This month I did something I haven’t done in ages. I took a break. Sort of. Recently I was talking to my supervisor about her holiday plans and I was asked about mine. As always the answer was “well, I’ll try and take Christmas day off, but other than that I’ll just be working”. Her response wasn’t what most PhD students would expect - she told me to make myself take a week off. Admittedly my first thought was to meet her half way- take Christmas and Boxing Day off and call it a win-win. After all I have a scholarship that runs out in less than two months and my PhD has been expensive with all the field work. So even though I have until August to finish, I am striving to finish earlier.

By the time Christmas Eve came around I realised I had one manuscript submitted for publication, two others out with my co-authors for review and I’d already started the analysis for my final chapter. This meant I really only had two options- to spend the break fine-tuning my final chapter’s statistics, or to take a break. As far as Christmas presents go, weeks of insanity brought on by statistics, isn’t on top of my list to Santa. So I took a break, which I am apparently not very good at, unless a long haul flight, foreign languages and exotic locations are involved. So I learnt the art of holiday procrastination. I like to think of it as time-off for beginners or weening oneself into doing nothing. It was supervisor sanctioned (perhaps ordered is a better word?) so I shouldn’t have felt guilty. By Boxing Day, the guilt had subsided enough that I was waking up after 7 am. Success.

I had less success in quieting the part of my brain that says “if you’re on holidays you should go somewhere”. During my time off I managed to spend every day looking at airlines websites. The skyscanner app should come with a ‘time-out’ button like all those betting apps are advertising these days. But let’s face it, I’d just find another app. Unfortunately, the whole finite-scholarship situation is putting a dampener on my travelling so I just dreamed. I was going well ignoring my impulses until I looked up the Gnawa Music Festival in Essaouira. My first trip to Morocco had me pledging that one day I would get back there for it and in 2016 it is in May. My super ambitious self told me that if I work really hard I could finish my PhD and be there in time for it. Then my travel-loving self told me that I’ve been to Morocco before, twice, so I should go to Spain too while I’m there. Anyway, one day later I had bought the Spain Lonely Planet, planned a 4-week itinerary and found someone to travel with for part of the trip. The next day I applied for a short-term job because no scholarship plus no job means no Spain. Fingers crossed.