The Busy Trap is getting linked a lot.
And you decided you didn't want to?
I'd comment on this post, but I'm really swamped at work right now.
He says stuff about what "we" do to schedule our children but doesn't say anything about his particular children. I find the busyness required to meet children's needs is different from job or general life busyness, neither of which stay too overwhelming for me for too long. (And I don't want this to be one of those "blah blah, it's hard to be a parent!" comments even though maybe it is one.) There's a lot of the childcare stuff where if it's excessive work it's because I've chosen to make it excessive work, but on the other hand if someone's throwing up or when Alex was waking me 20+ times a night, that just has to be dealt with.
I always say I'm busy because if you don't people dump fuck-tons of work or errands on you.
He's just trying to shit all over arrogant people living in self-imposed cages, which isn't very interesting, and busy catches a lot of people who aren't self-important jackholes.
4: I just say brightly "I do a lazy half-assed job, break a lot of dishes, and someone else generally has to clean up after me! Whatcha want me to do?"
Then people might not pay me/let me stay in the house.
I always feel like professional writers who talk about the virtue of retreating to somewhere in the woods to do their work and enjoying the virtues of idle contemplation don't quite understand what doing most things other than writing involves.
I have a bit of the same reaction as 5. I think I see what the author is getting at, but in the essay I find it hard to untangle leisure, calm, and relaxation from idleness, luxury, and laziness.
The low-paid housing support workers I interact with always say that they're busy except when things are really slow and they're bored.
Are the high-paid housing support workers more uniformly busy?
I can't get a handle on the author's attitude toward work, either. He says he feels unfit to live any day that he doesn't work, but then at the end of that same paragraph says that he'll happily ditch work for the day to go to a museum or drink cocktails.
I found the juxtaposition of "ogle girls in Central Park" with "drink chilled pink minty cocktails" kind of distracting, and spent a while trying to figure out what its rhetorical purpose was.
14: I think you're supposed to feel sad that you don't do either while he has conquered all ends of the awesome relaxation spectrum, though perhaps I'm stereotyping you unfairly.
Why woud you have to go clear to the park to ogle girls?
12: HA HA HA. When I find one, I'll ask, but for now I'll just describe them as "uniformly low-paid."
I'm probably coming across as bitter about this, which I shouldn't. I semi-deliberately chose a job that ends when the day is over, a life where I can cover my bills without huge stress in a city that's charming rather than New York, and then decided to become a parent in a way that's differently time-intensive than the norm. I'm actually happy with all those things, so I wouldn't expect an article like this to apply to me in a deep way since I've already chosen my own path.
I read that as "museum of drink cocktails" and wondered where it is and what the exhibits are like.
A strange delusion possesses the working classes of the nations where capitalist civilization holds its sway. This delusion drags in its train the individual and social woes which for two centuries have tortured sad humanity. This delusion is the love of work, the furious passion for work, pushed even to the exhaustion of the vital force of the individual and his progeny. Instead of opposing this mental aberration, the priests, the economists and the moralists have cast a sacred halo over work. Blind and finite men, they have wished to be wiser than their God; weak and contemptible men, they have presumed to rehabilitate what their God had cursed. I, who do not profess to be a Christian, an economist or a moralist, I appeal from their judgement to that of their God; from the preachings of their religious, economics or free thought ethics, to the frightful consequences of work in capitalist society.
20: I blame cheap, ubiquitous caffeine.
virtue virtue virtue
Keep thinking good thoughts.
I always feel like professional writers [...] don't quite understand what doing most things other than writing involves.
Tweety and I were talking to a staff writer for a major magazine yesterday, and later were saying to each other what a strange life he leads. Journalism is weird.
Someday, an alien ethologist sifting through the wreckage of our civilization will conclude we were killed off by an alkaloid overdose. He'll publish in some journal which no one will ever read because, hey, who has the time?
3: He doesn't have children.
This is one of the few NYT opinion things I've enjoyed in a very long time, not because it's right, but because it's good, and it's funny. I've spent the last day clicking around reading other things he's written, and looking through the archives of his old comic; he's a polemicist, not an expert. And when the formulations are clever enough to make me not take myself and my knee-jerk responses to things too seriously, that's a rare thing.
Of course, as a single childless person who moves around a lot and gets rejected for hangouts a lot in exactly this same passive way--"Oh yeah let's do that sometime really busy right now but yeah"--it rang perhaps more true for me. And mostly I don't get it from people with kids. It's usually people in couples who don't have very demanding jobs who can't possibly imagine having lunch or a drink.
Kreider wrote a good column a few years ago (I just read it) about the subtle, passive-aggressive judgments single/married/parent people make of each others' lives--the opposite of the grass being greener. It's super-bitchy and wrong in a lot of ways, but, like the busy column, wickedly well-written and very funny.
Rings true with me too. There have definitely been times in my life when I used "busyness" as an excuse to make me feel better about not socializing or doing anything interesting outside work.
25.1 That's what I assumed, though I probably didn't write it clearly enough. I thought his bringing that in as well as the thing about people who are working to get by being tired rather than busy was too hand-wavy for me.
wickedly well-written and very funny.
See, I didn't get any of this.
See, I didn't get any of this.
Yeah, me neither. I guess I was too busy (zing!) trying to figure out where this guy is coming from and who he thought he was talking to. Not in an attempt to ghettoize the non-married, unenchilded, but rather the acknowledgment that different life situations will lead to different obligations. (Obligations often being those things that make a person busy.)
Tweety and I were talking to a staff writer for a major magazine yesterday, and later were saying to each other what a strange life he leads. Journalism is weird.
Writer and academic -- two jobs in which you can sort of wind down your career, choosing to do less and less work until you're in a state of nebulous pseudo-retirement. I think they have this in common with "top business executive" but not with many other jobs.
I suppose it's a matter of taste. For me, it's very rare that rhetorical skill trumps critical response. I feel this way about Louis CK too; when he starts a bit, I often think, "I totally hate this argument," but by the time it's over I have lighted the fuck up.
People's rhetorical buttons get pushed in different ways. I wish I could be more specific, but in over a decade of research into rhetorical theory, it becomes increasingly clear that people have no idea why other people find arguments convincing.
