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Is Technology Killing Leisure Time?
from the a-wired-up-world-where-work-never-ends dept.
Americans for centuries have believed that new labor saving devices will free us from the burdens of the workplace and give us more time to ponder philosophy, goof off, explore the arts, and hang around with friends and family.
So here we are at the start of the 21st Century, enjoying one of the greatest technological boom times in human history, and nothing could be further from the truth.
The very tools that were supposed to liberate us have bound us to our work (and schools) in ways that were inconceivable just a few years ago. But technology almost never does what we expect.
Almost all of us -- especially the people reading this -- have less leisure time than ever. We work harder, take fewer vacations for shorter periods of time, report more stress than almost any other demographic group and find the boundaries between work and play increasingly blurred. Computing and communications technologies are destroying the idea of privacy and leisure.
According to a new study reported in the July issue of American Demographics magazine, as the distinctions between home and the workplace fade, more and more of us go online from our offices to buy the things and perform the tasks we used to do when we got home. At first, employers were wary of workers going on the Net. But they've learned to love and encourage it, since it keeps employees chained to their desks for longer hours.
In l999, the researchers report, 19 percent of the total population had Net access at work, compared with just seven percent in l996. Employers, who now expect workers to be available for longer periods, understand that they have to let them to do their chores online. At work, Net surfers go first to news, information and entertainment sites. Then they hit search engines, marketing/corporate sites, sex sites and retailing shopping sites, in that order.
But there's a huge trade off for this convenience. Inforum's l999 Survey from the MEDSTAT group, reports American Demographics, found that adults aged 35 and younger were the most stressed people in the population. Nearly seven in 10 said they were "somewhat" to "extremely" stressed, an astonishing contrast to adults over 65: 31 percent of them said they had almost no stress in their lives at all.
More than a third of adults under the age of 25 say they don't get enough sleep most or all of the time. No wonder. More than half of them report that they didn't have time to take a vacation, according to the Travel Industry Association of America. When younger people do travel, they don't take much of a break: 42 percent of travelers who go away for just a weekend are aged 18 to 34 -- the largest share of any single demographic group. Of course, maybe they have less disposable income or have young children they can't leave for long. But if you think about people you know in this age group, it's also obvious that they have trouble disconnecting from work, thanks mostly to technology, and they're also afraid to show employers that they're not indispensable. It may also be true that openly or not, more employers expect their workers to be around all the time.
Before the Net, cell phones and Palms, the lines between work and leisure time were markedly clearer. People left their offices at a predictable time, were often completely disconnected from and out-of-touch with their jobs as they traveled to and from work, and were off-duty once they were home. That' s no longer true. Even in a competitive job market, employers expect workers to put in longer hours and to be available almost constantly via fax, cell, e-mail or other communications devices. Bosses, colleagues and family members -- lovers, buddies and spouses too -- expect instant responses to voice-and e-mail messages.
Employers have thus begun to pay the small price of allowing their round-the-clock workers to shop and communicate online, found the AD study.
The American Demographic report validates the suspicion that corporatist employers are taking advantage of new technologies and of workers' anxieties to demand longer hours and increased productivity -- the very things new technologies were supposed to liberate people from.
Although there are no known studies relating to college students and their work hours, it seems they are also bound to their desks and dorms by environments in which faculty, friends and other members of the college community increasingly do their work online. Studies of time spent on instant messaging services would probably show staggering use. And research possibilities online are boundless.
Few of us manage to buck this trend, apart from some neo-Luddites. Half of all Americans now own a cell phone, and more than 46 per cent of pleasure travelers take their phones with them when they go away, reports the Travel Industry Association. More than 18 per cent take their pagers and 6 per cent their laptops, while 10 per cent check e-mail on vacation. Younger Americans are living in a hyperactive information culture.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 40 per cent of men worked more than 40 hours a week in l998, an increase of 5 percentage points in the last two decades. As for women, 22 per cent worked more than 40 hours aweek, compared with just 14 per cent in 1979.
So it's not surprising that a l998 General Social Survey conducted by the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago found that more than 40 per cent of American workers say they come home from work exhausted, up from 36 per cent in l989. Young married couples report that they work an average 26 per cent more hours each year than they did 30 years ago.
