One man's house is another man's something else

I need to find something recreational to do. I realized today that I rarely ever leave this place called home/work. And though that is partially because I make no money and cannot afford to do anything fun other than go for a walk, it is still very nearly driving me crazy.

The thing is, I live in the staff house at the place where I work. Which, it just so happens, is also the office of the place where I work. And though the office and the living space is theorectically divided (upstairs: three bedrooms; downstairs: continuous flow of people traipsing in and out, eating our food, pretending to be productive; basement: cold, dark sepulcher of inhabitability), in reality, there are some issues.

ISSUE ONE

My room upstairs is as cold as death. It has two outside walls, and as far as I can tell, negative insulation. When closed, my window lets in not only sunshine, but also freezing gusts of wind, and every form of skytrain/real train/busy major road/crazy neighbourhood noise. And also various small avian fauna. After two weeks of my suffering through ice cold sleepless nights, my gracious and kind roomie (henceforth known as the Intern) offered to let me crash in her room, which is huge, has an extra bed, and is at least 27 degrees warmer than my room at any given time.

Since I don't actually have an office downstairs, I converted my room into an office. And it has since been christened the Ice Cubicle.

The third bedroom at the end of the hall (Room Three) was our tv room/common space because downstairs is always full of people trying to look busy and feigning work until all hours of the night. And you can't really watch tv with all that distraction.

Since were getting another, pocket-sized, part-time intern type roomie for a few weeks, and had to clean up Room Three to make it all liveable and stuff, we decided to just make our room one big room of consolidation: Intern's room, my room, and tv room all in one! Enter The Consolidated Room.

So now the tiny new roomie (henceforth known as The Littlest Roomie) is in Room Three (which we should really rename), the Intern and I (who have perfectly good names), and the tv (which shall remain unnamed) are in The Consolidate Room, and my office is in the Ice Cubicle.

Our colleagues are all downstairs. And so our meetings are all downstairs. And also, my program thing that I'm kick startin', it meets in the basement.

So really, I never leave this place. Because when I'm home, I'm still here. And when I leave for work in the morning, I have to pass my office before I even get to the bathroom to have a shower. And when I'm doing the actual fun part of my job, the kids and I are still here.

I need to get out.

ISSUE TWO

Even though I'm always here, I feel like such a freakin' slacker. My hours are super flexible, and I only work 20 hours a week. Unfortunately, everyone else here works a lot more than 20 hours a week, so when I'm chillaxin' and getting used to my new life, they are all working hard downstairs.

And I'm in my PJs, eating granola and yogurt like a good newly assimilated West Coaster.

And that's okay, 'cause this place is the laid backest working environment in the history of forever, and I can choose my hours, and I choose not to work until I have had breakfast. Whenever that might be. Nine o'clock. Ten o'clock. Quarter after three.

So with a 20 hour work week, and a flexible schedule, and no real desire to go pay money to do something fun, I really could (and do) get away with working a few hours a week during real working hours, and a whole lotta hours a week during whatever the heck hours I want.

Unfortunately, I just look like a slacker compared to these 9 to 5ers, and 10-6ers who don't have the freedom of working at home. Or living at work.

~g. mango wants go out and do something free! dammit.