I've had a few students short-circuit me this way. Maybe five in my whole teaching career? I can remember all of those papers; ones in which I started out thinking "No, this is wrong-headed and ridiculous" or "How dare you pull that example out of your ass" or "WTF is this weird stylistic experiment you're doing?" and then I see my marginal notes getting more and more relaxed, and by the end, I end up writing, YOU WIN. Also, usually, Don't pull this shit with anyone else.
Almost everyone I know is busy.
I think his friends just don't want to spend time with him.
I feel like some of it (it = the "I'm too busy" response to stuff) is some sort of subconscious way to be the most important person in the relationship who is always being pursued. I've had friends do this, where if I repeatedly issue invitations or suggestions, I will eventually be able to hang out with them, but it's like a 1 in 5 rate of success with no reciprocal action and there are usually a bunch of last minute cancellations too.
I decided a while ago that I'm not interested in being in that kind of friendship, so if one or two volleys from me doesn't get us to actually hang out, then the ball's in your court and I'll go play with my other friends who say Yes to me. Sometimes the busy people get less busy after a while, or start taking the initiative, but more often we just slowly stop ever seeing each other. Eh. Their loss.
i am so busy that I couldnt repeat M/tch's comment until now.
In our current crowd of friends, people make plans and then flake out at the last minute, and it makes me super irate. I am absolutely not going to fault someone who is sick/has sick kids/has a real reason, but this is the first time I've been a part of a group where those excuses get abused so readily.
And it will be, say, 60% of a group, leaving the remaining people embarking on an outing that is outsized for the few left, who are sometimes an awkward network.
Like there is momentum among a few people/families, and they cancel like dominoes, not wanting to participate without each other.
I don't quite have an opinion about the quality of the piece, because it hits me on a sensitive spot. I feel as if I'm too busy to successfully schedule things, not so much because I do all that much, which I don't, but because I feel obligated to be flexibly available at the last minute for work or some categories of personal stuff. Just this weekend, I waffled and then bailed on a 'Let's hang out' type of plan, because a law school friend and her four kids who I never see unexpectedly visited from another State.
(Nine people and a dog in an NYC apartment, even a big one, during a heatwave? Tricky.)
Work, too -- I hate to make plans and bail, but on any given evening, I've got about a 1/10 chance of having to work late, sometimes higher, but never, that I can count on more than a day or so ahead of time, lower. So rather than make solid plans and fail to show, I sort of think of myself as too busy to do much, despite the fact that I'm not actually working on the vast majority of those evenings.
This all feels more like bad planning on my part than anything else, which makes me sensitive about it.
33 is me too. I sometimes wonder why people feel the need to create some fucked-up power dynamic when it's just about hanging out. With sex, sure, you're working out some boring crap about your mom or whatever, but friends? There's no need.
What people keep telling me, though, when I confront them about doing this to me (which I've started actually doing before fully forgetting they exist, as an experiment) is that they aren't *trying* to create some fucked-up power dynamic; they just don't like to be held down by plans, and feel oppressed by them, and besides, if going out never happens, who cares? It will be a shame, but not as big of a shame as having had all that stress about making and fulfilling a plan.
When I try to explain that yes, this sounds pretty unequivocally like a judgment that hanging out with me is not of sufficient interest, they protest. Because, see they weren't thinking about *me* at all! This is supposed to be comforting, somehow.
AWB, I think you're the one who's mentioned having dinner parties where people don't show up or cancel at the last minute. That would make me absolutely furious.
But I've instead structured my life to not include close friends now and I think that's a loss for me, or will be at some point if I don't become more social. If I'm socializing, it's either something I've planned in advance or a more casual anyone-can-drop-by thing.
I didnt read the piece. But, during the week, I only have two free nights that I have much control over. Those are my two non-kid nights. The trouble is that those are also nights that I have to catch up on work. So i hate scheduling anything in advance.
I am happy for people to come to my house when I have the kids bc I know I will be there. I just cannot commit that i will be able to leave the house with the kids.
So I end up talking with my best friends almost every day, but I could go a couple months without seeing them. Except for you people. I love you people and want to see you every day. Especially AWB. I will totally commit to spending time with her whenever she is in Richmond. Or in the Russian baths.
LB, I've never known you to be flaky, and ffs, you hang out. People with crazy jobs and unpredictable schedules--I really do get it! I don't have that kind of life, other than that I won't miss classes for anything, and I really do have to do hours and hours of prep and grading. But if I schedule it right, I'm in charge of when I do that work. People like me are aware that other people might RUIN THE FINANCIAL SECTOR if they don't stay late at work.
But when I was reading this, I was thinking of the look on the face of this guy I dated, a young lawyer, as he came to meet me for a very late dinner after having canceled a few dates in a row to stay late at work. He was glowing. The partner wanted him to do some extra work, and he thinks it's like a test, and maybe if he stays till 11 every night this week, the partner might be really happy with him, and... I was like, what is it that you're doing that is so crazy important? Oh, he's looking for phone numbers in records of calls. He hasn't found the one he's looking for yet, but in 30 hours of overtime so far this week, he feels like he's gotten a lot done interpersonally, you know?
a more casual anyone-can-drop-by thing
This is why I love living in the City. Totally commitment free dropping by/ hanging out on the front porch.
33, 40: I think I'm the sort of person who's the bad guy in that kind of interaction, and when I avoid it, I do so largely by cutting it short at the beginning and not making even vague plans with people. From this end, it doesn't feel so much like a power struggle as a loss of control -- that actually spending time with friends for fun isn't an obligation, so if something comes up that is an obligation, I'm stuck being a jerk and bailing.
I think the secret to solving this is getting in control of perceived obligations, but I haven't figured out how.
45 before I saw 43. I do try not to be a flake, but I end up socializing a lot less than I would out of fear of putting myself in a position where I'm going to be flaky.
The worst people in this respect are the hip young people. They don't really have jobs, but they are also far too hip to schedule to see people.
