Sunday, December 04, 2005

How I'm Spending My Winter Vacation

Well, here I am on my 4th vacation day out of 7. Yes I know, Saturday and Sunday are already days-off(at least to non-retail workers), but they're still part of a 7-day block of time in which my services are not required. You've gotta have a couple days off in a row just to 'air out'.


Of course I'm talking about your psyche as well as your office shoes. I mean, if you work a full-time job, 40-or-so hours a week, most of your time every week is spent at work--not even figuring the commute, whatever that may be.( Fortunately I have about a 12-block distance , which takes about 5-7 minutes in the vehicle--but then I have to stay and work if the weather turns to shit, unlike the commuters who get to hit the trail). You spend more time with your co-workers than your family or friends.


After awhile, your co-workers take on a familial air, since you see so much of their ass. You're concerned about what goes on in their lives, whether Aunt Bessie's gonna have that operation or whether they get that big promotion. Some of them you get pretty fond of, to the point that they would probably be friends if you didn't already see them all day every day. And, like family members, they can get on your last nerves(or you on theirs).


Some offices here in town are incredibly tight-knit as far as the cameraderie, carrying over beyond 5 o'clock. I know of a couple Public Aid offices where the fellow workers all go out after work for drinks, and all play on ball teams(well, they're a bit younger too, so that's part of it- just more gas in the tank). Others, to the other extreme, are more like "Invasion of the Body-Snatchers", with little or no interaction among the zombie staff , who go silently, expressionlessly about their business--and where they probably have to put mirrors on the phones to see if people are still breathing!


Our office is somewhere in the middle. We all get along, and talk and joke among ourselves, and occasionally go out for drinks. Some folks pal around here and there outside of work, and some of my co-workers are on my e-mail list as far as jokes and such, but basically we all have our separate lives before 8:30 and after 5. Which I think is healthy. I think playing on a ball team with my co-workers would be a bit much as far as togetherness--sorta like dating the chick singer in your band. You gotta let those office shoes air out sometime, or they start to smell.


So what have I been doing for 3 days? Not much. Like my shoes, "airing out"..

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