[TV] Outsourced: Season 1

I actually watched this TV series before I watched the movie it was based on. And admittedly I had no plans of watching either. But one thing led to another and I found myself with the first half of the season thanks to my brother.

I avoided this series like the plague since it's all about the industry that I work in. Why would I want to unwind by watching a show that is supposed to represent the call center industry? Would seeing Indian versions of agents help me relax after a busy, stressful evening working the graveyard hours at my own call center?

Think about it.

But I already had the episodes, so it seemed like a waste not to at least give the show a shot. Plus news of its cancellation had already broken out by the time I started watching - and somehow knowing that the show wasn't going to go on helped me decide that it would be okay to watch it since its impact on my life was definitely measured.

But admittedly, it wasn't that bad.

[Office Humor] How to Not Work at the Office

CNet News.com remains one of my favorite sources for tech-related news. On the other hand, they're also a fun resource for discovering little things of interest on the web as well.

There's been a recent string of Esoterica Blog postings penned by one of my favorite editors Mike Yamamoto related to things you can do to make working life "less stressful", in a manner of speaking. It thought it might be interesting to share some of the more interesting resources and websites mentioned in the blog.

One of the more striking sites found was for a page discussing How to Get Away with Doing Nothing at Work and its inevitable sequel, Even More Ways to Do Less at Work and Still Get away with It. The lists are pretty one and the second set is primarily user-driven based on the comments. At one point in time I'm sure you'll admit that you've attempted some of the suggested items here to great success. Personally, I've gotten pretty good at looking stressed, haha.

Another interesting find from Esoterica is this link to a site called Call-in-Sick.com, a site which promises to do precisely that. It's a very interesting service that helps users pre-record and schedule their sick day messages to be delivered to the phone number of choice at a pre-arranged time. You have the option of practicing your delivery before you submit the recording and they also ensure that your Caller ID information is what will be used in transmiting your message.

It's a pretty novel idea, but one that I'm sure a lot of company managers and supervisors might not see in the same humorous light. It's bound to work as long as it's just meant to go to an answering machine or voicemail box rather than to a live person. Then things are definitely going to get tricky.

Don't kill yourselves over work! As you can clearly see, the internet is filled with quirky ideas that should make the hours go by a whole lot faster.