Work can often be monotonous and tear inducing. Sometimes there is simply nothing to do. But when others are around you got to keep yourself looking like you're earning your keep. Even when we are busy and have much to do you can once and awhile find yourself staring off into the yonder. Then you're almost caught and have to cover. Oh the joys of adulting in the office.
Redditor u/ScheetyWok wanted to hear some interesting ways to stay "busy" when trying to not work by asking.... Office workers of Reddit, what's your go-to activity to "look busy" when you have no work to do?
Fluster....
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Just look frustrated with whatever you're doing.
Squint at your computer screen, shake your head, let out an occasional sigh, have a bunch of papers on your desk you can rifle through periodically.
You don't want to look so frustrated that you might need some help, but if you do this right everybody will think you're already too busy with something to be bothered. J-Dizzle42
Laps.....
I'm a cleaner/janitor in a warehouse complex.
I just grab a broom or a bucket.
Can walk laps of the place for hours without doing anything if I want. Oh, I can clock up those steps believe that.
Wore my girlfriends Fitbit one day... we were curious to see how for I'd go in a day.
10 hour shift I walked over 30 kilometers. 82recluse82
Filing the Brow....
I just read interesting stuff online and if someone walks back or looks at me I furrow my brow and maybe pull on the hair of my beard by my chin. And always have a reason if someone asks what's up - "Oh, I need this file in AI to send over and they only have the JPG..." even if it's a problem you solved earlier, as long as it's real it'll do. Administrative-Koala
View Source....
My coworkers don't really know computers like I do, and since my job is 90% on the computer, I just load up 3 or 4 explorer windows over a random Excel spreadsheet, and stare intently at it. GrilledStuffedDragon
- Right click on random webpage
- "View source"
- Stare intently at JavaScript NebXan
Reviewing.
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Reviewing. Going over work you did for the day "just to make sure I did everything right". Vyzantinist
Find the good clean remote restroom and use it.
If you work in a big enough building, you just put something important looking in one hand (papers, a clipboard works perfectly, etc) and scurry intensely from one random place to the next. Make friends in different areas, stop to chat briefly. Find the good clean remote restroom and use it. Grab a cup of coffee. Help somebody else with work that's more interesting than yours, etc. Rinse, repeat.
As long as you're holding something official looking (change it up) and hurrying semi-urgently from place to place you can go like this right up to your yearly review. Hopefully you managed to get some actual amazing stuff done here and there along the way. Congenital0ptimist
Chaos...
This was over thirty years ago, but a coworker and me used to delete one important file from a test UNIX server then see how long it took the other to fix it. That was a great way to learn. PreviousResponse
Netflix uses chaos monkey, it's a script with full super user permissions that can randomly terminate any process on any live server at any time. If their systems can't cope with the damage done, and their tech support can't get it back up fast enough they consider the system to be faulty and in need of improvements.
https://github.com/Netflix/SimianArmy/wiki/Chaos-Monkey Fenrir101
Click Away....
talk to strangers on reddit. WhenAllElseFail
I work on a Mac, with reddit dark mode I just have a corner peeking out behind my main window and if the boss walks in I click away to my work window. We work in a call center, when there's no one calling it gets boring, fast. MarkStonesHair
Ready Player One.
Find something to read that they can't tell isn't work if they don't look close. Like did you know the script of the Truman show is online somewhere? That was a fun day. Jenslosingit
I read Ready Player One like this.
Part of my job was just being up to date on research and best practice. So I'd have a pdf of a work-related journal article up and another pdf of Ready Player One. I only had to tab to the journal once. brad-corp
Shuffle a bit.
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When you look annoyed all the time, people think you're busy. BlinkRogue1
I have a co-worker who is always late... when they get into the office they just slam things around and shuffle papers and staple things and slam stapler down onto the desk. I guess they think if they make noise it looks like they came in and jumped right into work and are very busy! mrsh529
I can't definitively say I've come face to face with the spirits. But I have had some unsettling feelings in the dark. Shadows are just shadows sometimes, but who can be sure.
