Wasting time

I have previously written about my rampant internet abuse but circumstances dictate that another post needs to be devoted to my love of things non-work-related.

I am currently working for a firm whose internet policy bans by firewall the use of all net-based emails with the intention of preventing staff from wasting time on the internet.

I don't know what bone-headedly naïve HR micro-manager dreamt up this pointless and pathetically ineffective policy but I suspect it was someone who has never been a secretary and is not versed in the multitude of time wasting activities that we seat-warmers and paper-pushers have spent years honing and perfecting to an art form. That's right, an ART FORM. While being chained to a desk for years and years enhances the skill and proficiency of secretarial activities like typing and answering phones, it also promotes development and growth of another less-lauded skill - that of filling up time. The bigger the law firm, the more time there is to fill as the firm's ego is directly proportionate to their employee count. I've worked in firms who have gone on recruiting drives during recessions - just to show they can; I've worked in firms who have a bi-monthly induction scheme regardless of employee capacity mainly for the purpose of giving the over-staffed HR department something to do; I'm currently working in a firm who have employed me as nothing more than a seat-warmer for the two days a week that the other secretary is unavailable. And this is a Magic Circle firm who likes to think it's the best in the city.

As a result, I have a vast arsenal of time-wasting measures to deploy when dumped into a job that I'm not needed for and that doesn't require me to do anything other than sit and pretend to work.

For those in HR who think that all internet time wasting is done through personal emails…..think again, brainiacs. In my time as an under-utilised seat-warmer, I have:

tested how many times I can press a spacebar in ten seconds - and then spent the day trying to beat my own record, solved stick figure murder mystery games, played on-line chess with a former South Dakota senator, found how many seconds I have left to live, diagnosed myself with about 5 different maladies, diagnosed ex boyfriends with various personality disorders to make me feel better about breaking up with them, read bitchy in-depth reviews of fundamentalist christian videos made circa 1985, matched my horoscope love chart with every man I've ever dated (and a few I haven't yet but want to), signed up for paid medical research, met about 7 men through various dating sites, subsequently visited www.dontdatehimgirl.com to see if any of said 7 men were on there, purchased numerous and unnecessary items off ebay and other gift sites AND accessed my emails by discovering how to log into my yahoo account without entering through www.yahoo.com.

All done without being burned by the firewall. And when all else failed, at the rare times I was plonked on a computer that had no internet access at all - I went out for coffee.

[I may have wasted my twenties in these firms but hey, not many people can claim they wasted their twenties and were paid well for it at the same time.]