Aside from long hours, the nature of work has changed. Economist and author Richard Sennett (The Corrosion of Character: The Personal Consequences of Work in the New Capitalism) and Joanne B. Ciulla (The Working Life: The Promise and Betrayal of Modern Work), point out changes in the nature of work itself.
"Flexible" work projects, the growing number of part-time workers, and a culture that embraces and even celebrates continuous layoffs, down-sizings and re-engineerings have rendered almost everyone's work life stressful and unstable. Workers work harder and longer, move more often, change their work tasks more frequently, and are nevertheless constantly subject to dismissal or its threat.
This isn't what technology is supposed to be doing for us. New technologies, from genetic research to the Net, offer all sorts of benefits and opportunities. But when new tools make life more difficult and stressful rather than easier and more meaningful -- and we are, as a society, barely conscious of it -- then something has gone seriously awry, both with our expectations for technology and our understanding of how it works.
Who's forcing us? (Score:3)
It's not built for the benefit of individuals any longer, but for the benefit of corporations.
But who's forcing us to work these jobs? That's right, no body. We choose to. If we decide that the stress or hours are too much, then we should quit. It's all your choice. The corporations don't force us to work these hours. I'm tired of people bitching about their jobs, then doing nothing to better it. I hated my previous job but rather than complain about the hours, I found a new one.
One of the biggest problems I see with the tech industry is that way too many employees don't know how to interview their employer to see if it's a place they want to work. I see this most with just-out-of-school grads (of which I was one not long ago). It's hard to know what questions to ask to see if your potential co-workers are any good at what they do, to see if the project will be interesting for you, etc.
But I digress... If you don't like your job or the way the corporation is treating you, no one makes you stay there. Anyone worth anything in the tech industry could have a new job in a second.
In a way, the issue is choice..an example (Score:3)
Getting lots of interesting e-mail, one of which is reprinted at the end of this message: To me, it comes down to choice. If you feel you are free to disconnect at any time without penalty, thereis no issue. If you feel you can't without suffering in some way, then there's a problem.As is the case with this e-mailer:
I'm 19, I've been working in IT since I was 16, and been working with
> Linux in specific since I was 13 years old, I've got a mile long list of
> abilities, and I've recently moved from Seattle to Milwaukee to be with my
> girlfriend, and also to evade the work market in Seattle, as it envolves
> lots of 80-90 hour weeks most of the time. Needless to say, in my last
> job in Seattle, I was accually asked to resign because I made absoutley
> sure I was working exactally 40 hours each week, after the first few
> weeks of not getting any compensation for my long hours. (No "number of
> hours considered a work week" was present in my contract, Washington state
> defines a work week as 40 hours.)
>
> When I moved to Milwaukee, I made the explicit declaration in my resume
> that I was seeking a standard 9-5 job, but that I would gladly be on call
> 24/7 for emergencies. I've been told by numerious employers that a 50-60
> hour work week would be required from them for "server maintaince and
> upkeep", which basically envolves setting up a paging system like
> NetSaint, and waiting for trouble to strike. When I inquired further as to
> what kind of compensation would be provided for extra hours, I was
> informed that it would be agreed that 60 hours was a standard work week in
> any potitental contract I may sign with xxx company. In one case, I asked
> what the hours of my possible supervisor were, I was told 40, and that was
> because "he was 35, and had a lots of Linux experience". I've been working
> with Linux for 6 years, I can code C in my sleep, I've even given
> interested employers ideas on things I can do to increase profit with less
> resource and even pointed them to some of the GPL C programs I've written,
> still, this outlandish requirement of too many hours exists.
>
> I've tryed rationally informing employers that a 50-60 hour work week is
> not acceptiable, because I also have a life at home with my girlfriend,
> they seem to feel that's some kind of personality flaw, and quite frankly,
> I'm getting fairly sick of it.
>
> I've just now polished up my resume, removed that request, and am sending
> it back arround, because unfortunatley in this world you can't live too
> long without money, but this is a growing trend I feel ought to be
> scrapped ASAP. As of right now, I've got 3 resumes, one that makes me look
> like a script kiddie (essientally), one that makes me look like I'm still
> learning, and one that's my accuall list of abilities. I'm trying to sort
> through job offers to figure out what one to send xxx company as we speak.
