Am I supposed to stack them, or wear them inside each other?

Sometimes it feels like you're a matryoshka doll as regards new tasks.  It's nice to have a boss who asks instead of just assigns, because regardless of how much you communicate, no one knows what it's like to be in your shoes.  Of course that's a two way street - you have to be willing to stretch once in a while.  I had a year where my weeks ran to 60 hours on average.  At the time, I almost wished I was back in the consulting world so I made money for each of those extra hours.  But at the same time, none of it was boring, it was all very technical, all the technology was very new, and I could do a large chunk of it remotely.  I determined when I wanted it to end, communicated that to management, and stuck to my guns about transferring the work when I was asked to continue at that capacity after a year.  I had a great time and still look back on it as a great project.

What's more aggravating is when the responsibilities pile up and they're not interesting, they should have been automated at some time in the past, and you get them because you're the only person who won't say "no".  An interesting side effect of being in a car accident is that a few of those tasks moved off my plate solely because people thought I wouldn't be returning to work in time to keep them alive.  I made it back in under a quarter/three months, and they were the last thing I'd worked on before the accident, so I could continue to own them.  But the transfer provides a chance to automate.  My responsibility is now the much more interesting tasks of training, consulting, documenting, and offering best practices.

Title: Am I supposed to stack them, or wear them inside each other?
Snarky: Why yes, I did want to talk to you about assuming some new responsibilities.