Work Avoidance Methods Chapter 3

Another convenient method for avoiding interaction with people that might delegate you work is to listen to music on your headphones. Concerned that the appearance of headphones might suggest that you don’t take your work seriously? Well, you don’t, so cast that concern aside. That being said, the solution is to have one headphone in your ear and another dangling out, which suggests that while you’re listening to music, you’re also open to discussion, even though you really aren’t, which is basically the point.

Additionally, if your boss ever queries you as to why you seem unmotivated or unable to succeed during work in the morning, simply retort with, “I fail in the morning so I can succeed in the afternoon – you know, like Edison and the light bulb.” Say it with esteem, and your boss will have no choice but to applaud you on your never-say-die attitude.

In the unlikely event that you are queried later in the day about why you continue not to succeed in the afternoon explain, “Success today is evasive – but I’m not leaving until I complete this work in a satisfactory manner. And satisfaction to me is only achieved when success is met. I could be here all night.” Then once your boss has left for the day, you leave too. Make sure to wait a sufficient amount of time so as to ensure your boss doesn’t see you as he/she is driving out of the parking lot. When asked in the morning why you didn’t complete the work asked of you simply explain, “Edison failed 2000 times on the light bulb alone, and he was a genius.” This ought to buy you enough time to make it to lunch. After that, you’re on your own.

This strategy has resulted in me only getting fired twice*, so, its, you know, pretty good.

*I’ve never been fired. I read something about how employers/prospective employers can read these things and take them seriously. If I work for you, don’t take this seriously. If I might work for you, don’t take this seriously. If I’ve worked for you in the past and this looks suspiciously liked something I might have done/said, then please don’t tell any future or current employers about it… because, remember, you’re the BEST BOSS EVER.

Sprucing up your work environment

In addition to drawing clever things on Post-it Notes, you can improve your office life by bringing things to your desk and leaving them there. Plants, for instance, are a good addition to an office devoid of life. The only nagging quality about plants is that some of them need water, or they will give up and stop trying so hard to be beautiful. This is displeasing. That is why I buy cactus plants. I have had a miniature cactus at my office for over two years and I think I watered it once when I first bought it. Yet, it's still alive. Or if it wasn't, I am pretty sure I wouldn't be able to tell anyway.

Cactus plants in particular are great because their natural environment is harsh and unforgiving, like your ex-girlfriends. In other words, they are able to subsist on very little, which means that you don't have to feed, water, nurture or even really acknowledge them. Which is why they are light years ahead of children. The only adjustment you will have to make to bring a cactus into your life is to turn the thermostat up to 93 degrees (at least) in order to simulate the cactus' natural environment (desert). Hopefully your co-workers will realize your commitment to all forms of life and cooperate with the change.

They are also prickly, which is useful if people try to steal them from your desk because they will walk away crying and full of needles. This gives the cactus a sense of triumph and satisfaction. In fact when I picked it up at the store today to look at it it pricked me which is probably why I bought another cactus in the first place. You know, because when people and houseplants insult you, you tend to seek their approval even more than you did in the first place.

Another good way to enjoy your job even more than you do now is to spend lots of time making and drinking teas. Tea doesn't really do anything for you, it's kind of expensive, and it can't be substituted for food. But there are so many kinds of teas! I encourage you to try them all. It's interesting to note that every time you buy a box of tea, a British person instantly appears. I get most of my exercise walking to and from the microwave to make tea. For example, yesterday I spent so much time making tea that I didn't even have time to drink it or to read my emails.

I drink a lot of English Breakfast tea at work, which tastes like dirt. I'm not sure why I would drink something so often that tastes a lot like dirt, other than it is something to do and doesn't make me fall down the stairs at the end of the night.

Another thing you can do to make your daily environment more aesthetically pleasing is to have your neices, nephews, or any small child that you don't really know draw pictures of you doing funny things, like attempting an armed robbery or cheating on your taxes (any child will do, they all have roughly the same underdeveloped and pitiful art skills) to put up on your office walls.

I hope you find these tips useful and that they help to brighten your day. Now if you'll excuse me I have to go to the store because I've found myself out of tea.

Help for the bored and artistically impaired (i.e. losers)

(Picture of amateur, lifeless sketches of cubes and squiggles)

Is this you? Are you only able to draw cubes and squiggly lines? Do you find yourself at a loss as to how to fill your notes with doodles during long meetings?

No problem! Just anthropomorphize them. Any good cube can take on typical human activity. And while you’re at it, make them edible.

In case you were wondering what exactly I do here … I don’t have any more time on my hands than anyone else (this is a purely literal examination). But I do have a generous supply of Post-it Notes and ballpoint pens at work (perhaps too generous for their expected use). Also, my co-workers and I have reached an unspoken mutual agreement that I will do the least amount of work of everyone.

You may notice some errors or contradictions within these sketches. For example, light sources may seem to be coming from several disparate, absurd directions. Or perhaps you may think to yourself, well I don’t think that cheese can really ice skate all that well and I’m not entirely sure they can grow a mustache either. I’d like to take this opportunity to remind you that they are only cartoon blocks of cheese. They’re not perfect. And neither are you.

Oh, got to go. Time for lunch.

