David and I had a discussion very much like this just the other day.

This surprises me — not at all, reading the requirements. They want a combination half-time researcher, half-time developer, half-time sysadmin, half-time web designer, half-time project manager, half-time librarian, and half-time information architect. That’s just a few too many halves; of course they didn’t find anybody! That’s the kind of job somebody grows into, if it can be done at all by a single person (and I’m not sanguine, not sanguine at all). The kind of person they want — if she exists, she isn’t unemployed, I guarantee it.

Look! Out in the stacks! It’s a hummingbird! It’s a supersonic bookworm! It’s Super Librarian!

I’ve been pulling a lot of overtime lately for this very reason: Too many hats, not enough heads. It’s better, but I have to constantly be doing about 3 things at once, which of course makes quality suffer on everything (viz. a goofy error I made last week; stress and fatigue contributed). And I can be derailed, as I was last night, by people who call in relatively late in the day with detail-rich travel needs. It’s easier to put off a project than a person, so the person takes precedence.

Which means, of course, that ongoing projects keep getting shuffled back on to the “to be done” pile and not open and active on my desk.

In spite of all, yesterday I was able to knock off a satisfying number of open items on my “To Do List” and make a start on a few more. So the “To Do” pile (and its companion list, “Emails what must be dealt with”) has gradually gotten down to a more manageable size.

And hi ho, hi ho, it’s that time again.