Used to be exactly like this. Get everything done in the first hour, then just hang out the rest of day and handle anything that hits my desk.

Be careful asking for more work. I did and my boss won’t stop now. Even after I told him I’m swamped. He “made up” for it by getting me a huge bonus and pay raise this year but now that it’s gone into effect, it seems like he uses it to justify giving me even more.

On top of this, we hired someone new in our department. She has more experience than me, so has a “senior” in front of the same job title as me (prob makes a lot more too). And guess what? My boss seems to think her hiring has frees me up. In reality, it’s the opposite. She is assigned mostly things I’ve never done. And whenever I try to hand off some of things I’ve been instructed to hand over, she has a million questions and I have to guide her by the hand.

Hopefully this gets better with time, but I’ve felt like I’ve been underwater for awhile now. Really long for those days when I didn’t have much.