Meetingfest 2006

So this week I have 35 hours of meetings on my calendar. No, wait, that’s not the good part. That’s 35 hours of meetings plus two whole days of SAP training and an additional day of less-crucial but kind of important preparation for the SAP training. Yeah. On top of the 35 hours of meetings. This isn't typical, but that was precious little consolation as I called in to my 6 a.m. (although I have to say, that was a very pleasant meeting, as meetings go).

The other day a friend of mine complained about how his meeting schedule was so insane that he wasn’t going to be able to eat lunch. I was all, dude, your company lets you eat lunch? Where do I get an application?

The thing is, my company would love for me to eat lunch. They’d like for me to eat lunch and work out and achieve Work-Life Balance. Alas, they’re also evaluating me on the basis of my accomplishments, which currently require that I attend the 35 hours of meetings. Oh, and I should also be producing something that looks like actual work. Heaven only knows when I’ll be getting that done. Probably on Friday, which is freakishly clear of meetings despite my outrageously overscheduled week (because all of my meetings require the attendance of people in Israel).

For those doing the math at home, first, you clearly need to achieve some Work-Life Balance of your own. Second, some of my meetings start at 6 (a.m.) or end at 7 (p.m.), so if you're assuming 8 hours in a day, dream on. Also, many of the meetings conflict with other meetings, so I’ll probably end up attending the first hour of this hour and a half long meeting in order to attend the first hour and a half of this two hour meeting, which I’ll leave early to attend another hour long meeting in its entirety. If you see what I mean.

Meanwhile, I try (try is the key word here) to read two or three books a week. This week that might just drive me crazy. So this week my reading is going to include something really, really trashy. No, really--it's so shameful that I hesitate to share it with you. It's a Laurell K. Hamilton novel. And I might really really like it, because I doubt I'll have a single critical faculty online by the time I read it--if it's more interesting than a change impact assessment or a baseline data assessment, I'm expecting to be enthralled by it.