>
> One last thing, if I do find a job that's 40 hours that sounds reasonable,
> I'm informed that they aren't looking for anyone "with as much experience
> as you have", because either "they don't feel they could pay adiquatley",
> or because "we want someone who's still learning to some degree, so we can
> learn as well". I've learned to hate both comments, because no matter how
> many times I say, "the pay scale you have presented to me seems more
> than adiquate", they've still made their decision, and the conversation
> is over.
>
> Just my 2 cents,
>
Re:Unplugging is essential. (Score:3)
But does nobody else use the 'net almost entirely for their leisure? I have a group of friends I hang out with online, I get my jollies from posting to Usenet and mailing lists, and if I'm deprived of contact with my friends for a while, I start feeling anxiety, and that's just no fun.
I would like to think that if I did have an office 'net-connected job, and used Internet access from home, I would do it just for fun stuff, not for job stuff. I know the difference between fun and work, and you won't catch me doing one bit more work than I absolutely have to...unless I should find I love my job, and then the two roll into one.
--
Re:Unplugging and consequences (Score:3)
If a company wants me to have a pager, they pay for it. If they want me to have a cell phone, they pay for it. If they contact me off work hours, they pay for the time in minimum 1 hour increments and all travel time is charged. If they contact me durring a vacation, then that vacation day is now fully charged as a work day even if it only took one minute to handle it. All overtime (>40 hours a week) must be paid for, no comptime allowed.
I'm very tempted to make a rule where all hours spent on company related trips are charged from the time I leave my home till the time I return home, or atleast one vacation day per day away from home.
Why do I have this set of rules? It's employer abuse that caused me to set them up.
Are you kidding me? (Score:3)
And I refuse to take my pager/etc when I go on vacation. I don't own a cell, and don't plan on owning one. My vacation time is MINE, and I'm not going to let work interrupt it.
Information age... (Score:3)
I get paid to goof off. (Score:3)
The thing is, I'm a hacker. It's creative.
Nobody expects a painter or a musician to punch a clock, or measure the value of his or her output by volume. When the inspiration hits, you work. When you are stuck, you read slashdot, or do the countless other kinds of woolgathering activities that allow your subconscious to reorganize so you can attack the problem fresh. Pleasure vs. work is not the relevant dichotomy -- other kinds of balances have to be struck: social vs. isolated; family vs. clients, physical vs. intellectual.
I'm fortunate, because my boss is pretty well resigned to getting results in irregularly spaced but prodigious bursts. Being a programmer, I'm in an elite class of workers and one that where I work is understood to be creative. Not everyone can do what I do, nor can everyone who can do it as well as I do. But there are lots of folks out there that are exploited. Worse than exploited -- wasted is more like it. The problem is that as information becomes a bigger part of the economy, the problem of measuring a person's contribution becomes bigger. Stupid bosses go for time as the metric. It's about the worst metric there is because all you have to do is to occupy a defined space for a defined period of time to "accomplish" something. In fact I think most folks who push paper could cut their work week down to 25-30 hours and actually get more and better work done. Even hackers should get lots more vacation, IMHO, but spread out through the year.
But... you still have to pull all nighters, not just for deadlines. For truly creative work, there's no substitute for being able to hack until dawn because you've got the bit in your teeth.
Vacations are for getting *away*, dammit (Score:3)
I do wish I had a laptop to take with me, for entertainment on the plane and so I could keep hacking on a script I'm writing, but I'm doing that for fun anyway. I won't be checking my work email, I won't be telling them where I am (besides "Denver") or how to reach me (even I don't know that), because I'd rather relax and have fun. No way I'm gonna have any connection to the office for that week.
It's sad that other people don't know how to do the same thing. People have always been "overworked and underpaid," but when you throw in the amount of stress that a lot of people have these days (whether it's their own fault or not), people really need to learn how to take a vacation. It's like the stress is such a part of them that they can't just lay back in the sun for a while and soak up some cancer-causing rays without a death grip on their cell phone, just in case the office needs them.
You need your vacation time more than the office does. Remember that. If you're gonna stay tied to work, what's the point in leaving in the first place?
--
Technology is and isn't the problem (Score:3)
It's the job and its use of technology that gets me down. I work as a Mac tech support person in a largely Windows environment. My employer is less competent than I had hoped when I started, the client company is missing large bits of clue, and the users are, well, users.
