I spent a good part of the afternoon trying to get NPR on the office radio. Hunched over and very intense, I must have looked like one of those soldiers in a World War II picture who has come across the only radio for miles, desperately combing the airwaves for a signal. Giokas to the world . . . Giokas to the world . . . do you copy? This building I'm in must have been a former nuclear plant because nothing penetrates it except the cold and heat. I even destroyed the only hanger in the office closet so I can enhance the radio signal. It didn't work, but now I'm ready if I lock the keys in my car.

It's not that I don't have anything better to do. I do, and lots of it, but I need music--soothing music--to quell the entrepreneurial beast within. Honestly, I think I'm losing it. I don't have all my oars in the water. I'm actually listening to taped phone solicitations. After working straight 7-day weeks for the past three years and no vacation time two years before that, I can honestly say that I'm nuttier than a Planters warehouse.

So I've caved in--I'm planning a vacation. My wife insisted (actually, her attorney did the insisting) so I'm going. I'm planning to have a terrible time. It's a cruise, so I'll be out of beeper and cell phone range, not to mention E-mail. And the prep work involved in vacations is no fun. I'm actually spending three weeks making sure everything is covered just so I can take one week off. More stress.

This is also the first time I will be away from my business for a full week. I feel like I'm leaving an infant to fend for itself. Who will feed it? Who will clean up after it? Who will tell it stories? Who will stay up with it all night? Good God, I can't leave now! I'll be in much better shape next year. That's it. I'll wait a year just to make sure everything's covered. But that's what I said last year and the year before that. I do need to get away and my people will do a good job keeping an eye on things. They say that entrepreneurs return from a vacation with a whole new outlook on their business because they're able to step back and view it from afar. Nothing farther than the Atlantic Ocean, right?

So maybe this is a good thing. Maybe when I get back all the bills would be paid and all my clients would have sent in their payments. And maybe two new big accounts will come in. And listen--NPR is coming in!

George Giokas is the president and CEO of StaffWriters Plus, a specialty agency that places writers in temporary and permanent positions with corporate and other employers. It also provides editorial consulting work. His database includes 2,500 writers and editors specializing in more than 60 categories. His Web site is located at www.staffwriters.com, and you can E-mail him at george@staffwriters.com.