Dissecting the Workday, and other Minutia

The fact that I'm writing this before 9 am should be a commentary on my day at work. But, today is Friday, so nothing I do today actually counts. Those who work in the industry understand that there's only several days where you buckle down and do real work, but I'll go into that later. Today, we look back and take a lesson on the anatomy of a regular work day.

The normal workday is filled with shit you really don't want to do, people you don't want to talk to, and meetings you don't want to attend. In fact, no one really wants to be here. This is even more evident towards the beginning of the week (Mondays) and ends of the week (Fridays), but every day has its ups and downs. Everyone has a lot on their plate, well, except for the people who sit around me, that either read newspapers, or daydream about Skyline for lunch. These people should really be taken out of their misery. Even if they don't know their miserable, it's pretty much evident to everyone else - especially if you're looking forward to Skyline on a daily basis.

The day is usually broken into two parts, the shit you don't want to do before lunch, and the shit that you don't want to do after lunch. You come in the morning, your eyes blood shot from what you wish was extreme drug use, but really extreme exhaustion. Like a robot, you have your cup of coffee (heroin) on your desk before you even turn on your computer. You check your email - nothing is really to you, it's all CCed by people who think their importance is counted by how many people they can send an email to. Here's where the fun begins: everything is behind schedule. You got stuff assigned this morning, and it was due yesterday; this really isn't a problem though because you haven't finished your first cup of coffee yet, worry about that when there's a 3rd meeting about this piece of work. For the first hour, don't try too hard to get anything done, it just won't work. If there's a meeting within an hour of you getting here in the morning, sit back and read up on last night's sports, because everyone knows nothing can really be started in an hour. It's really like wasting time.

Then, there's lunch. Because, lunch is by far the most important meal of the day. I know, most of you are thinking that it's breakfast because your mom has told you that for many years; but it's not, it's really lunch. The reason it's the most important, is that this is where you get your sanity back. You take as much time as you can to get away from your desk and bitch about a meeting, your friends do the same - because they were in the same meeting.

Two cups of coffee have been directly injected into your blood stream, and things are starting to roll down hill, the Inbox of work is slowly being shifted to the Outbox of work. But not too fast, because if things get done ahead of time, new things will be assigned. It's not like when you get your work done ahead of schedule on a syllabus and have the rest of the semester/quarter to goof off. The afternoon meeting though, is always the worst, time passes at least twice as slow in this meeting, and if you're not on a sugar high, you can't keep your eyes open, but hey, at least you're not doing work, meetings are always a valid excuse for not getting work done. When you look up at the clock, it's almost time to leave - there's an hour to go in the work day. No point in starting anything now, there just isn't enough time, and leaving late is not a viable solution. Music cranks up, and daily reading of CNN, Sports Commentary, and IM chatting hits its maximum when everyone has one thing on their mind, the drive home.

Just like every other day, I didn't get much done today, but that's okay, because everything I have was due yesterday, so I'm already behind schedule and over budget. It's a good thing backup plans were discussed in that afternoon meeting.

This week's been slow, and I guess that's good, because I can write these posts. Some new characters have popped up, and I can't wait till they do something extremely stupid for me to write about, it shouldn't be a long wait, they're really dumb people. Just like any other day, I'm planning on not doing anything today, especially since today is Friday, and I want to coast right into the weekend. Besides, just like every other Friday we're going out to lunch today. It's best to regain as much sanity as we can before the weekend.