Love in the Time of the Sniffles

I'm not sick. I'm not even hungover. My boss, however, is sick and I don't want to have what he has so I'm playing it safe by not returning his emails. As a result of my proximity to a great deal of nose-blowing and sniffling, I have decided that the next time I am sick, I'm going to be very selfish and competitive about whatever I've come down with. Whenever you run into an ailing friend, co-worker, or arch enemy, you know they are sick because to show how pleased they are to see you, they immediately cough all over you and ask if you've brought any soup with you. Before you can even ask what they are sick with (because you weren't going to in the first place), they inform you that they "have what everyone else has" or "picked up what seems to be going around" (poverty also seems to be going around, is that contagious?). Not me, though, because I value originality, even in my diseases. And in order to make my illness sound more glamorous than your common cold, I'll probably say something like "Oh, this old thing? Picked it up in some third world country. You've probably never heard of it" or "This is a completely new disease. Just released by Apple, and only in Asia so far. They can't even identify it yet." I'm prepared to lose a few friends to keep my individuality.

*Sorry if I misled anyone - no, this post was not about love, not even cryptically, it was just an under-whelmingly clever title.

Not LOL

Disclaimer: Eat me.

In my opinion, our world has been dumbed down by emoticons and internet acronyms. There’s only a few I find acceptable. Here is a complete list:

Emoticons:
:-\

Acronyms:
NTTAWWT

I have a particular issue with “LOL” (laugh out loud) because I’m positive 95% of the time the person excitedly typing it is not actually “laughing out loud.” You see, it's bullshit. Besides, why type “LOL” when you can simply type “ha” or “haha” or “hahaha”. The root “ha” can be used to indicate multiple levels of hilarity. My definitions are as follows:

“Ha” = Worthy of a snicker, and mildly entertaining. Like something you’d hear from a bum on the street.

“Haha” = Entertaining, because the comment eliciting my “haha” response likely came at the expense of a third party. Think of Neslon Munz laughing at someone in an episode of The Simpsons.

“Hahaha” = Genuinely funny, and very likely at your own expense, because you’ve just made fun of yourself. I like laughing at you, not with you.

“Hahaha(any number of additional “ha’s”)” = More than three consecutive “Ha’s” should fill you with pride, as it’s likely your joke would have passed for an actual laugh-out-loud moment had you actually been surrounded by people rather than being anti-social and on the internet.

Bonus:

“Fuck off” = genuinely funny, probably true, and definitely at my expense.

So next time you think to write “LOL” ask yourself if you’re actually laughing out loud. Because if you’re not than you’re just being dishonest. Prick.

Jesus might love us, but does he really LIKE us?

Disclaimer: Please do not attempt to interpret this post as any sort of actual philosophical argument about God. If you've ever read this blog or associated blogs before you may have noticed that I generally stick to pretty superficial criticisms and this post is no exception. After all, I am Catholic, kinda. That being said I do not welcome commentary of any kind unless it is "job well done," "keep up the good work," etc.

I walked through Harvard Square on my way home last night and witnessed a group of some kind of Christians proclaiming Jesus's (Jesus'?) love to a bunch of hipsters through a megaphone. They repeated the words over and over to the crowd of unamused onlookers who were really reading The Weekly Dig or whatever. I didn't keep my headphones out for very long, but it did make me think. How do we know that Jesus actually loves us? It's hard enough to determine when people really love you, and they have human mouths and are capable of speech. Personally, I haven't heard from the guy in a while despite repeated texts, telepathic messages, etc. When was the last time he called just to say hey, picked up a check, or appeared to us before 3 AM when we were on a bunch of drugs and were probably hallucinating the experience? Maybe he's just not that into us? Are we just deluding ourselves into thinking we're the only one for Him when He's totally over us and is already macking on another group of followers? Maybe it's time to look deep within ourselves, head to the gym to lose that 5 pounds we've been talking about, buy a killer new outfit, and channel our inner confidence to go out and find ourselves a smokin' hot new messiah who loves us for who we really are ... a bunch of people who haven't been to church in a while.

Directions Would Be Nice

In my pursuit of sustenance, I went to McDonald's for lunch. If you're curious about the food, I didn't find it all that good. It's not that I have a problem with McDonalds because their food isn't healthy or something. It's just that they did a shoddy job making my Crispy Chicken sandwich. Anyway, as they were doing their shoddy job, I decided to grab some napkins from the condiment counter just to the left of the order station. I noticed that the napkin dispenser actually had directions on it.

"Pull Up"

I think this is a reaction to that coffee incident long ago. For those of you that don't recall, some lady ordered coffee through the Mickey D's drive thru, and after receiving and holding it in her hand for a while, she spilled the coffee while trying to sip it, while trying to maneuver her car. She received burns on her crotch region and hands. It was all quite debilitating. Due to the fact that she was not properly informed that she might, in fact, receive a burn if she were to spill Mickey D's coffee on her lap while trying to drink it while also trying to drive her car, she rightfully sued McDonald's. Since then, everything seems to come with explicit directions. I'm happy McDonald's has gone out of their way to explain to me how to take a napkin from the napkin dispenser. But I noticed they were missing some other important instructions that might lead to me hurting myself.

• I don't think it’s clear you're supposed to take a wrapper off of the straw before putting it in your drink. Directions would be nice.
• I think the package of salt McDonald's provides should actually say "Salt Inside" rather than salt on the package itself - this might confuse people who think the package is the salt. Same goes for pepper.
• Sometimes I confuse the knife with the fork - or is it the spoon? I was hoping they could print the names on each utensil. And maybe directions if there's enough space. I'd hate to cut myself with the knife because I thought it was the fork.
• Furthermore, while the directions on the ketchup and mustard packets do say, "tear here", it fails to tell me to squeeze out the contents. I had to figure that out on my own and it took me a while to realize that ketchup wasn't the reddish stuff as well as the delicious plastic.

With these changes, I’m sure the items listed will go even better with future Crispy Chicken sandwiches. I really love that paperfoil wrapping! It’s delicious.