Now, I have it relatively easy here; I'm paid well for my high experience/low education level (no degree yet), the Mac calls are far less numerous than the PC ones (despite having a similar number of machines of each platform) my fellow techs have to run, and I don't have to work overtime. Plus, many of the questions are relatively simple ones - password requests and the like. The stress comes from my employer forcing me to become more Windows-savvy (life's too short for that), their disconcerting management practices, the stress of dealing with clients and their frequent lack of understanding, and the knowledge that this isn't what I wanted to be doing with my life when I was younger. My main escape is through technology: blasting away at bots in Unreal Tournament, learning Java via computer-based training modules (so I can get a programming job and cause problems rather than have to fix them), or just generally goofing off on one of the many computers at home.
So, technology is causing my stress on one level, but relieving it on another. I suspect many other readers have a similar love/hate relationship.
ok (Score:3)
I really can't think of an employer who WANTS their employees to look at porn. I mean, really. Yes, I'm sure our employers want us to be at work longer, but what's the point of being at work longer if you're not getting anything done?
Students use instant messaging a lot! God, no! it's some faculty conspiracy?? No! How many times have I messaged my prof's? umm.. let's try zero. I message friends essentially exclusively. I'm not working, when I'm messaging (unless I'm ICQing as I'm coding.. which is possible..). The point is, ICQ detracts from work, it doesn't add to it.
Yes, I'll warrant that we're working longer hours, and we're more available, but I doubt that's part of some evil corporate conspiracy. Yes, I'll warrant that layoff's are up (though I'm not sure of that one.. any stats on that??), but it's not some The Man using technology against us as Jon would apparently have us believe.
also, people 18-35 being more stressed? Aren't these people in the prime of their life? Aren't they trying to find jobs and make some sense of their lives? I bet that this age group has always (well.. for quite some time.. ) been pretty stressed.
gaaaaaaaa
-V
Shackles?!? (Score:3)
From my point of view, these technological shackles, have totally changed my life for the better. I have a house, a car that doesn't suck, a lawn that always needs watering, and a family. I have infinite free time compared to the past. If I choose to spend that free time connected to the electronic heroin at Battle.Net, you can hardly blame the laptop.
People may be dragging their cell-phones everywhere they go, but it's because they like looking important. How can we complain about people bringing palm-pilots on vacation? We can finally afford those vacations!
I guess I just don't see the downside...
Re:L999? (Score:3)
So, you may notice people who have been around for a while, or simply used older typewriters when they started out, will write like this...
-pf
Yet Another Diatribe from Katz the Red (Score:3)
What Katz sees as evidence of Corporatism is nothing more than employee greed. In the get-rich-quick IPO mania of the 90s, people have been willing to sacrifice their lives for a shot at retiring early. Nobody forced you to go to that pre-IPO startup with gobs of options, and you knew full well that it was a craps shoot. Sometimes the gamble pays off, and you'll be able to spend the rest of your life with your family and hobbies.
But if you truly enjoy what you're doing, do you really care? Many of us were out to change the world and make it a better place, and no revolution was ever done 9 to 5.
Re:Technology - what doesn't work (Score:3)
Oh, come on. I know second-year tech-support monkeys who make more money than a High School teacher with 15 years of experience. (I actually was a licensed teacher, and changed careers for that very reason.)
If you are not getting paid a lot of money for what you do, you are either:
1. A chump
2. Incompentent
3. Unable to comprehend how well-off you are.
If you are making a modest salary, but are putting in long hours and are always on call, put yourself in category 1 on the above list.
Re:It's all relative... (Score:3)
Or hunter-gatherers, who have to work maybe four hours per day to ensure their survival.
How many hours do we have to work to ensure our survival? Hint: Cable TV and Diablo II don't count as necessities for survival.
/bluesninja
leasure time? (Score:3)
Code Mines beat Coal Mines (Score:3)
The Code Mines are a nasty place to work
- RSI, stress, headaches, tendonitis, bad eyes, etc. but the Coal Mines were worse - cave ins, coal dust in your lungs, cancer, naptha fumes, suffocation, never being clean.
And whereas he gets paid in cabbage, I get paid a lot of money to do what I do. I can afford to take a month long LOA. I can afford to take a flight somewhere warm. I can throw the Palm in a drawer, the cell on my dresser, the laptop in my cupboard and bug out.