Honestly, I don't see this applying to people I know from here--certainly not will or LB. It's insincere people who do this. And, unfortunately, some of my "friends" have been mysteriously insincere people, the kind who tell you to your face that they love you and you're amazing and they need you in their lives, but cannot imagine agreeing to see you at any specific time in the future. I have a very good friend, whom I love a great deal, whose friendship has turned out to be as good as worthless because he hates making plans so much. Even when we do get together, an hour later he tells me he has really pressing important plans with someone else right that moment. Maybe he does it to everyone, maybe he just does it to me--I don't know. But it's enough that I just don't believe anymore that he values our relationship at all. He says he does, and acts like he does, and then disappears to spend time with people he says he doesn't want to see.
And--to serially comment--reports back from these people about their motivations seem to be reports about vast webs of unfreedom that bind them from doing what they want.
Kids are real. A lot of job shit is real. Some extended family stuff is real. I'm not saying everyone is infinitely free. But I am inclined to think that a great deal of people's sense of their unfreedom in being able to express care or interest in other people's lives is bullshit, even if they don't know it. Maybe they really don't actually think about other people at all. That's even what they say, without understanding that people who do care about other people at least actively spend time thinking about them.
I find it impossible to get together with most of my London friends. I don't have huge numbers, but some of them I've known a long time and consider very good friends. But with kids or work, they are always busy.* It's a PITA.
40.last is how I feel a lot of the time. Especially when I know the friends with kids DO make time to see their other sprogged-up friends.
* the two closest friends really do have jobs that involve mad hours, periods away, sudden last minute demands on their time, etc.
I think I'm like LB but I worry that I'm like AWBs "friends."
I only got 2/3 of the way through that article because it was irritating me even though I thought there were the seeds of some interesting thoughts there.
It's true that in some ways you can deliberately choose to schedule more or less of your life. I know people with kids who very deliberately say they're going to do ONE thing (gymnastics, soccer, whatever) rather than try to do lots of scheduled activities. That leaves them free(er) to have downtime, see friends, etc.
It's also true that you can plead busyness as a way to avoid seeing people for whom you don't really want to spend time (I cannot bring myself to call them "friends").
But my overarching observation is this: It's not about busyness so much as having shared processes.
My sisters and I have very similar processes for scheduling time together. We schedule 2-3 weeks out, we honor our commitments unless something particularly unusual comes up. It works very smoothly.
In contrast, it's often really hard for me to to schedule with people who never plan more than a few days in advance, because that requires me to hold a time open with no commitments, on the off-chance that they will turn out to be available. That's much harder for me to do when working 55 hours per week than it was when I was working 40.
I basically agree with AWB, and also recognize myself (at leas past versions of myself) in her description of her "friends.". Oh well, I'm trying to get better. One nice thing about having a kid is that it made pretty clear the difference between being really to busy to see someone and being lawyer busy.
Left to myself, I wouldn't plan things more than about a week ahead (and more often a few days) but I certainly am willing to make exceptions for people who prefer to set things up a few weeks out.
Generally I feel impatient about people who are unwilling to make any sort of accommodation to other people's schedules/preferences/lives. You don't (well, I don't) maintain friendships with people just by accident without any effort at all. If one side's not doing any work, the other side is probably doing a lot.
Sweet Jesus, that was illiterate. Iphone!
Also, the kind of socializing that is hardest for me is the one date scheduled two months in advance. A lot really can change before then, and if all our eggs are in one scheduled basket, the socializing is screwed.
The thing that irritates me the most (besides flat out canceling) is people who insist on scheduling something 3 weeks out, and have very specific parameters (it has to be Wednesday on the east side between 5 and 7 or Thursday on the south side after 8:30), but then the day before are all "Hey something came up can we do happy hour on Friday instead?"
Sometimes I say no even when I could have made the switch, just so we don't get into a pattern that will make me hate them.
That's much harder for me to do when working 55 hours per week than it was when I was working 40.
I haven't read the article yet but, as I've mentioned occasionally here, quote-unquote busyness is an issue that I think about a lot.
I have a relatively simple life, no kids, work which is demanding and engaging but with a flexible schedule and which rarely demands time on off-hours, and yet I still find myself having stretches of months where I drop off the earth and don't see anybody (and, let's be fair, I don't see many people even at the best of times).
I can't quite tell how the cause is balanced between (a) me being unusually introverted, (b) me being too willing to use tiredness as an excuse to not do anything, or (c) me being willing to work harder than most people.
The times when I'm find myself holing up, I'm not working more than a 40 hour week, I'm just focused non-stop when I'm at work, and that wrecks me pretty quickly. After a couple weeks of that I'm dropping into bed exhausted at 9:30. Whenever that happens I just find myself wonder how everybody else does it. I feel like if I'm doing that to myself with my job I'm not sure how anybody balances, for example, a 50-60/week job plus kids and maybe a commute eating up part of the day.
My sisters and I have very similar processes for scheduling time together. We schedule 2-3 weeks out, we honor our commitments unless something particularly unusual comes up. It works very smoothly.
This makes sense. I like to schedule 1-2 weeks out and am unlikely to be happy with less notice than that. I don't mind planning farther in advance than that but am unlikely to suggest that myself.
NMM to Anderson Cooper's closet.
You mean his closet that's full of Gloria Vanderbilt jeans?
(Also, seriously, this is news to people?)
60.parenthetical, this has been discussed before, but I wasn't alone in finding it annoying that he was coyly outish but not actually out, though others found his argument that he needs to be safe in war zones and whatnot compelling.
others found his argument that he needs to be safe in war zones and whatnot compelling
Because it's a well-known fact that, whenever American journalists have been taken prisoner in war zones, they just have to say "Wait! Don't cut my head off, I shag women!" to be released and given a bus ticket back to town.
Oh, I agree about his half in-half outness and I'm glad he's all the way out. It's just always funny to me that there will be people who truly are surprised about someone like him.
"Wait! Don't cut my head off, I shag women!"
Not as effective as "I can eat glass, it doesn't hurt me."
Shockingly, no sign languages included in that list. We should ask Kristin.
62: I'm being unfair, of course. It's not as if he could have given interviews saying "I can't talk about whether I'm gay because If I said I was, then blah blah blah" without essentially saying that he was. But some version of that argument seemed appealing to people and of course there are plenty of people who thought he was right that he had no obligation to anyone to talk about being gay.
