What would you do?
 

OK, so I have ANOTHER FUCKING MEETING in about 10 minutes. This is scheduled for an hour, but I'm sure we'll be talking about ABSOLUTELY NON RELEVANT BULLSHIT for 2 hours or more. You may sense how THRILLED I am about this. This will bring to about 7 hours already the meetings I've had to attend already this week. And I'm technically management, but in reality I'm the only IT worker bee here, so NOTHING gets done when I sit in these DAMN THINGS!

So...anyway, it's about a new purchasing system, so to stay awake how would you (aside from wanking off or reading the Cellar, etc) kill the time??

Re: What would you do?
 

What the hell would you want to stay awake for? The beauty of these meetings is that all the sleep you lost from wanking and reading The Cellar is regained the moment the lead puppet opens his mouth and your head hits the table!

Count how many times the facilitator says "um." Mark it on a piece of paper, then track it through other meetings in the next month. At the end of the month, create a graph which shows variating "um" usage.

I have never done this, myself, but it could me mildly entertaining.

Or you could play buzzword bingo. Make a bingo sheet with all the commonly used buzzwords ("Leverage", "empowerment", etc.) Just be careful not to holler out "BINGO!" too loudly. They will look at you funny.

I feel your pain...really.

Oops, forgot to mention I'll be teleconferenced in to another facility, alone in my office, so I'll have a bit more freedom to screw around than your typical meeting.

Work on "THE LIST".

Just have it headlined that.

Put various coworkers names on it.

Scratch your head a lot (not so much they think you have lice, but a lot).

Mumble from time to time.

Redo the list, with people's names in different orders.

Cross things out a lot.

Write some names very heavily. Going over and over and over the name with your pencil (yes, do this in pencil, but cross out instead of erasing.)

10 or so names down, you're going to want to have a subheading.

It should say "reload."

You might want to have something like a Pez or other refillable novelty candy dispenser handy in your pocket, so just in case someone gets really freaked out over this, you can offer the explanation that you were merely deciding with whom and in what order to share your candy ...

If you are video conferenced as well ...

Get a ping pong ball.

Cut it in half.

Use a marker to draw black dots on the center of each half.

You now have a set of Three Stooges pretending to be awake eyeballs.

Stick them in your eyes.

Make sure you are always directly facing your cam.

Slump back slightly in your chair.

This also works in live meetings.

Cripes, let's spend the first half hour discussing the old way....WHY??!?!

And I've already been mentioned by name, fuck! :)

On the plus side however, I have discovered the Cellar's View NEW messages feature!

SWEET.

A videoconference requires the use of a sock puppet. If anyone asks about it, have the puppet ask them "What sock puppet?" I had a simple sock puppet all ready for my last job, but we got laid off before I could use it, and no real opportunity to use it.

Do you play guitar? I've been memorizing the position of the notes on the fretboard this way.

I draw the fretboard and start filling in the notes. Pay attention to the dotted frets and, if you have enough meetings, you'll be playing riffs in no time.

Or just pick a song that you know the key of, and look at the fretboard, and figure out how to play it in your head without the lettered notes.

Lesson for today: the main riff of "Day Tripper" - The Beatles. It starts with an open E string. Take it from there. If you get stuck use the tabulature archive here.

If you can imagine playing it, you can probably play it! I swear this works!

Spitballs ;)

My new job features a regular Monday AM staff meeting. Everyone brings a pad and a pen. As far as I can tell, I'm the only one who actually takes NOTES! The first one I went to, the salesman I was sitting by was doodling through the whole meeting, drawing palm trees and shit...apparently, he was bummed with the cold snap we'd just undergone.

Yes, Spode! DRAW!

Specifically, if the meeting is going nowhere, then draw studies of the other people at the meeting.

You may as well practice something.

Lot's of fun. But that sort of thing comes up at yearly reviews.