It’s that time again. The time when everything seems to pass slowly. Very slowly. The time between projects, the time before lunch break – the time at work when you just aren’t working. If you’re in a data-induced stupor or just bored to death, there has to be some way to make the minutes pass faster.
Your cubicle at work may seem like a reinforced prison cell at times but it can be a place of fun and amusement too. There are lots of things to do on slow days – you just have to find them.
Chatting with Pidgin can provide lots of amusement. Pidgin is a handy little instant messenger that puts all of your contacts from other chat programs in one place. Just grab all of your account information from the other chat programs and add it into your Pidgin account. Then you can set your status in Pidgin and it will notify all of your friends no matter what programs they’re using.
- If your contacts are using Pidgin too, you guys can open a doodle board and play out fierce games of tic-tac-toe or even draw mazes for each other to maneuver. The possibilities are endless. You can also use Google translate to change what you said into a random language. Who knows? You might pick up a few words.
- You could play a word game with your Pidgin friends. Tell one of them the beginning of a sentence like “This is…” and then who to pass it on to. Have them add their names to the “sent to” list at the end of the message so it will go full circle. Example: “This is a big… (Sent to: Paul>Jim>Linda>Jane).”
- Update your status with what you just did (like getting a drink from the water cooler) and report it in spy-like code. Use your “secret” codename. “Dingo-Benny reporting in. The cooler has been drained. Repeat: cooler has been drained. Requesting refill!” This works with Facebook or Twitter too; you can even get your friends to be other spies, enemy spies or HQ.
- While chatting, why not play a free online game? You may be burnt out on this already, but try playing games you usually pass up like Sudoku or Mahjong. Or you can take on something a little more action-packed like Desktop Tower Defense. Challenge co-workers and make the loser get coffee for everyone.
- Design a code or use one online to encode something very plain and boring like Chinese fortunes or your recent tweets. Hide the encoded message in a co-worker’s desk in an envelope marked “TOP SECRET” and update your status to let them know what they get if they find it and decode it before lunch.
- Speak in a foreign accent. Research the country to make it seem more authentic and use common slang from the language. No one will guess you’re cussing when it’s in Esperanto.
Stop dozing now and start amusing yourself. There are far more stimulating things than counting how many times you yawn. Chatting can keep you from getting too groggy, especially later in the day. Hurry before you become another paper-pushing mindless zombie!
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