I'm being super cranky and also talkative today because I have a headache, but I'm hoping once I eat lunch it will go away.
A year ago, I was a single parent, working full-time, and going to grad school part-time. About eight years ago, I was working full-time and homeschooling, which is brutal. I understand busy. Right now, however, I am idle. Still a single parent, but quit my job to finish grad school, then dropped out of grad school instead. Currently thinking I really ought to start looking for a job, but you know, idle is really, really quite lovely. Waking up in the morning and thinking, I have nothing to do today. Hmm...well, I guess I'll walk the dog, have coffee on the porch, go for a swim, maybe browse the internet a little, think about some writing, make something complicated and interesting for lunch...it's just really a remarkably peaceful and pleasant way to live. I'm not sure how long I could do it -- it's been three weeks and it's weird -- but I fully support his position that people ought to try idleness sometime.
It's not about busyness so much as having shared processes.
Yes, very much this. I have a friend who will ask in an email or text if I want to hang out next week. Sure, I write, I could hang out next week on this evening, or that one or that one, or this afternoon on the weekend. Days and days go by. She emails back that great, let's hang out on Day X. It makes me so very weary to write back and say that while that day was free as of four days ago, it is now no longer free. Bah.
I aspire to do more social things, get out more, see friends more often, keep in better touch, etc., but it's similar to trying to eat better or get more exercise or other such worthy endeavors that many people have as goals. Without specific actionable plans or deliberately cultivating new habits or some similar change, it's just as likely that one won't get around to it, even though one insists to oneself and others that one wants to. I've been consciously trying to get better at making specific social commitments rather than stating simple intentions to see people, but it doesn't come very naturally to me.
So I can see someone being sincere in saying they want to hang out with you, but just not having figured out the personal structures/systems that would actually make it happen reliably. This doesn't make it any less annoying, but assuming "they don't REALLY want to be my friend" is kind of like deciding that someone who desires to but fails to get more exercise doesn't REALLY want to do that. It's true only in a trivial sense.
68, 69: Although it's one of those "I know it when I see it" things. You, and I, and everyone else like us may just be bad at this sort of thing. But I've run into people who do use scheduling as some kind of manipulative thing, and it's probably not all that hard for other people to distinguish the incompetent from the manipulative.
Hanging out with people is kind of overrated. Have you met people? Some of them are real jerks.
But I've run into people who do use scheduling as some kind of manipulative thing, and it's probably not all that hard for other people to distinguish the incompetent from the manipulative.
I guess the way I see it, it doesn't really matter to me if the other person's incompetent or manipulative; they get a couple of chances, and if we don't manage to get together then I don't try to get together with them again. But I also (try to) maintain a sense of detachment about it, so I don't get upset if it doesn't work out.
This may explain why I don't have many close friends.
People kill people. I'm just often nearby when it happens.
74: Me too.
I fall into the Heebie/Blume camp regarding the OP's article, but the one AWB linked in 25 that I found hilarious and quite true (in some ways).
Oh dear, I really did mean 25. Never proofread, boys and girls, it just messes you up.
Stuff we do with people is often weather dependent: no one has to go biking in a thunderstorm, or skiing at -5F, and so last minute cancellations are pretty common. We like to have people drop by -- and really you folks should do so -- but dinner is nearly always assigned seats and don't be late for the soup course.
79 was me. In case you were wondering where to drop by!
Skiing on a soup course sounds dangerous.
I've skied worse.
Folks might want to wait a few days until we get some beer in the fridge, wine in the cellar, places to sit, etc.
82: Not to mention a stable pseudonym.
Up here people's schedules are largely determined by the timing and size of the salmon runs.
Proper cooking and storage can prevent the salmon runs.
8, 23, and 30 are right, journalism is weird. Sure, every job is different, but I'll bet that at that level of income and credentialism, journalists are expected to be much more available and have much more flexible routines than most people. If I somehow magically had my previous job but my current circle of friends, I'd be cancelling outings or taking phone calls in the middle of them on short notice frequently. And that was at a relatively laid-back, small newspaper, not even a daily. Better time management could help but busy-ness just comes with the job. I can believe that a social group mixing journalists and otherwise similar people - engineers, bureaucrats, whatever - would have the journalists acting really flaky and unreliable entirely regardless of their actual personalities. And journalists probably spend more time around busy people than non-journalists, both other journalists and the movers and shakers they write about, than non-journalists do, so it's an over-reported phenomenon.
But then, 70-73 are right too - some people may be unable to schedule well or try but are bad at it, but some people really are being manipulative about it, or so thoughtless as to make no difference. Having a social life is overrated.
But on the third hand, this isn't journalism in general we're talking about, this is an article in the New York Times. One of the most striving, hobnobbing media outlets in the country. Even granting for now that people are too busy, this guy would be right in the middle of the worst of it.
I often feel like I'm busy because I am not good with things that are important that do not have obvious deadlines. So feeling like I could take time out to go to a movie or out to dinner feels like I'm justifying slacking off. Shouldn't I be working all of the time until the task is done? I'd go out, but then be paralyzed by guilt.
As this attitude both nearly killed me and nearly destroyed my marriage, I basically decided it was an attitude that needed to get stuffed. Somewhat paradoxically, by enforcing a reasonably rigid schedule on myself that includes things like "go for a run", "meet friends for coffee", and "do a hobby", I'm a lot more productive and not praying for death.
I wonder if there's old etiquette we could dust off for arranging social events with reasonable parity. I seem to remember several days' notice expected on both parts, and no cancelling allowed except for death or the head of state. Has Miss Manners weighed in recently?
Won't help if job expectations are contrary, or where cancelling is now high-status, although in the latter case everyone else had better join in on Cancelling is Cadly and cold-shoulder the fools.
(88 is the tactic recommended by _The Now Habit_, at least the first parts thereof.)
I must decline your invitation owing to a subsequent engagement.
I would gladly pay you Thursday for a hamburger today.
