To go, or not to go??

I just emailed The Queen about taking some vacation days in September. Even though I know she's going to be ok with it, I always feel so incredibly awkward asking (telling) her. My advisor is more reasonable/permissive than a lot of advisors about vacation time, largely because she seems to understand better than most that happy graduate students are more productive graduate students. And in my individual case, she knows that I work when I'm here (you may or may not be surprised by how many people don't), and it doesn't hurt that I've had and will have my own outside funding for the entirety of my grad school career. In other words, I don't cost my advisor anything.

I "asked" for a Thurs-Sun for a kayaking trip in Utah with my roommate and some of her friends, immediately followed by a Tues-Sun for my college roommate's wedding in St. Louis. While I'd really like to go on the kayaking trip (Utah is gorgeous, kayaking is fun, seems like a no-brainer), I'm technically not committed (though my roommate might kill me for backing out - even though she backed out on Death Valley last April). I'm definitely committed to the wedding in StL - I'm in the wedding for starters, and I've already bought the plane ticket.

Since last Christmas, when I went home for (I think) 6 days, the only time off I've taken were 3 days over "spring break" for a backpacking trip, three 3-day weekends that The Queen knows about, and two 3-day weekends that she doesn't. I don't really feel that bad about the 3 days weekends (including the ones she doesn't know about) because I work more than enough weekends to cancel them out.

Here's where I start to debate whether or not to go on the kayaking trip. I really, as in REALLY, want to go to Europe next year, hopefully immediately after Christmas. In order to continue living, I have to go home for Christmas for at least a few days, so I can't cut back many days there. The motivation of going to Europe after Christmas is that I could fly directly from Boston, making airfare $300-400 cheaper (my parents will buy me a plane ticket home for Christmas for my birthday). I could easily get away with going to Europe for a week, but there's a lot I want to do on this trip. I want to see my friend Amy who's living in Amsterdam and my labmate Ashley who will be living in Paris, and I also really want to get down to Lyon to see my host family if at all possible. I've also never been to any of the low countries, so I'd really like to see a bit more of them between Amsterdam and Paris. All that makes a week way too short. (There's also the possibility of flying IcelandAir, and taking a layover in Reykjavik, which would add a couple of more days...but we won't talk about that temptation for now.)

So it comes down to, do I go kayaking, and not go to Europe for as long as I'd like, or do I skip the kayaking and have an easier time getting away with going to Europe longer??? If these decisions are tough now...I have NO idea how I'm going to feed this addiction when I have a real job...