I hear it...
Nbc Wings GIF by HULUGiphy"I was helping my dad clean my grandma's house after she passed and I went in and was trying to find a song in my phone and before I could I heard a cough plain as day come from down the hallway where her room was. She died of lung and throat cancer it was pretty crazy."
Running Past...
"When I was 5 I remember getting home from my grandpa's birthday party. For context my mom was pregnant with my brother at the time, so my parents had already bought his crib. I woke up in the middle of the night to find a women in a white dress and long black hair standing over my brother's crib. I managed to wake up my dad so he could take me to the bathroom. When I got back it was still there. It was only until morning when it disappeared. Every now and then I see a glance of what I assume is that thing running past the backyard."
The Cat
"My best friend and his wife had moved to a new apartment. I came over to visit a few times, and each time I'd see the motion of a cat in my peripheral vision. Not the image of a cat, but a sense of how a cat moves. Anyway, one day I finally cracked some joke about the ghost cat in the place and his wife was instantly saying "See! See! I told you we had a ghost cat!"
"excuse me"
"I worked graveyard shift in a dementia ward for 4 years and it was anything but quiet. I was working with a nurse one night when we both heard a resident say "excuse me." We looked around and no-one was there. I checked on the resident in question and she was fast asleep in her own room. Many of us also experienced someone whistling in the ward late at night and one nurse even managed to catch a video of it happening. It was unnerving to say the least."
Clueless
Skeleton GIFGiphy"I once saw someone short walk by me in my house. They walked into the laundry room which only has one way in. I walked into it behind them and they where gone. I thought it was my little brother but I went to his room and he was asleep. I still have no clue what that was."
- ImBolio
Now was everyone here positive they were sober? Just asking. Those are certainly spooky moments. I'd like some video footage please. Continue...
Reflections
ghost library GIFGiphy"I was up at 3am when I was maybe 7 or 8. I looked out the window and saw a woman in a white dress run across my yard. I could see through her. She was transparent like the reflections on the window."
"you alright?"
"So, my work place is haunted. I was having a really crap day, and as a cleaner, it's normal that me and my co worker will be the only ones left at night. So I was standing on the second floor, leaning on the banister for the stair case, when I heard this male voice say in my ear "you alright?" Clear as day. I turned around so fast and nobody was there and it scared the hell out of me."
- Rex-the-
Watching Me
"I remember as a young kid I usually use to sit in my bed and watch tv with my room door open while the adjacent guest bedroom next to mine would always have the door shut. I always remember seeing that door fully open and close by itself multiple times a day very slowly and gently. Never really bothered me much now that I think about it… but there were other creepier experiences I had in the same house that made me feel uncomfortable like I was being watched."
Betsy
"I went to the Betsy Ross House as a really little kid in the early 90s. Normal house but I was confused why the tour guide never talked about the woman on the chair crying at the edge of the bed in Betsy Ross's bedroom. So I asked about it. No one else saw the woman at the edge of the bed. I figured it was just a wax museum since there was a wax statue of a man in uniform rolling bullets in the basement."
"Years later, I was looking at haunted Philadelphia tours to go on with a friend and the Betsy Ross House was on it. I was like "woah! I was there!" and looked into it some more. Turns out there is a woman at the end of the bed crying and a uniformed man in the basement that people have reported seeing. There is no way that 8 year old me would have known about either of these things."
hello kitty...
hello kitty lol GIF by Animation Domination High-DefGiphy"I had this hello kitty Balloon In my bed room, it had a string and weight on it. So it was late, I had the lights on just Sitting on my bed. The Balloon turns, faces my door, slowly floats into my hallway and turns and floats into my sister's room. To this day I am scared of balloons."
They are among us and they like Hello Kitty. I'm probably rattling the paranormal cages and they'll come for me next, but I'm ready. I feel like this thread has prepared me.
Boo!
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