I often feel like I'm busy because I am not good with things that are important that do not have obvious deadlines. So feeling like I could take time out to go to a movie or out to dinner feels like I'm justifying slacking off. Shouldn't I be working all of the time until the task is done?
This. Loads of anxiety for me, though it also happens fairly constantly with things that aren't very important.
Shouldn't I be working all of the time until the task is done?
I often share this feeling and am also temperamentally prone to anxiety and generally being tightly-wound, so I really don't like letting go of a problem once it's come up. Two things that have been important for me are:
1) Leave work at the office. I'll think about problems when I'm at home, but I don't hold myself responsible for being productive at the times I'm away from work.
2) Learning to recognize the point at which I'm no longer being productive and stop.
Point (2) is hard to learn but is the biggest change in my approach to work from when I was a student and perpetually feeling the weight of one obligation or another to being better at managing my time and attention as a professional.
It helps that, working on computers, there's a clear point at which one is not merely non-productive, but actually producing negative value -- introducing errors or starting down wrong paths. That's a pretty strong incentive to pay attention to how clear your thinking is at any given moment.
I definitely have days where I realize, around noon, that my focus is more or less shot for the day and that I can realistically expect to get 30-60 minutes worth of work done in rest of the day. When that happens I know from experience that I'm much better off if I don't have to force it, but I can just take that 30 minutes of productivity, feel good about, and go home and think about something else.
I must decline your invitation owing to a subsequent engagementsecret reasons.
One of the best things my therapist said to me is that expecting myself to get 8* hours of work (specifically writing my dissertation) done a day was unrealistic. She challenged my assumption that everyone who was working 8-9 hours a day was actually working all those hours. That was so helpful to me and paradoxically, by not killing myself trying to work for 8 hours, I actually got a lot more done. It took me into my thirties to learn this.
And yeah, a lot of my schedule is now 'hang out with friends', 'read book', 'cook fancy dinner' but it makes the 'article revisions, part III' easier to face.
*so to work 8 hours, I would be putting in like 14 hour days
One of the best things my therapist said to me is that expecting myself to get 8* hours of work (specifically writing my dissertation) done a day was unrealistic. . . . It took me into my thirties to learn this.
Just think how much heartache you could have saved by reading the archives.
(I say with sympathy. As I said above, it's an area where I suspect my expectations are still unreasonable, but it's difficult to know what the standard for reasonable looks like.)
The first time I saw this article linked to, I was reading a student discussing her current health insurance situation: three part time jobs, which collectively give her too much income for medicaid, even though none of them on their own provide health insurance.
Just now when I saw this link, I was reading an essay on euthanasia by a student who is taking care of her severely cognitively disabled step daughter, who is 14 and unable to more or talk.
Once I saw that the article was addressed to people who think they are busy, but don't actually have problems, I decided that I just didn't want to read it.
I also found out you can get mumps in your testicles, causing them to swell to three or four times their usual size.
Those of us who only think they are busy and don't have ball mumps really have a lot to be thankful for.
Hmmm, I see that link was only 18 months ago. Apparently I repeat myself more often than I thought.
Oh, I see, I said the same thing in 2009.
Repeating yourself is a prodromal sign for ball mumps.
At least my writing improved. The comment linked in 97 and the one immediately proceeding it are clearer (if you ignore the typo) than the earlier one.
Ball mumps it is, apparently.
The range of responses to the article is interesting. I found it well-written and entertaining, but it's definitely referring to a social context very different from any I've ever experienced. It seems to be pretty NYC-focused (or maybe just big-Northeastern-city-focused).
It's also exclusively focused on the educated professional class, which is unsurprising given the venue but definitely limits its relevance to a lot of people.
Leave work at the office.
One of the key reasons I want a new job is so I won't be expected to check my e-mail or voicemail outside of 9-5 or to turn something around over a weekend.
It's a niche publication, so that's to be expected.
I wasn't alone in finding it annoying that he was coyly outish but not actually out
You certainly were not alone in that, no.
my assumption that everyone who was working 8-9 hours a day was actually working all those hours.
Oh my god. The very idea of working 8-hours during my workday makes me want to go out and contract ball mumps in despair.
Does the MMR shot protect against ball mumps?
My beef with Cooper's protracted closetedness is revealed in the letter itself. He couldn't come out because he wanted to ensure his safety, maintain objectivity, and not have his identity or life become subtext to the important issues he reports on? Like the serious objectivity with which he reported on the time he tried spinach? No, Anderson Cooper hasn't been capitalizing on his personality at all. He's a serious journalist.
110: Yeah, but watch out for ball-autism.
112: Please to not be forgetting the time he dressed as a bunny to feed green beans to a bonobo. JOURNALISM. (This was the one where they were teaching bonobos language, and they could point to little pictures on a keyboard-like thing that said "pine needles" when someone brought them pine-needles. There was not a button that said "superannuated Chelsea twink" so we may never know if bonobos have gaydar.)
113: I was going to link that one too. Journalism! Panbenisha wants Anderson Cooper to wear a bunny costume and bring her pine needles, he'll do it.
I have run into Anderson Cooper in Chelsea and when he saw recognition in my eyes he seemed to inwardly groan and duck.
Up here people's schedules are largely determined by the timing and size of the salmon runs.
118: But I did not work from two till three.
I have contemplative thoughts while, say, walking back from the grocery, or scrubbing the tub. It's other people (including the Internet) that interrupt me. Pity my housekeeping is so low.
I would probably have even better thoughts if scrubbing my antique tub in a coastal ex-fishing village, of course.
So it's easy to overlook that hidden beneath all this smug certainty is a poignant insecurity, and the naked 3 A.M. terror of regret.
I really enjoyed the older essay that AWB linked. It was funny and sharp. I don't find myself being judgmental with single people so much. And I'm sure not one to tell other people they should have kids - I'm openly covetous of a kid-free lifestyle. But I do find myself reacting with that self-righteous/defensive judgment with other parents - those at different stages or with different resources.
Busy, meh. Before I can worry about that I have to get over my self loathing for how much I procrastinate all the shit I'm supposed to do but don't want to. And to do that, I might actually have to start shaping my life in a way that made me happier. But where the fuck to start?