The modern work world will eat your time IF YOU LET IT. If you decide you are going to work 11 months a year, then you can set that up. Career management. That is the key. Let people know your limits, and live with it. Yes it may impact your success, but that is the decision you have to make. If you feel you need that extra $10K enough to sacrifice your weekends for 5 months, then do it. If family, social life, and health pursuits are more important, then you'll accept that and get on with it.
The old world never was a nice place. Those who think it was wonderful to live in the period of knights and chivalry were idiots. Diseases ran rampant, pogroms massacred minorities, and life expectancy was short. Plumbing was outdoor. Ignorance was the state of affairs.
Similarly, those who cling to the "good old days" like say the 1950's, are clinging to an idea of a period that wasn't. The beginning of the cold war and real nuclear tensions were in existence. People were overconsuming and living in a faux utopia of excess that helped lead us to the sorry state we're in today.
Today isn't the best of times and yesterday wasn't either. Give or take a bit, things are different but pretty much life isn't terribly better or terribly worse. It is different. The threats are different, as are the benefits and boons.
So lets stop crying about the modern world. I have friends who wouldn't be alive without modern medicine. I myself wouldn't be so happy or well employed. And I wouldn't be able to have made so many friends around the world on the Internet.
:) Tomb
Separating work and leisure was an abberration (Score:4)
Prior to the Industrial Revolution, if you were a farmer, you worked your farm, no matter how long it took. Ideally you gained satisfaction from what you were doing, seeing how your crops and animals grew, and you didn't mind the extra work.
If you were an artisian, you worked at home doing your crafts, for as long as it took. You were doing something that interested you, and you worked extra hours and didn't complain about it.
Once the Industrial Revolution came, you couldn't take your assembly line home with you. You worked your boring, mind numbing job, then went home.
Today, if you're lucky, you get a job that interests you, and you may even work at it at night. UNIX and computers fascinate me, I would play with them at night even if I didn't have a job that dealt with them. The fact that my job deals with UNIX and computers is only a bonus.
To say that you should be free of your job at 40 hours a week misses the point, after 40 hours a week I'm free of the tedious paperwork, but I still play with technology.
George
It's all relative... (Score:4)
Re:It's all relative... (Score:4)
Thus if you assume rent at US$300/mo (not unreasonable for a room) and health care at US$200/mo, we're looking at less than $20 a day. Not hard to do when many fast food places are offering better than minimum wage. So if you are willing to live very frugally, without dependents, surviving at the hunter gatherer level (and probably in better health) costs maybe 20 hours a week. Of course, if you're willing to work as a web developer, it's probably closer to 2 hours a week. Me, I want my DSL and my wine cabinet and my car and my (future) house and my meals out. But it can be done.
Walt
Re:Unplugging and consequences (Score:4)
I work for a company that doesn't just expect _unpaid_ overtime, they flat out tell you they expect it. A 60 hour work week here is average, and for some departments, not enough. There is one guy who's doctor told him to go on stress leave indefinitely, he is wound up as tight as a drum and I am surprised he hasn't had a breakdown yet. The company gave him permission to take stress leave, but when he came back a week later to pick something up from his desk they didn't hesitate to keep him there all day answering questions. He's been back at work ever since.
I recently decided that my declining personal relationship with my long term girlfriend and most of my friends needed some attention. I started showing up for work at 8 and leaving at 5, taking my full hour for lunch. This has lasted for about 3 months and during my annual review I was told I wasn't a team player, wasn't working hard enough and if I didn't start spending more time at work I would lose my job. This of course just pissed me off and I have doubled my efforts to find a good job where they will treat me right.
I've been working here for 2 years and have banked up 4 weeks of vacation time, mostly because when I ask for a day (1 freaking day) off they give me a hard time and end up paging me for something anyway. I was at the gym the other day and had my pager turned off in my locker while I was showering and they were trying to page me. I didn't get yelled at, but it was made abundantly clear they weren't pleased that I didn't get back to them right away.
In any event, this does happen and it happens all too often.
forge
the difference between working and just showing up (Score:4)
People may well be in the office for 18 hours a day, but how much is actually working? Perhaps the need for change is not for less tech, but more sensible management telling you to just do the job quickly and then GO HOME - placing more emphasis on getting it done and less on being seen taking ages over it.
