Desperate Freelancer

I did not watch at all the Olympic Games in China. I am sure the ancient Greeks would be as disappointed as I am seeing what their invention has became. But, once again, I am an old grumpy old man.

But I did ask myself, what could it lead to, if someone somewhere decided to organize office Olympics ? Can it become something funnier than all theses athletes in tight-fitting bodysuit sweating like dogs to get a little gold medal that isn't worth half the money spent for their training ?

By chance, they were people that already had the same idea (thanks to my friend Google, they were easy to find), and I could discover what this tiny idea once materialized could become.

Red Bull, in Netherlands, launched last year its own office Olympics, where office clerks competed in funny disciplines. I don't speak a word of Dutch so if someone can translate, I would be thankful. All I understood is that there is a lot of funny videos of office sport sent by participants and that winners met for the final in Olympic Stadium in Amsterdam. It seemed great.

You can discover this peculiar event on the dedicated website. You would find people throwing folders, playing a kind of mouse curling, riding chairs, playing bowling with beer cans or playing soccer in office. And a lot more of crazy office sports. Quite amusing indeed. I would have loved to be employed by a company that has enough sense of humor to organize such a foolish competition.

But Redbull was not the only company to promote this idea. Some firm, in Fresno, named Provost & Pritchard did something similar.

I also found out the website www.officeolympics.net where some crazy guys practice wheelchairs destruction, wheelchairs races, wheelchairs jumping, well, a hell lot of things about wheelchairs. They seem to be looking for sponsoring companies to be able to pursue in their madness.

There is also a bunch of insane videos on Youtube about this idea of Office Olympics. But few are really noticeable. I only keep this one. Just because It gave me some hint about how far you can lead people to act in a ridiculous way.

Lots of blogs as well are dealing with "office olympics" posts, providing advice to set up your own games, like jobacle.com or Hellium. Even the guardian has something to tell us about this idea of "office olympics"

So, where am I going with all that ?

Sometimes, you can feel a lot better if you realize that you don't have time to materialize all the ideas you have and that it's much more fun to just watch others doing it.. and finding how they did manage to turn this idea into gold .. or into crap.

It's a long time since I have posted something on this blog. For one good reason, I was on holidays somewhere where there was no way to get connected to Internet at all. You can still find some places like that in France. It's harder every year but still possible. It didn't helped me at all to get rid of my addiction for the world wide web, and I felt like a smoker trying to quit. Angry, nervous and bitter.

Nevermind. I am back and as I guess you are too, I would like to share with you some great tips to prepare yourself a great return from holidays.

You do know that going back to work after a few weeks off is a hazardous exercise. If you don't get yourself ready your return could turn into a huge havoc where you get thousands mails to read and hundreds people queuing in your cubicle to have a word with you.

So here are some advice I want to give you :

1. Empty your mailbox in 30 seconds

Just throw every waiting mail away. You don't need to read them for one good reason :

- if the sender is actually in holidays, he will have forgotten he sent you that email when he comes back
- if he isn't, he is actually queuing in your cubicle

2. Get some delay with all your time-killing colleagues

No doubt that as soon as you return you will get interrupted constantly by dudes that were waiting eagerly for your coming back. For sure, they were eating their socks not being able to talk to you about a very very very important matter that couldn't wait or that you forget to deal with before your leaving, and all the usual blabla.

Get rid of any people trying to harass you about some urgent matter of that kind with a very simple tactic. Just say you are ok to talk to him and invite him to a general meeting where you would bring together all these troublesome colleagues. Set up this meeting in 2 weeks from now and invite them all. Of course, it's a meeting where you'll forget to come. No worry. They would be enough people to find great topics to discuss about. They won't notice your absence, since they will surely have forgotten themselves the reason why this meeting happens.

3. Don't answer the phone.

All the people not queuing or popping every ten minutes in your room, will try to get you on the phone. You need some time uninterrupted to have a great and peaceful return.

Just unplug the phone. If questions arise, just pretend it's broken. The technician is in holidays anyway.

4. Get a sum up of what meaningful did happen during your absence

What you truly need to do when you come back in office is not to respond to thousands solicitations of people that were unable to do without you (as if you could be indispensable- ha ha !!). What you truly need to do is to get to know what you really missed. Bet it's not much, tough you need to be informed.

Before you get yourself submerged by unuseful information by asking colleagues around you, just call the youngest trainee you have in the place. As nobody talks to him, he will only know what happened that really matters.

5. Focus on what's really important

Don't jump on every task assigned to you during your holidays. Make a to-do-list. Prioritize on the 3 main things to do and forget the rest.

There is a huge chance you will never hear about again.

6. Go see your boss

To have him informed that you're back.

If only one guy should know it's him. And, busy as he is, organizing is own departure in Mauritius Islands, you can bet he doesn't even know whether you were to come back or not.

7. Plan some appointments in a UV rays Tan Salon

Coz you don't want lose that wonderful tan you got during your holidays, do you ?

That's the most important after all.