Semi-OT
My sister and I are having scheduling difficulties which are driving me crazy, and I'm just finding a way to talk to her on the phone. She works erratic hours, but mostly in the evening. I work in the day time and need to be in bed by 11. She frequently has her phone turned off when she's at home, and, for slightly paranoid reasons, she doesn't answer the landline that her boyfriend maintains. She frequently calls me from the train station etc. This would be okay except for the fact that I am trying to plan our parents' move and medical care and would like to be able to have her look at a computer or at least take notes--which I have told her. I wanted to talk to her about which care manager (like a realtor for elderly people) to hire, but I have to set a limit on the amount of time I allow her to get back to me before I just do it myself. I resent this enormously.
This is not quite on point, because it isn't just hanging out, and my sister has some real issues, but the different scheduling processes problem is horrible.
My dedication to procrastination is total. After watching the Anderson Cooper spinach video, I'm now watching other Anderson Cooper clips, including a whole episode about interracial dating. I need help.
It's funny, I'm pretty sure people with non-desk jobs spend more than half the time they're at work actually working. When I worked in a restaurant for the summer, there were lulls in the afternoon, and occasionally delivering stuff wasn't the same kind of work as the rest of the day, but I definitely spent four hours out of six working, in chunks of half an hour or longer*. When I was substitute teaching, every minute kids were in the room as work**. When I was in a junk mail factory, I was working almost every minute I wasn't on break. People in retail sure look busy. It's just us sitting at computers, with irregular responsibilities and Internet access, who can plan on 50 percent procrastination or more.
I read somewhere that this actually isn't as much of a change from pre-Internet days as it seems, because back then everyone procrastinated by going to mailrooms or searching through filing cabinets or whatever. Same amount of work done, people just have less fun in the process.
* Now that I write this down, it occurs to me that that was a very tourist-driven area. In the winter there would have been either much longer lulls, or no one doing my job at all. So maybe that's a bad example.
** And, of course, regular teachers have to do work when kids aren't around too.
It's funny, I'm pretty sure people with non-desk jobs spend more than half the time they're at work actually working.
That's why they're called the "working class." And yet people still insist that they are poor because they are lazy.
It is definitely easier to focus your attention, though, when you have a task that provides immediate feedback, in the form of customers that say thank you and go away, or shingles that are nailed on straight or whatever. It is very different that trying to compose an email that uses the right combination of forcefulness and sympathy to get people to change their policy.
122: Do you need synchronous conversation to plan the parental stuff? Can you just use email?
And yet people still insist that they are poor because they are lazy.
Some people say it is because of their genes.
Last night I got cancelled on - at the last minute - by the very people I was complaining about above! "I'm just not feeling 100%" was the reason.
After bitching about it above, it was easier not to take it personally and think "this is a flaw of theirs. If I want to be friends with this person, it comes with this annoying habit." So good for me.
"I'm just not feeling 100%"
Deployment of this excuse is basically a dealbreaker for me. It would at least provoke a Serious Discussion that would end with some sort of ultimatum or metaphorical handwashing on my part.
I was pretty appalled, to be sure.
I just didn't take it personally, which is good, for me.
I'm usually feeling about 37%, give or take a few.
"I'm just not feeling 100%"
This depends on what the person's definition of 100% is. If they are, as a matter of record, in constant low level pain, or subject to depression or under extreme stress at work, then they may regard 100% as being in a state where they can put a brave face on it and interact with their friends, but it wouldn't take much to make that impossible. It might not even be a matter of record, if their experience teaches them that severe stoicism is the price they have to pay for having any friends. How well do you know these people?
(Comment partly arising from Mrs y having just run into a close friend of ours who's been mysteriously off the radar for nearly six months, to learn that she's had two bouts of pneumonia in that time, but didn't call because she wasn't very good company (sic).)
When I deploy "I'm not feeling 100%" it is usually because I don't feel comfortable enough with that person to talk about why I'm in a funk. If I feel loved by that person, I'll go out in whatever mood. But some people I really have to feel 100% to deal with, whether the funk actually has to do with them or not.
I'm feeling about 52% right now, and would be happy to hang out with you Heebie!
Friends who are very needy are fine, and I love being needed, but I can't sit around and talk about their shit if I'm feeling terrible myself. And friends who are hypercritical of me are also fine if I'm feeling on top of shit. But when I'm feeling lonely or grumpy myself, spending time with people like that makes me want to jump off a bridge. And that's hard to explain without ending the friendship.
One of my best (read: only) friends here is totally fine to hang out with one-on-one, but if anyone else is around, she interrupts every single sentence I say with "Anyway, on a *totally* different topic...," as if she's embarrassed that I was about to bring up whatever I was going to talk about. It's not even like I was talking about porn or fucking or anything, just like something that happened today or whatever. If she's not interrupting me, she's announcing to everyone that I'm weird. So weird! I don't even have to say or do anything even remotely strange for her to make this announcement.
I get so angry about it, but I think it's part of her anxiety disorder. Totally cool one-on-one, shaming normative interrupting asshole in groups. I would have given up on her a long time ago if she weren't otherwise an almost absurdly loyal and caring friend in other situations.
How well do you know these people?
Very well. Good friends.
I've never had anyone with an actual chronic illness or disability use the construction "I'm not feeling 100%" as an excuse not to do something.
I thought "I'm not feeling 100%" was just a polite way of saying, "I have the runs and can't be that far from a toilet."
I've never had anyone with an actual chronic illness or disability use the construction "I'm not feeling 100%" as an excuse not to do something
Have you not? I use it a lot, for values of "100%" which approximate having sufficient energy to pretend to undertake normal human interactions for a few hours.
I have used "I'm not feeling 100%" as a reason for canceling. The feeling usually means that I'm going to have a cold by the next day.
I would be much less sanguine during the school year, when such plans would have required significantly more jostling. During the summer I can accomodate pretty much anything. We rescheduled for tonight.
I think I don't like it for two reasons. First, "not at 100%" is a rude way to frame it. You should be saying "I would absolutely do anything I could to hang out with you but I absolutely can't because I feel so terrible right now; you know I would fight through anything minor because I love you." Not "Any miniscule deviation from perfect renders me unable to keep my promises because hanging out with you is so exhausting."
