The All-Time Top-10 Fun Things to Do at Work

I had a boring office job. I cleaned the windows in the envelopes.
- Rita Rudner

You are what you do. If you do boring, stupid, monotonous work, chances are you'll end up boring, stupid, and monotonous.
- Bob Black

Commuter - one who spends his life
In riding to and from his wife;
A man who shaves and takes a train,
And then rides back to shave again.
- E. B. White

If you are not a member of the idle rich nor were you born into royalty, you likely have to work for some lousy corporation. No doubt you have arrived on The Fun at Work Café due to workplace boredom.

By working faithfully eight hours a day you may eventually get to be a boss and work twelve hours a days.
- Robert Frost

Here is something that you can do to handle your boredom and irritate your co-workers at the same time. Recite this poem to each of your colleages at least 3 times a day. 

The fallen Hazelnuts,
Stripped late of their green sheaths,
The grapes, red-purple,
Their berries
Dripping with wine,
Pomegranates already broken,
And shrunken fig,
And quinces untouched,
I bring thee as offering.
- Hilda Doolittle, 1886-1961, Keeper-of-Orchards

If the above doesn't work, no matter how intense your boredom, doing one or more of the following top-ten fun things to do at work should help kill your boredom at your workplace without your having to resort to a gun.

Top-10 Fun Things to Do at Work

1. Pretend that you are working when you aren't - just like you are doing right now!

2. Generate symptoms of severe psychological abuse which you can then blame on your boss as well as all the accidents at work that you cause with your silly behavior.

3. Run an Internet Business during two hours of your work day that makes you more money than what your company pays you.

4. Master the art of pen bouncing - off your forehead will really impress your co-workers!

5. Buy a copy of the international bestseller The Joy of Not Working to put on your desk for your boss and co-workers to see.

6. Read a page or two from The Joy of Not Working occasionally to your co-workers.

   

7. Mark a folder with these words "TOP SECRET: Preparing Myself for Fame" Then place it on your desk where people can see it.

8. Take a nap under your desk with a power cord in your hand. If someone comes along and asks you what you are doing, just say you were plugging into something.

9. Send a memo to everyone in the office stating that you have heard a rumor that someone has a crush on you and you would like to find out who it is.

10. Hire a VA (virtual assistant) in India and pay him/her $4.00 an hour to do your work for two hours a day while you meditate, talk to friends on the phone, or take a nap.

If a person [including your boss] offends you, and you are in doubt as to whether it was intentional or not, do not resort to extreme measures, simply watch your chance and hit him with a brick.
- Mark Twain

If none of these items work or if they are not appropriate for your workplace, check out some of the other funny things to do at work on the other webpages on The Fun at Work Café.

Before you do that, however, check out My Retirement Plan, and get really pissed that it is much better than your retirement plan. One reason: Drinking a bottle of 1982 Latour is a big part of my retirement plan.

Savor your obscurity while it lasts!
- Unknown Wise Person

Why did the Government Worker kill the snail?

Answer: Because the snail was following him around the office all day.

The Author Wins and

So Does the Engineer!

NASA was interviewing professionals to be sent to Mars. Only one could go, and he couldn't return to Earth.

The first applicant, an engineer, was asked how much he wanted to be paid for going. "One million dollars," he answered, "because I want to donate it to M.I.T."

The next applicant, a doctor, was asked the same question. He asked for two million dollars. "I want to give a million to my family," he explained, "and leave the other million for the advancement of medical research."

The last applicant was a best-selling author, who wrote a book called The Joy of Not Working.

When asked how much money he wanted, the author whispered in the interviewer's ear, "Three million dollars."

"Why so much more than the other two applicants?" the interviewer asked.

The author replied, "If NASA gives me $3 million, I will give you $1 million, I will keep $1 million for myself, and we will send the engineer." 

25 Websites, Blogs, and Books

Recommended by

The Fun at Work Café

to Brighten Your Boring Work Day

1. Oddly Enough: News, But Not the Serious Kind.  These true news stories from around the world remind you to take life a little less seriously.

2. Sensational Quotes for Smart People: Organized into many categories for easy reference, this is the ultimate website of sensational quotes for the professional speaker, journalist, author, financial advisor, banker, executive, and connoisseur of great quotes. It also makes great reading for just about everyone.

