Solomon Jones takes a little - A LITTLE - time off

IT'S BEEN A WHILE since I've had a break.

Not that I'm complaining. When you are busy, it means you're working, which means you get paid, which means you and your family can eat.

And since I am pro-food, it stands to reason that I am also pro-work.

There are those, including my wife, LaVeta, who say I am a workaholic. I think I speak for all workaholics when I say that phrase is offensive to us. We prefer to be called the work-ready, a phrase that avoids the negative connotations of our work addictions, while celebrating our industriousness with a term that's politically correct.

So yes, I have a work problem, but that doesn't mean I deserve to be work-shamed. Just because I've managed to finagle my way into working seven days a week creating multimedia content doesn't give you the right to judge me. Not even if you think my work is glamorous.

When you're writing two weekly columns, doing television commentary and hosting a daily radio show, there's very little glamour involved. In my darkest moments, I am huddled in a bathroom with a phone and computer, taking multitasking to a level that no one should have to reach.

I type until my fingers are as brittle as saltines. That's good, I guess, because I can always eat them with my brain, which frequently turns to soup. Running from one story to the next, from one studio to another, and grabbing ideas from wherever I can find them, I am a man who is often standing on the brink of the breakthrough that will get me off the hamster wheel. Unfortunately, the wheel just won't stop turning.

That's why, when I finally had the chance to take a vacation, I jumped on it like a kid on a trampoline.

Now, before you start picturing me in some faraway destination with servants clipping my toenails as I sip daiquiris with LaVeta, let's keep it real. I have a wife, two school-age children, and bills up the wazoo. We can't afford a weeklong stint in Paris. So instead of hopping a Concord and flying to the City of Lights, we hopped on the expressway and drove to Ocean City.

No, we didn't eat caviar on the Champs Elysees. We bought $5 beach tags, sat next to Marge from Kensington and dined on fish sandwiches from Ike's Famous Crabcakes. As our children frolicked in the ocean, LaVeta worked on her tan under the Jersey sun.

Having been born with a ready-made tan of my own, I sat under a rented beach umbrella, where I promptly fell asleep. I imagine I looked very much like someone who'd slipped up and stayed in the sun much too long, but none of the beachgoers around me had the heart to say it.

When I woke up, we strolled the boardwalk while compulsively eating every junk food known to man. The kids rode amusements. We stayed overnight. Then we left to spend the remainder of our whirlwind Delaware Valley vacation at Hershey Park. There, after watching the edge-of-your-seat drama of singing cows in Chocolate World, we were given microscopic chocolate samples, and we were grateful.

After all, we remember the days of staycations. Back then, the closest we got to rollercoasters were the hills of Manayunk. I'd drive to the top of Ridge Avenue, pause for a moment, then turn around and tell the kids to raise their hands and yell as we rode to the bottom.

Yep, we've come a long way as a family, and I've come a long way as a workaholic. I can actually sit down now without giving in to the urge to work, and my kids can get in the ocean for a leisurely swim.

Maybe in a year or two we'll actually make that trip to Paris, but at least we've moved a step beyond the staycation. For now, the Jersey Shore will just have to do.