Second, I never feel at 100% and I often feel way worse than 100% and yet I somehow manage to push through it and see my friends because I like them. So suck it up, whiner. (This aspect of my reaction is probably not well-justified).
141- I mean, I cancel on people all the time because I'm too sick to do things. (Except I usually really say What if you came over here instead and can you please pick up some food on the way).
In my circle people either say specifics or use the weird "spoon" metaphor. I guess it means the same thing. I don't think I'd get pissy about 100% from a person I knew wasn't just being whiny. If we ever have plans, and you back out for not being at 100%, I will try to remember not to hold it against you.
Huh. That seems like a spot where being all 'stiff upper lip' around serious health issues ends up in inadvertent rudeness. "Not feeling 100%", if you're talking to someone who knows you well enough to know about your health issues, communicates "I'm really not able to do whatever we had planned, but don't worry about me, I'll manage."
But from someone who I thought to be in basically good health, I'd understand "Not feeling 100%" to mean "I feel ever so vaguely unwell or tired, but so mildly that I can't even pin down what's wrong." Using that as a reason to break a social engagement is effectively saying "Plans I made with you are so unimportant that any vague whim is a good enough reason to break them."
I might be wrong about the basically good health, and so be offended by someone who I thought was in the latter category but was really in the former category. But in that case, I'd think someone with genuine health issues should, to be polite, try to be sure that the person they're excusing themselves to understands that they really can't go through with the plans, even at the expense of a natural desire to minimize how badly they're feeling.
146 to 141, and Cecily basically said what I was thinking before I did.
Also I think the implications are very different if you use a value less than 100%.
I dunno. I wish I had so many friends that I only hung out with people who I feel comfortable not being in a good mood around, but I don't. When someone says "I'm not feeling 100%" as an excuse and we're close, I usually respond first with an offer to do something less taxing, or I ask if there is anything we could do together that would feel good. If not, I tend to assume that there is some part of my personality that does not rub them the right way when they're down, but it's not something they want to make a big deal out of. I feel that way about a lot of people. Seems reasonable.
If it's a regular unexplained excuse from someone I thought I was close to, I will gradually draw a line through their name on the BFFs list, and that's probably mutual.
I am 90% sure in this context it was "This is the Monday after vacation and we have kids, although not super young, tiring kids. Decently tiring kids. And we just got finished putting them to bed and I wish I hadn't made plans."
Fascinatingly, while I rarely feel ill without some concrete reason, I've been inexplicably nauseated all morning. If I had plans with anyone today, I would be cancelling on the basis of a risk that I would ralph all over them. Much politer than just saying 'not 100%'.
"Not 100%" is always, always grumpiness, not illness, in my case.
I've been trying, of late, to say that I'm feeling antisocial instead of "not 100%." It's more accurate and less (I hope) insulting.
I've been inexplicably nauseated all morning.
INEXPLICABLY, EH?
Neither hung over nor pregnant, yes.
To me, "not 100%" sounds more polite than "I think I'm going to be sick." I guess I feel like you're not supposed to volunteer information about your bodily state. If I were actually sick, I wouldn't say anything more than "I'm not feeling well."
Well, yeah -- I was kidding. I wouldn't threaten to vomit on anyone I didn't have a warm, personal relationship with. Polite cancelling for illness I think requires a combination of successfully conveying the intensity of the illness, such that you'd carry out the plans if it were reasonably possible at all, but also, as you say, nonspecificity about any gross details.
The one that made me most irate was when we invited family A to go tubing. Family A texted us the day before and said "Family B is coming, too!" Awesome, the more the merrier.
Then Families A and B, who were hanging out, proceded to get so drunk that they both cancelled on us the next day, pleading hangovers. We'd bought food and filled up the tubes and generally prepared to treat them both to an outing, and it was a last minute cancellation.
There is some overlap in people involved in this story and last night's story. This is an ongoing problem.
153 -- See, I don't get why that's less potentially insulting than 150 (or a childless variant: eg 'I went for a run today, even though it was hot, and I'm a lot more exhausted than I thought I would be'). Isn't there less risk of the person being ditched thinking it's personal when there's a totally non-personal explanation? I'm feeling anti-social could reasonably (albeit uncharitably) be thought to mean 'I don't want to hang out with you' while, imo, one must be especially uncharitable to be offended by 'my boss wants me to be on call' or 'my back hurts from moving boxes' or 'I didn't sleep at all last night, and am really not feeling like good company today.'
Friends owe friends charity, of course.
Obviously, if given reasonable charity, one nonetheless has reason to believe that any of the above are cover for 'I found a better offer' then all bets are off.
I associate "I'm not 100%" with people who are generally anhedonic or go through bouts of asocialbility wherein hanging out within anyone will make them feel stressed and bad company. Saying "I'm not 100%" is easier than going through all the reasons they probably need long-term therapy.
E. Messily: what is this "spoon" metaphor?
162 before seeing 152, 153, which jibes with my experience. Also, less I be misunderstood, the bit about "long-term therapy" was meant to be droll.
163: I had to google that one.
162: I make that same association, mostly because it describes me, or at least it used to. Nowadays I have no need for that excuse.
Well, sometimes those same people are in long-term therapy.
163: Spoons.
A sort of irritating stand-in for a limited supply of energy/capability.
167: thanks, I get it now.
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons...
A skill I've never picked up is how to manage friendships when my tolerance for socializing is so much lower than others, and when I'm only rarely able to perform well in social situations. Except for those times when I have a SO to manage relations for me, people tend to assume I don't want anything to do with them.
weird "spoon" metaphor
Qu'est-ce que c'est?
167: While I think I first saw 'spoons' in some context where the usage was clear, I've spent a really annoying amount of time wondering "Okay, but why 'spoons' specifically, rather than any other token?" And then I saw that link somewhere and found out "Oh, no reason. Could have been forks, could have been paper clips."
Qu'est-ce que c'est?
Fa fa fa fa fa. Fa fa fa fa fa.
Could have been forks, could have been paper clips.
