h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Does anyone else find that it takes them half the working week to get into work mode, then half the weekend to get back out of it again?

Honestly, it's so annoying! I don't exactly have a demanding job and I mostly like it OK for most of the time (I never have and doubt I ever will be in a position to say'I love my job!' who are these people?!).

From Monday to at least Tuesday (usually Wednesday too..) I seriously resent my lifetime being sucked up by an employer and everything I do is a chore. From Wednesday (or Thursday) onwards I'm fine with it all and 'in-the-zone', mostly even enjoying what i'm doing.

Come Friday home-time I find it hard to switch off from work and find myself thinking about work things and even checking my work email for the rest of Friday and much of Saturday. Sunday I'm in weekend mode. Monday I *seriously* resent having to work, and so it continues...

Maybe there's some sort of evolutionary reason why we hang onto mindsets and there's a delay until we can re-set our minds to new circumstances. Or maybe it's just me ...

In my 37 years of maintaining and repairing stuff for our military, there was only one stretch that I actually did not like. About 6 months of a 6-year stretch of managing the NORAD stuff, I got to the point that no failures challenged me, and I got bored.

All the rest of the years, I would go to work each day (or shift) and never be sure of what I would be facing.

I recognise the work lag similar to how you describe, but I do manage to switch off from it on Friday evenings.

My job’s largely operational, and anything can happen. It would be quite enjoyable if the company didn’t employ a few people to make my life a living hell.

For nine years I logged onto H2G2 from my work computer. Then I retired. I've now logged H2G2 form my home computer for eight years so far.

They say that if you love what you do, you'll never work a day in your life. Or, like me, you can find enjoyable things to do in your work space.

Yeah me too- I logged into h2g2 from every job i've had since, um 2001 or so..

The job is fine; I have freedoms to make what i want of each work day, in/out of office, etc. It's more my mindset I'm talking about. I know it's a shock for some that such attitudes exist, but honestly, I'd just rather not work at all , regardless how good the job. So it just takes me a while (half the week or so) to ease my brain into the uncomfortable reality that it has to help me to work for a living.

I have more than enough interests and curiosities and places I'd like to see, that the need to carry out a defined role for a defined organisation for a defined amount of time per week, irks me somewhat.

But I do get used to it by Wednesday.

I find a commute helps. I've lived five minutes' walk from work - not good. My ideal is 30-45 minutes driving - nice bit of Radio 4 or more recently podcasts, and my mind gears up for what's coming - be it work or home.

What I find frustrating is getting into work and getting stuck in (I'm a morning person) and then hitting a brick wall at ten or eleven and never regaining the momentum. Sometimes I hit it at nine. Sometimes at eight...

Technically, when you do the morning/night math, you have to consistently go to bed at 2:00 or later in order to be considered a night person. Many of us (myself included, apparently) are somewhere in the middle....

But I'm close to being a night person, and that midafternoon slump is what hits hard.

Retired so I'm kind of lost as to what day it is let alone having a weekend rundown problem.

Good point about the meaning of weekends when you're retired. Sunday is different as far as the newspaper is concerned. I get papers delivered, and the Sunday Globe has a magazine section with a big crossword puzzle.

Its a tough life but someone has to do it, do not forget the

would probably put me to sleep. helps keep me awake...

I've never really had a very short commute (or a hugely long one for that matter). I'm currently at the short end of the scale with a 15 minute drive along a dual-carriage-way, if I'm having an office day, but I do enjoy that time listening to an audio-book or there's less enjoyment if I'm tired just listening the various sounds my aging car now makes

I do however take a very long time to get ready for work - I work flexi- so don't need to rush for a specific time. I take my time showering and then listen to music on bluetooth headphones as I amble around the house getting ready. So that does help ease me into the day in much the same way, I imagine, as hoov's commute.

Easing yourself into the morning works for me, too.

I retired at the beginning of the month, so the work routine is still fresh in my memory. The weekly ups and downs you describe do sound familiar.

I remember thinking on Mondays that I would spend the day going through all the e-mails in the "to-do" category and not necessarily doing much actual work (processing orders). If that procedure went over into the Tuesday, however, I did have a twinge of a guilty conscience; work had definitely started by the Wednesday, though.

The more the orders came from the PTB (who have no idea what we did all day) to process so many pages of orders and who was to do what, the less I felt like doing what I was told.

By the end of the week, I also remember that feeling of resignation - I'll never manage it all anyway, so just leave early on Friday to get the most out of the weekend.

Probably a good thing that I did leave, with that attitude!

Back in the days when work hours were stricter, I used to have a colleague who admitted to having a lot of trouble getting going in the mornings. He would get up at 5 to give himself time to have enough coffee and read the newspaper etc, so that he would be at work on time.

That used to be my intended strategy, except that I'm too much of am night owl to get up *that* early.

I am too, but I get up before 5am 4 days a week anyway, and sleep in on weekends meaning I'm constantly suffering from jet lag.