It's early Thursday morning, and I'm tired. Not too strange, considering I haven't been sleeping all that many hours each night, and when I do sleep, it tends to be in small doses in front of the TV set.

Later today, when I do wake up, I will be heading in to the office to file my end-of-month paper work. It has been an unproductive month, and I haven't done my share of "learning" - the process of trying to upgrade my skills in anticipation of my next assignment. I did start and complete a course on management; the first of what will be four courses taken from February through May. But, with so many other courses available to me via computer-based training, I should have accomplished more.

I have been somewhat depressed this month over the manner in which I was removed from my previous assignment, and I still fear that there may be further-reaching consequences to that removal. No longer the "golden boy", I need to be concerned that I don't allow any more tarnish to accumulate on my otherwise-spotless employment record.

Next month, I will break out of this funk and accomplish twice as much as I should have this month, bringing me to "even" on the scoreboard of effort expended during my "bench" time. It's not like I did nothing during the past month. I was engaged in sending several thought-provoking ideas to company management, and I came up with a "pet project" that I thought would keep me from getting rusty while contributing a useful tool to my company. But, when I asked other people their opinions about what I intended to do, the feedback was sparse, and primarily skeptical. It seems there are so many things that need improvement, the powers that be have been overwhelmed with suggestions for improvement. Now, there are factors like budget to consider before approving any change to the status quo.

I am not advocating any massive expenditure of resources. I only want to work on this project myself, from my home, while I'm not employed. It costs the company nothing extra (since they're paying me anyway). Yup, just talked myself into getting back on track. Boy, March will be a busy month - what with double the training courses I would normally do, plus the pet project, plus the second phase of the management training.

Anyway, I can barely keep my eyes open, so it's time to hit the hay!