Leave to Katz to be anti-feminist (Score:4)
The interesting thing about the increase in work hours is *why* people work longer. Consider, for example, professional people who work more than one job. When you ask them *why* the answer is not "because I need the money, etc." but on average because they want the job to fulfill some personal or professional goal.
Unintentional irony? (Score:4)
STOP READING THIS AND DO SOME F'KNG WORK, DAMN YOU!
News Flash! (Score:4)
And just exactly who do you think should be more stressed than 18-35 year old workers?
The way this story should have read is, "a report from American Demographics show that work-related stress drops dramatically as you get older. The good news to those under 35 is that there is light at the end of the tunnel."
What a bunch of whiners. (Score:5)
I couldn't agree more. I think that the only thing that has gone up since 30 years ago is the number of people that are habitual complainers.
My grandfather's generation lived through the depression, went to war in World War II, and basically didn't have a third of the comforts that I take for granted, and yet they somehow managed to be pretty darn optimistic about their lives, their future, and their country. His grandparents hiked clear across the U.S. cooking their meals with Buffalo poop. Compared to my forebears I wouldn't know stress if it smacked me in the face with a tomahawk.
Nowadays Americans don't really have to worry about things like invading tribes of Mongols, or the Black Plague, and so instead we worry about our stress levels. We habitually whine about how hard our life is without even realizing that pretty much the entire world would happily switch places with us.
I went to high school in Lima, Peru and if there is one thing that I learned from my time there it is that I have no room to complain. My life is not that hard, nor do my pitiful little worries amount to a hill of beans. The average American will almost certainly live longer and be more successful than 99% of the people that have ever lived on this planet, and yet all we do is complain.
Unplugging is essential. (Score:5)
I've brought a laptop on one vacation so far, and it was just to have something to dump the digital camera into. I allow myself *no* net access on the road.
Who knows how long this tech bonanza is going to continue... It may be 5 years, it may be ten, or it may pay at these ludicrous rates for the rest of our lives, although that's doubtful.
The point is that if you're going to be in this field for a long time, don't burn yourself out. It's bad enough that there are so few people with genuine experience already... If you have people killing themselves 24/7 on tech, in 4 or 5 years they're going to need to do something completely different just to remain sane.
Unplug once in a while. Take a month off from IRC and watch your RL relationships get back to a normal level. Turn off the machines at home and listen to the lack of hum... I'm willing to bet you'll actually physically notice your heart rate slowing. I know mine does.
Your heart has a specific number of beats it's going to complete before you kack. Try to savor a few of them
Lies, Damned lies.... (Score:5)
Huh? 7 in 10 is 70 percent. That would imply that 30 percent had no stress. That's pretty darn similar to the 31 percent of those over 65 who had no stress. What's the point?
On vacation, take no calls. Turn off ans machine. (Score:5)
Now for the tips to avoid having your off time fucked up.
(1) Never give your personal cell number to co-workers. If you did, leave the cell phone home on vacation, or change the number or take a different phone (for *your* use on vacation). This advice also applies to personal email.
(2) Tell co workers you're unreachable because yoiu're going on a cruise to Tahiti even if you're just going to work around the house on vacation. This reduces morons trying to **STEAL** your hard earned vacation time from you.
(3) Next, get rid of your answering machine. Once I realized that my answering only serves the caller and not me, I got rid of it. With the Caller ID box, I never answer the phone unless I recognize the number and want to answer it. 999/1000 times if it says "Out of Area"/"Unavailable" it's telemarketing scum. As for everyone else, getting ring... ring... ring... ring... endlessly with no opportunity to leave messages serves them right for bothering you. Works wonders with debt collectors wrongfully trying to collect from you too.
(4) Don't capitulate. Don't listen to office voice mail on vacation. It'll just add stress or worse, may cause you to cave and solve problems.
(5) Don't accept "deals". "Come back a day early and take another day or two later." Contiguous days off is != to the sum of its parts. Work-DayOff-Work-DayOff-Work-DayOff-Work-DayOff-Wo rk (that's 4 days off) is not the same as 3 days off in a row.
Do all of these things and know that it is RIGHT for you to do them. Your hard earned vacation time takes absolute priority over all work related issues. Now quit reading this (you're dangerously close to "doing work") in your hotel room and go back to the beach!
This is typical... (Score:5)