I was sitting at work the other day when it occurred to me how horribly futile my work life has become.
You can imagine my surprise.
Had I shown any previous incarnation of myself my current workload, I would’ve laughed me out of the room.
Observe the Keyboard-Crested Number Monkey. She didn’t used to wear a keyboard on her head, but since it’s always on her mind in one form or another she’s gotten quite literal about it and now insists it’s a hat.
She has also begun to refer to herself in the third-person. An attempt to distance herself from the action, no doubt.
She apologizes for this.
Her behind, expanded to the width of her chair, her pupils fixed and dilated, she spends her time developing carpal tunnel in exchange for medical benefits, a catch-22 style loop that ensures both wrist issues and the prescriptions for the anti-inflammatory drugs needed to treat them.
Someone should warn the next generation.
Don’t do it, kids! If someone asks you if you can make coffee, tell them you’re allergic to coffee grounds. If someone suggests that you work in an office “just to make a little extra cash”, tell them you never learned the alphabet, was once traumatized by a collating machine. Tell them you have a creeping case of Tourette’s and cannot guarantee obscenity-free documents.
We’ve all heard it before, but maybe it’s time we took it in, drank deeply of the cup and chanted it into the night:
Friends don’t let friends type.
27 comments:
Hari OM
I rather think the next gen have cottoned on to this one Pearl - it's all "let's get to the celebrity status quick stix by entering every possible horror ...er... 'talent' show there is!"
They on the other (-hand?) will be sufferers of the over-sized and impossible-to-straighten-without -surgery prehensile digits.
For our parents it was the tennis elbow and housemaid's knee.
Good grief woman, you don't want a plastic doll society do ya - what about character building through overcoming adversity? What about climbing the walls from the insanity of it all? What, for crying out loud, about blog fodder???
All that said. It hurts don't it? OOH I wish I was there to give you some TLC. Trust me, all jokes aside, healing is on the way. Hugs, YAM xxxx
I've thought about setting myself up on a busy street corner with a banjo and a cup, now that I'm almost retired. Why don't you come and join me, and you can sing and I will play the banjo and we will not have to worry about typing anything anymore.
Of course, I first have to learn to play the banjo...
Yam, much of my personality, I suspect, has been gained/is due to adversity -- and of course, there is always more lurking in the wings!
I await the healing...
Shelly, will I have to dress as a monkey? Because I'm willing!
I was going to type a comment, but then ....
Amen sister! You are me, down to the spending 8 months of the year in the freezing cold.
I used to climb a lot in my work. Now have a big monkey tail. Get teased. I know we have to work but it seems like it undoes a lot of evolution.
Hey Pearl!
"friends don't let friends type"?
Sage advice. That should be right up there with:
"Don't have sex in the elevator during a fire drill".
Not a good idea. *cough* Or so I've heard.
Roth
After year 6 of constant typing, I began to feel it. If I had not discovered the wacky keyboard (aka ergonomic keyboard) I don't think I could have gone on much longer. Took me about a week to get used to it, but I have been pain free ever since.
Also, just don't type. That will work too. RETIREMENT FOR ALL!!!
Too late but thanks for the thought lol.
We all need to go back to running on the plain (or climbing the mountains) chasing our food and squatting to eat. It was a whole-body workout. On the other hand, do you suppose there was such a thing as Spear Man's Elbow? Maybe Carcass Lifter's Back? Different times, different ailments ... Hope yours improves soon.
It's so true. It's sad. It will never change. We grind our bodies to a pulp and it's called making a living.
You just realized how futile work is? Let me buy you a drink. If I were rich, I'd buy you a bar.
Friends don't let friends type...
There needs to be a final word like: drunk, sober, randomly, futilely, or ?
Back from days in the hinterlands, I find the self overwhelmed, what with legless Vin, and Murr, and Minnie and Buck, and Tourette's, and person who cares not for the comfort of her fellow workers...
Oh, my.
I agree with Susan. How about, "Friends don't let friends type straight," ?
This whole "working for a living" is getting to be a major bore. Let's just chuck it all and move to Fantasy Island. We'll figure out how to make a living when we get there....probably in an office somewhere....
Friends don't let friends type unless they creatively type -- which is what you very much know how to do, my friend. Keep on doin' it.
The warning comes too late for me too, unfortunately, but hey, somebody has to do it, right? :-)
Much wisdom in that last sentence.
MY WIFE empathizes. As a numbers-oriented (payroll department) person herself, she resembles your remarks.
I can't imagine being a Data Entry Engineer (or any other variant thereof). I'm glad that, even though I work on a computer all day, that various issues crop up throughout the day that make me wave my arms in frustration and revulsion, thus providing me with enough downtime to let my wrists relax...
Catch 22 taken far too far. Except that I am very, very grateful for your agile mind and also for the torture you inflict on your hands and wrists.
My mom could type like the wind and went through dozens of jobs because she eventually got so bored. She later found out her talent was in teaching and writing. She did a little of both, but she was near retirement by then.
Kinda makes me glad I never learned to type. of course the alternative is low paying factory jobs....
You're funny, Pearl, but I hope those wrists of yours are healing. I'd prefer to work on my carpal tunnel via fly fishing, but since I often have to do my own typing (especially since I've often been able to type as fast as my secretaries, but thankfully I'm not as fast as my current administrative assistant).
I guess we all feel that way in some way or another. I've always envied my musician friends who seem so content... until you spend real time in the music business and then you find that often, it too becomes just another job. It's the 80/20 rule. 80% crap for 20% pleasure.
Weren't we promised a future without typing? I think I remember a science-fiction show or movie, or book or something that included that. If not, we should have been. We've been robbed. And you've been tortured. I am so sorry. I bet it hurts to do your waitress gig, too. So you need to earn a living without using your wrists, right? I hear belly dancers are rarely unemployed. No wrist work involved.
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