Isn't it a reference to the Eliot as per 169?
No, I'm pretty sure it isn't. I think the link in 163 is the original source (at least I've seen the same link elsewhere described as such), and if you click through, the person who devised the metaphor just used 'spoons' because she was sitting in a restaurant when she came up with it, and spoons were the tokens at hand.
This is the original source (it's linked to at the link in 167, but 167 isn't the original).
I like my social engagements like my coffee spoons, nonexistent. I don't even really know what they are.
I like my social engagements like my coffee spoons, filled with psychoactive drugs.
I still don't understand this spoon thing. Can someone use it in a sentence?
In order to bring both the flakes and the milk to my mouth, I ate cereal with a spoon.
Oh, just clicked on #177. This concept has spread throughout the world?
"the world", doubtful. A subset of people (I think mainly English-speakers) with disabilities and political inclinations, yes.
179: So do I, that's why they're basically non-existent these days.
Actually I had one on Sunday, drove an hour-and-a-half to meet an old college friend for brunch. It was OK.
||
Maybe we've already talked about this before, I don't remember, but: Why is it that we haven't heard a single thing about Romney's lack of foreign policy experience? If this was a Presidential election with a Repug. incumbent and a Dem. challenger, all you'd fucking see on the TV and papers and interblogumblers would be "foreign policy experience! foreign policy experience! foreign policy experience!" it would be a constant drumbeat, impossible to ignore. And that's not even factoring in the whole killing-UBL business. I mean, I still don't like capitalist politicians or electoral politics, but the way the game is so obviously rigged just cements my cynicism.
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140: That, or "I'm really, really depressed and vaguely suicidal and I can't really deal with anything more strenuous than the internet or popular fiction."
185: His primary challengers* had less experience in foreign policy than he did and Obama is doing much better with the Bain-outsourcing thing. Most voters don't worry too much about foreign policy anyway.
* The ones with a real chance, that is.
187: Yeah, but I mean, it would be coming from the pundits, not so much the official talking points.
I don't know, but I don't assume it would help Obama if they did.
When I need to get out of a social engagement due to fatigue, I just say "Sorry, but I've scraunched my last marmoset for the day."
I'm hoping to get the "out of spoons" community to adopt that formulation instead.
As it's the day before a holiday, I'm ducking out at 4:30. Nobody tell the lawyers.
Our office actually closed at three today -- I'm still working, but everyone's allowed to go home.
I thought sometime during the last presidential election someone explicitly formulated this rule: "Presidential candidates are generally either senators or governors. If they are a senator, you accuse them of lacking executive experience. If they are a governor, you accuse them of lacking foreign policy experience."
I had actually been hoping that, now that the lameness of this gambit had been laid out plain for all to see, that people had just stopped using it.
Obama's also in a bad position to raise lack of foreign policy experience, given that he didn't have any when he was elected and he's done fine (by conventional standards) on that front.
I had actually been hoping that, now that the lameness of this gambit had been laid out plain for all to see, that people had just stopped using it.
Because that's exactly how our political discourse usually works.
I managed to get to be on a conference call with my boss, my boss's boss* and my boss's boss's boss at 4:45.
*Who is on "vacation" at a very nice place. Do us a favor, take your vacation, for God's sake.
Sounds like some people need a condescending lesson on the virtues of idleness.
As it's the day before a holiday, I'm ducking out at 4:30.
Our holidays just go into a bank we can use like our vacation and personal leave hours. Since I currently have Wed-Fri as my regular days off I used a banked holiday for today so I could start my drinking early. And I just dropped 200 bucks on aerial fireworks. God I love the 4th.
199: Just show them by becoming a living example of idleness.
We aren't allowed any good fireworks here. Given my present position on loud noises, I'm not that upset about the law.
201: I've shown them that already.
The boss's boss's boss's plane was late, so we are delayed, or maybe cancelled/postponed to later in the week or early next week.
Our office actually closed at three today -- I'm still working, but everyone's allowed to go home.
The fuckers at FINRA closed at 1:30 today. 1:30! I needed to talk to them and they closed at 1:30!
Woo hoo! Conference call starting.
I've been trying, of late, to say that I'm feeling antisocial instead of "not 100%." It's more accurate and less (I hope) insulting.
I've been trying to do this, too. I dunno how others are taking it.
The fact is, there are some people I never feel antisocial around. It's not even like it's close friends; I was thinking today that our department secretary here is like this. I am never, ever grumpy or short with her because I really like her, and she is always great, even when she is grumpy herself, in which case we dish about people we are mad at. I also very, very rarely feel antisocial around students. I feel like I can be honest when I'm teaching in a way I can't be around others. And then there are the few people I don't mind being grumpy around because either they're sympathetic or they're funny, or maybe they're grumpy too.
A lot of other social interactions--the "why are you so weird?" ones, the "why aren't you more like me/us?" ones--I have to meditate myself into being able to stand.
OK that's over. We jammed our proactive proactivity so far up the motherfucker's ass that it's coming out his fucking ears.
You need to punch those people in the head, AWB. I'm not saying that you need to be more like me -- I stab those people with a fork that I carry at all times for just such an eventuality -- but both God and Reason dictate that those people must suffer.
I think I read the book that was based on. It's the only one of the Reacher books I read. Anyway, based on the locations in the trailer, I can just drive around and use my imagination to combine one of the MI movies with what I see in front of me.
210: I had no clue, so I Wikipedia'ed and the physical appearance section is a hoot. And I note: [H]e reveals in Persuader, he has never been an exercise enthusiast.
200: if you set the fucking bench on fire I will beat you up.
Ha, I'm only about 1100 E so no worries about fire. We're watching the smoke come up from that Alpine one, bad times.
Here someone set the canyon on fire this morning but they contained it quickly.
I also thought aerials were banned but fine, set the city on fire.
I'm working tomorrow, because we have to have coverage on the holiday, and I'll get an extra vacation day out of it. But the main reason is that my favorite client has been wanting me to go to her group home's cookout for a long time. It'll be a pretty easy day. No beer, obviously.
So I just misread the title of this post in the "Latest comments" list as "Shake your busy trap." Let's try not to read anything into that.