Hey Astralounge. I know you weren't asking for coping advice with the new job, but here it is anyway. Unequivocal's tips for successfully coping with having a job:

(For those of you who question my authority in this matter, please note that I am currently working two 25 hour per week jobs. Previously I worked a seven day per week, 55 hour per week training/manufacturing position. My credentials are in order.)

• First and foremost, you must compartmentalize. When you are not at work, you cannot let your mind be at work. This cannot be sufficiently stressed. If you are unable to manage to leave your work at the office, please give up any hope of living a happy, satisfied, productive life. I am not joking about that; if you can't learn the trick of separating work from life, then you must simply resign yourself to unending misery and stress.
• Be grateful for your job, no matter how unpleasant it is. If you can't learn to stop resenting your job, you should either find a new job or simply resign yourself to unending misery and stress. If you are one of those childish people who resents the very necessity of having a job, stick a goddamn fork in your eye. Loser.
• Take pride in what you do, regardless of how banal it might seem. A fast food worker who strives to be a good fast food worker is a more laudable human being than a highly-paid professional who doesn't really care. If you can't find anything in your job to feel pride about, you should either find a new job or simply resign yourself to unending misery and stress.
• You must maintain your idealism through thick and thin; expect to always do a good job, to always find the right solution, to always make everyone happy, and to always go home feeling like you have effected a positive change in the world. Unless, of course, your chosen profession is not "Magical Unicorn Princess," in which case it is a good idea to get used to the fact that you're going to make mistakes, and that sometimes people will be dissatisfied with your performance. The fact that you can't make everyone happy all the time doesn't mean that you aren't doing a good job. If the only way you can take satisfaction in your work is by pleasing everyone, simply resign yourself to unending misery and stress.

As far as the "not having enough time to accomplish basic life-maintenance tasks," that's actually a pretty easy one to solve: When you're doing the stuff that needs to be done, don't fuck around. Most of us are masters at letting little things fill up way more time than they need to. That's just fine... assuming that you have the time to waste. If you don't, then you need to be more efficient -- and by that I just mean bust your ass when you're taking care of the little things. Don't fuck around.

One of my household tasks is cleaning the kitchen. I realized pretty early on that I could choose to clean the kitchen in one of three ways:

• I could dawdle. Do a little bit here, check my e-mail, do a little bit there, take a shower, do a little bit somewhere else. Cleaning the kitchen like this takes about two hours.
• I could just clean the goddamn thing and be done with it. Cleaning the kitchen this way takes about half an hour.
• I could buckle down and clean at top speed. Cleaning the kitchen this way takes a little less than twenty minutes.

Now the thing is, the total amount of energy spent is pretty close to the same, regardless of which way I way I choose. If anything, I'm more tired after dawdling around half-heartedly cleaning for two hours. So it seems to me that the choice is pretty obvious.

And that's how I live my life. Work takes up about 50 hours a week. I can clean, take care of the frogs, do laundry, pay bills and balance my checkbook in about 5 hours, give or take. I sleep eight hours a night, on average. That leaves me with approximately 57 hours of waking free time a week, minus time spent running errands. Fifty-seven hours of free time represents success. I get to spend more time doing whatever I want than I need to spend sleeping.

This is not hard. It just requires a certain degree of commitment.