Reporter interviews people hanging out instead of working
Mark Frauenfelder: Chris Colin, a writer for the SF Gate, was curious about the people he sees hanging out in coffee shops during the day, so he interviewed them, and asked them why they weren’t working. It turns out there are a great many reasons why the people weren’t working. Not wanting to work seemed to be the most popular reason of all. He reported his findings in a piece called “The Mystery of the Daytime Idle.”
Going over my own findings, a surprising number of people had had something job-related happen that very day. A surprising number had called in sick. Claire, who works in quality control at a biotech company, used a vacation day to get a tattoo of a bird. Another woman took the day off to be with her dogs. (“And catch up on errands,” she added responsibly.)This article reminded me of Bertrand Russell’s 1932 essay, “In Praise of Idleness,” which contains a funny definition of work:“John,” who is 18 and was strolling through Yerba Buena Gardens one Thursday morning, laid out his typical itinerary: “Watch the grass grow, get high, hit on the ladies.”
How does he pay rent? “If you ask 100 girls for $10, that’s $1,000, that’s rent,” he explained logically.
What is work? Work is of two kinds: first, altering the position of matter at or near the earth’s surface relatively to other such matter; second, telling other people to do so.Link
