Vacation – all I never wanted….

n the past couple weeks, I’ve had at least two people tell me that I need to take a vacation – one of whom was a commenter on a post here.

The fact is I have no desire to take a vacation. Vacations combine two of my least favorite things – change and spending money.

I can’t really bring myself to spend money on something like a vacation. To me, it’s basically throwing money away. There are a number of physical, real items I need to buy – a house, a new car, a TV that is actually HD-compliant, a PC that doesn’t sound like a jet airliner taking off and regularly takes two restarts to come back up, a treadmill – that I can’t see spending any money on something I can’t hold in my hands or put in my living room.

Some people will argue that vacations are worth it – that the memories will last forever and make it worth spending the money. I’m not one of those people.

I’m also not a big fan of change. I don’t really like meeting new people or seeing new things. I like the comfort of familiarity, of walking into a resturant and the person knowing what I’m going to order, of knowing the exact way to get to destination without having to decipher the best route.

At the end of February, my employer sent me to Apple Training for 4 days in Reston, Virginia. I enjoyed the training and learned a bunch, and the hotel I stayed in was nice. But even though I had four nights in a new area and a nice per-diem, I didn’t use it as a chance to party. I went to the mall one night, and went to Target. I got fast food and ate it in front of the TV in my suite. The hotel I stayed in had a manager’s reception with free drinks. I actually went down the first night, looked around, and went back to my room. I had no real desire to talk to well-dressed business people – pretty much the opposite of me – or sit by myself surrounded by them nursing a free drink.

So I suspect if I went somewhere, that would pretty much be my experience, except I’d be spending my own money. I think it would make me feel worse, not better.

That isn’t to say that I never stop working or leave my apartment. Several times a year, at holidays and usually once or twice during the summer, I drive up to New Jersey to visit my parents. Being cheap, I like the fact that it costs me nothing beyond gas and coffee for the 4 hour drive each way. I even enjoy the drive, if the weather is decent and the roads are clear – there is something nice about rolling through the PA countryside at 75 miles an hour, singing along with rap music, windows and sunroof open. I get to see my parents, older brother, aunt, ect and I get to eat some good food. And after a couple days, I get to go back to my normal life.

I love my parents, but like Jagermeister, too much of a good thing can be too much. After a few days, I usually feel kind of bored and feel like I need my space again. So I usually leave feeling somewhat refreshed – I’ve gotten some good home cooking, a few days of doing nothing, and some time away from my messy apartment and the stress of work and school and life. I’ll be going up to NJ on Wednesday – I took two days off, because I’m already “maxed out” on vacation days at work and have stopped acumulating new vacation days because I haven’t taken any – and my college gives me 4 days off –so I get a 6 day weekend. I hope to leave feeling refreshed, and hopefully ready to take on the challenges of finishing my MBA and buying a house.

The only negative is that I have a night class on Monday night, even though I don’t have to work. I’m not really looking forward to it – it’s Finance, and I’m a guy who doesn’t balance his checkbook. But I only have a month of class left – which is bad in a way, because I have a group project and my group has yet to start working on it. But I will be glad when it’s over.