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Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Hating on my Job: The Long Haul

I’m back in the office today after a week of “vacation”--actually a week of mostly-good-but-not-terribly-relaxing family visits, novel revision, and school volunteering.

Now I’m looking at a nasty little pile of paper and 38 totally uninteresting emails and wondering if I can really do this for five more years. On Nov. 11, 2015, I will let myself quit, whether or not I have enough money to actually retire. Apart from the hideous conference season in the early spring, my job is usually not terribly taxing. But oh my god do I not care about it. Eight years is long enough doing something I don’t care about, and I ought to have enough savings by then that I can at least switch to something part-time.

3:00. Down to 2 boring emails and a very small pile of nasty paper. In other words, it’s back to the status quo: staring at the few unappealing items on my to-do list, occasionally doing one, and then killing time in one way or another. I’ve had very few interruptions today (yay!) but have been answering the phones for a big chunk of the day. Oh, and two people have come to talk to me about the attendance habits of one of the women I supervise. Joy.

4:15. I really want to go home. Have been reading for the past hour or so. Am actually a little tired of reading. Caught up on my RSS reader. No personal emails to speak of. Could work on revising my novel but I don’t think I have the concentration at the moment.

Maybe I’ll somehow find a job I like better in the next five years. I do look occasionally and once in a blue moon apply for something.

4:23. Back to counting my blessings:

  1. Make good money, enough that early retirement is plausible
  2. Job not taxing
  3. Job offers good benefits
  4. Flexible schedule
  5. Lots of vacation time
  6. Have own office
  7. Can read without anyone noticing
  8. Boss not crazy
  9. Free coffee and tea
  10. Access to Internet

Yup. Still better off than 99.9% of people in this world.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Hi. I'm enjoying your blog and will be watching as you proceed to retire very, very early. I'm quite a bit older (48) but hope to get out of the rat race about the same time, in another 4 years or so. My job is very similar to yours - I too am lucky in that it pays well, has great benefits, etc. But most of the time it just bores me half to death. Good luck!