3. EscapeArtist.com: Reduce Workplace Boredom by Fantasizing about Living Where You Want To Live, Living How You Want To Live, and Making Money Doing It! Heck, You May Even Not Just Fantasize about All These and Do All of Them.

4. Mr. Boffo Cartoon: That zany catastrophe-prone star of the ever-popular syndicated strip. He's a con man, he's a cook, he's a cave dweller, and he's a working stiff. Mister Boffo transcends time and space to be anything and anywhere he wants to be - but he's usually staring down disaster.

5. Fun at Work with an Unreal Job: If your entrepreneurial fantasy life and your real job are diametrically opposed, check out this funky website on how you can leverage your how-to advice on any topic and make a fortune at it so that you can leave your boring job and never have to feel imprisoned again.

6. 43 Things - Are you a Newness-seeking Self-improving Tree Hugger? Take the 43 Things Personality Quiz and find out. 43 Things.com can also be a great way to achieve your goals. You can post your aspirations for all your co-workers to see. Your goals can include such things as win the lottery (fat chance), become a millionaire (fat chance again) and retire early (only if you read How to Retire, Happy, Wild, and Free).

7. Dilbert: Humor, Business Absurdity, and the Ridiculous Meaning of Life to Keep Things in Proper Perspective and Make You Smarter and Richer. The Official Dilbert Website featuring Scott Adams Dilbert cartoon strips, animation, mashups and more starring Dilbert, Dogbert, Wally, The Pointy Haired Boss.

8. The 237 Best Things Ever Said about Retirement - E-book :  Few things spice up an article, a book, a conversation, or a speech more than a great quotation. From a collection amassed over many years, this is a wonderful assortment of some of the most unpredictable, ridiculous, outrageous, humorous, motivational, and inspirational quotations about RETIREMENT. 

9. Career Success Without a  Real Job: by Ernie J. Zelinski. Career success is much more than having a real job and earning a decent income. Real career success is truly enjoying what you do for a living and having the personal freedom to perform your work virtually any time you want.

Career Success Without a Real Job:

The Career Book for People Too Smart to Work in Corporations

Top 17 Tell-Tale Signs That You Are Not Having Fun at Work and Need to Read The Career Book for People Too Smart to Work in Corporations

• You just may not be having fun at work and may have to read Career Success Without a Real Job if your company handsomely rewards mediocrity of the highest order.
• You just may not be having fun at work and may have to read Career Success Without a Real Job if your two biggest life successes are that you have always eaten and escaped being eaten.
• You just may not be having fun at work and may have to read Career Success Without a Real Job if you have learned to despise your co-workers so that you don't have to despise yourself for continuing to work there. 
• You just may not be having fun at work and may have to read Career Success Without a Real Job if at your workplace two people have never tried to be clever at the same time simply because your company doesn't have two clever people.
• You just may not be having fun at work and may have to read Career Success Without a Real Job if you think that your company uses dullness as the first requisite for being promoted to management. 
• You just may not be having fun at work and may have to read Career Success Without a Real Job if you are convinced that all your managers at work are descendents of Attila the Hun, Hitler, and Charles Manson.
• You just may not be having fun at work and may have to read Career Success Without a Real Job if the Suggestion Box at your workplace is used to lure good ideas so that they can be strangled. 
• You just may not be having fun at work and may have to read Career Success Without a Real Job if everyone at your workplace distrusts everyone else because it is their only defence against assholes.
• You just may not be having fun at work and may have to read Career Success Without a Real Job if your overriding helplessness at work makes your uselessness seem unimportant.
• You just may not be having fun at work and may have to read Career Success Without a Real Job if nine of your co-workers are deceitful and the tenth is too stupid to be so.
• You just may not be having fun at work and may have to read Career Success Without a Real Job if your boss at work couldn't lead lemmings off a cliff.
• You just may not be having fun at work and may have to read Career Success Without a Real Job  if the charm of working for a corporation is that it makes a life of deception more easily concealed.
• You just may not be having fun at work and may have to read Career Success Without a Real Job if your company handsomely rewards mediocrity of the highest order.
• You just may not be having fun at work and may have to read Career Success Without a Real Job if at your workplace, the more ridiculous and destructive the ideas, the higher the probability that they will be adopted.
• You just may not be having fun at work and may have to read Career Success Without a Real Job if at your workplace, like in most corporations, the psychopathic elements rise to the top.

