On the Job by Anita Bruzzese

Here's the biggest news flash of the day: The world did not fall apart while I was on vacation.

The birds are still singing in the trees, the Earth is still rotating and the weeds in my garden have continued to thrive. I received nearly 200 e-mails in my absence, and dozens of phone messages. None of them were critical. Well, at least to me. (Macy's really, really wants me to shop their online sale, and someone felt it was imperative that I was aware some woman is suing Victoria's Secret because of a thong injury.)

But, I can say with complete certainty that nothing was so important that it required me to take a laptop on vacation or check my phone messages.

Many of you urged me not to do it, and I listened to you -- and to myself.

So now I'm back at work, trying to tackle all the e-mails and phone messages and doing my best to ignore the tic starting at the corner of my eye. Still, I'm coming to quickly realized that this may be the worst day of the year.

I'm trying, really trying, to hang on to my vacation glow, but I can feel it starting to fade. My office looks like a cyclone went through it. I wrote things on my calendar for this week that I am now having difficulty understanding, such as: "Fri. a.m., call Dave for interview."

Who the hell is Dave??

OK, I think I've learned that while the vacation was everything I dreamed of and more, I may have sabotaged myself for my first day back at work. There's no reason this has to be so bad, is there? I used to have a boss that would always say to me: "You play, you pay" on my first day back from vacation. I always had the overwhelming urge to smack him.

Was he right?

What's the best way to handle the first day back from vacation? If you've got any suggestions, I'd love to hear them.

Before my tic gets any worse.