Full Speed Ahead

It is 1:38 PM.
I just sat down at my desk for the first time since I arrived at 6:45 AM.
I have been either in meetings or class since 7 AM.
I have so many things on my to-do list that it has its own to-do list now.

I think I have reached capacity today. I feel like I've hit a wall. I have dozens of things I need to be doing, but I just can't seem to get revved back up this afternoon. The sheer volume of crap to take care of is overwhelming.

I've come to realize that my job only has two speeds - full throttle or dead stop. For the past year the two have cycled on and off fairly regularly, but now it seems that I've been stuck on full throttle since February. With no signs of slowing down before August, if then. Several strange circumstances have all popped up at once this year, slamming me with big, urgent, difficult projects and situations. The biggest one is the pending (doom) acceditation site visit sometime this fall, for which reporting is due by the end of June. It will be our first one in five years. That's a lot of reporting, for two different programs. Meanwhile I have to get the graduating fellows graduated and processed out, the new fellows processed in, and get my returning fellows acclimated to their new administrative duties as upper level trainees.

But right now I can't even motivate myself to create an invitation to the fellows farewell party we're having next week. I think I need a nap.