10. For Anyone Who Gave Ernie Zelinski's Books a Bad Review on Amazon.com: Also a way for you to tell bosses and co-workers what you think of them.

11. The Retirement Jokes Café: A Comprehensive Collection of Retirement Jokes and Retirement Humor That You Can Use for Retirement Speeches, Retirement Parties, and Retirement Cards.

12. The Idler: Besides being a website, The Idler is a bi-annual, book-shaped magazine that campaigns against the work ethic. It was founded in 1993 by Tom Hodgkinson and his friend Gavin Pretor-Pinney. The intention of the website and the magazine is to return dignity to the art of loafing, to make idling into something to aspire towards rather than reject.

13. The Joy of Not Working: Features the World's Second Best Retirement Book, in fact, The Joy of Not Working is a book for the retired, unemployed, and overworked. Real life success stories about people not working, 25 reasons to retire early, and retirement quotes, letters, jokes, and poems.

14. World Leisure Organization: is a world-wide, non-governmental association of persons and organizations dedicated to discovering and fostering those conditions best permitting leisure instead of work to serve as a force for human growth, development, and well-being.

15. Retire Before You Expire: Your true nature is to retire happy, wild, and free. Never lose touch with it. You will, however, if you are not careful. The way to ensure that you have a happy retirement is to have a copy of The World's Best Retirement Book by Ernie Zelinski available at your fingertips. This webpage shows you why you should retire before you expire.

16. Workaholics Anonymous: Workaholics Anonymous is a fellowship of individuals who are addicted to work who want to stop working compulsively. The only requirement for membership is the desire to stop working compulsively. There are no dues or fees for W.A. membership.

17. Work is Hell Cartoon Book by Matt Groening: In "Work is Hell," Matt Groening, who later created The Simpsons, concocts some very subversive laughs at the workplace with pearls like "The Secret of Success: 1. Get a job. 2. Get a better job. 3. Get an even better job. (repeat if necessary)". Titles of the cartoons include: "How to face up to your first job", "The 9 Types of Bosses", "The 81 types of employees", and "How to Get Along With All The Jerks At Your Crummy Job," "Just How Bad Is Your Job," and "How to Tell Everyone Off."  

18. Benefits of an Economic Recession: This Website will help you see the positives of a recession and help you survive a recession if your sense of humor is still intact.

19. Zen Habits:  With a Zen flavour, this Blog covers subjects such as achieving goals, productivity, being organized, motivation, eliminating debt, saving, getting a flat stomach, eating healthy, simplifying, living frugal, happiness, and successfully implementing good habits.

20. The School of Life: Great Ideas to Live By. Particularly for people who live in London, The School of Life is a new social enterprise offering good ideas for everyday living. Based in a small shop in Central London this small enterprise offers a variety of programs and services concerned with how to live wisely and well. You can also join their group on Facebook.

21. Creativity Is Thinking Big: How to Become a Genius in No Time Flat So That You No Longer Have to Work in Corporations.

22. The Joy of Being Retired by Ernie Zelinski: A calendar and book with the subtitle 365 Reasons Why  You Will Love Retirement.

23. Fun Retirement Jobs: Quit your job right now and get into the retirement mode while you work at a fun retirement job or an Unreal Job, one that you can quit at any time, and pursue another one when you feel like it.

24. Wall Street Executive Library: Links to all the great newspapers in Canada and the United States as well as many other business resources that you can utilize to plan your great escape from work.

25. My Fun Retirement Plan Is Better: Why My Retirement Plan Is Better than David Letterman's Retirement Plan! David's Is Fun But Mine Is More Fun!

1001 Best Things Ever Said about Work (and the Workplace)

Free E-Books - Batteries Not Included! 

Also Check Out:

Fun Things to Do with Friends

Fun Things to Do When You Retire
 

COPYRIGHT © 2013 by Ernie J. Zelinski

Author of The World's Best Retirement Book
All Rights Reserved