Ya, GGT, one of my friends is a nurse and deals with that alot. Last Saturday she ended up working an extra shift, plus 2 hours after that because someone called in sick and another had car trouble. My cousin is also a nurse and she's always working it seems. I really feel for people in hospital employment. You really have to have a special personality and compassion (and patience) to do that line of work. I lack all three

My sister's job (in the science field) she gets alot of time off but ends up working major holidays because she is unmarried and no kids.

For what it's worth, before I got my government job I worked all holidays at my other private industry jobs, and sometimes came in for other sick people. Even sometimes at my government jobs I worked them if others had already requested vacation (I worked for an aquarium so we were open every day but Thanksgiving and Christmas, and my job was "behind the scenes" so someone had to do work even if the public wasn't there). Luckily I got overtime for holidays, so in the beginning I'd work them just to get the extra cash.

It wasn't until I moved up in position that I took more time off. However, some people who had been with the city for years had so much vacation (we could rollover a certain amount from previous years) that some people would take off weeks at a time. One guy I worked with didn't work a full 40 hour workweek the entire time I was at another city facility-2 years!