a little jealous. I’d love to get a week off every year in the spring, but honestly I think this whole week long spring break thing is pretty lame. I don’t know if the full week is a recent thing, or a West Coast thing – but where I grew up our spring break consisted of the Friday before and the Monday after Easter – just a long weekend. So I have a few – someone pissed in my Cheerios – gripes about this thing.

First off – it’s a real pain in the butt to those of us working regular jobs – both those who do and don’t have kids. People who have kids all have to make other arrangements for them during the day. They have to pay money to send them extra hours at their normal childcare place, a spring break camp, or some such place – or they have to take time off of work and burn their PTO hours. And when they do that – it increases the work for those of us who have to cover for them, ’cause it’s not just one parent gone, but several who take the week – or at least a part of it – off. And if you want a vacation day during that week but don’t have a kid…well no such luck getting that approved.

Secondly – The whole world does not revolve around the school calendar. Only about a quarter of the households in the Portland area have school age kids – yet suddenly everything in town is on a new “spring break” schedule and costs more than it did last week or will again the following week. And people will talk to you as if you’re supposed to know: “oh that beach house you wanted to rent – I know that website says it’s $200 per night, but this weekend it’s $350. Why? Well it’s spring break of course!” Not for me it’s not!

Third – what the hell are high school kids doing taking trips to Mexico or Florida for anyhow? That is supposed to be a college experience. Enough said.

And finally, like I said, I can admit to being jealous – I’d love to have a teachers schedule. I whole heartedly feel that they deserve to be paid well, but when you consider all the time they get off – and how much they’ll all complain next Sunday about having to go back to work next Monday – it’s hard to listen to any whining about salaries that are pretty comparable to a lot of other professionals out there who do work more than eight months out of the year.

So happy spring break everyone! …. grumble grumble grumble….