Bumping this WFH. I picked up a set of Bowflex 552 dumbbells since I've been assigned permanent working from home now. It arrived at my home today and I noticed on the box mention P65 potential chemicals causing cancer/birth defects etc. label on the box. I know with any plastic, going to be chemicals used to produce the item that may or may not be harmful but I started googling this since I got a bit OCD. My understanding is unless you chew or eat the plastic on the dumbbell, I don't see how touching the dumbbell would transfer chemicals into your body. I've never seen such a label on workout equipment I've bought in the past. Now I'm debating to sell the Bowflex and get something not made of plastic...

That's just to comply with overzealous California guidelines. It'll be fine

If you're really worried just wash your hands after using them, but yeah Cali has that sticker on everything.

I bought a Master padlock and it came with that warning as well lol

^ Lawn chairs for me....

Have you guys actually taken some vacation time for a break or rest during Covid? I've only taken 4 days off since Covid started and it's been fucking tiring (also doesn't help when I work for a shitty ass company that doesn't value work life balance). None of the senior staffs I work with have taken a single day, so it makes no fucking sense. People just have stacks of vacation days saved up now. The work is so busy, it's so hard to even squeeze in some consecutive days off.

I took a week off so far and it was amazing for my mental health and stress management levels. Having a week off from not having to stress over how much shit is waiting in my inbox the next day was great.

If any of you guys haven’t taken vacation then I seriously urge you to do so. being able to unplug for a week was worth it.

I feel VERY SORRY for anyone who hasn't had a chance during COVID to really take some time off, or slack off working at home or something like that, for a abnormal prolonged period of time (2-4+ months). and really experience what life was like before work/the hustle/rat race... and really have the time to sleep that extra 1-2 hours, have time to introspect and realise the things they really wanna do in life.

That was one of the few silver linings of COVID.

I hope everyone comes outta this more mature and happy, knowing fully more who they are, and what they want to do.

Take your damned vacations.

As a manager it annoys me to see people complaining about burnout only to see they barely used their vacation days. Do I need to remind people to eat as well?

I can see how it can be difficult if a company culturally avoids this with nobody else taking vacation days, but ultimately the vacation days are yours to use they can't stop you from using them.

Took 2 weeks off in Sept 2020 to drive around BC/Alberta before the 2nd wave

Took another 2 weeks off in December 2020 did nothing but sit on my ass

Taking another week over Canada Day and another 2 weeks in October. Even after that I still have about 5 weeks vacation banked.

Looking forward to these are the only thing that gets me through the work day.:okay:

I get one regular weekend a month and two 5 day weekends, plenty of time to relax and as such I think it’s a big reason why my mental health hasn’t suffered. Although I’m not really a person who has big swings either.

If you work in a place that you get 3-4 weeks vacation but you feel like there’s pressure not to take it then maybe you’re working in the wrong place. That’s kinda what my last company was like basically encouraged to take time off in between projects etc. Which is BS

I’ve leveraged my longer weekends by having them fall on stats and then taking an extra day here and there or a personal day. I’ve got 19 days off in august and like 6 6 day weekend through the summer :woot2:

Even if you’re sitting on your ass at home if gives you some time to relax catch up on things, take them.

We can't hold onto more than 7 weeks on a calendar changeover, anything above that gets paid out... but I've been around long enough that I get 5 weeks annually.

I been holding 7 and adding 5 for a total of 12 weeks on calendar changeover for 2 years now, was taking off every Monday for months last year just to burn 5........ but I have a reason, I built up to 12 because I had planned to take 3 months off to do a walking/camping trip in another country and figured hey why not get paid the entire time I'm gone?... was slowly buying gear and planning for it... but COVID killed all that... pretty funny because my managers are all over my ass all the time to take time but I didn't really want to tell them why I kept stacking it up :p

Take your damn vacation.

I took 2 weeks off this month. Visited Tofino and Jordan River for a week, then headed to Osoyoos/Twin Lakes for another week.

Your paid vacation time. Use it.

^ Last I checked the restrictions to stay within your health region hasn't been lifted....










J/K I don't really care.

I'm...essential... :smug:

It's not always that simple to just take time off.

My job is a lot of project work, meaning there's a lot of context and nuances that I am intimately familiar with. We are so familiar with the workings of it all that we become invested it in wholeheartedly. It's like a sense of accountability in the work.

While I can find someone to cover me when I'm away, it's not like I don't come back from vacation with a pile of work waiting for me. It also means that whoever covers me, I have to basically brain dump a lot of info onto them. It doesn't sound like it, but it's actually really tedious to compile all that info, then try to relay it to the person covering me. Lastly, I have to actually "let go" of that mental investment that I have in the project.

When I come back, I have to reacclimate to what I missed while I'm away. Depending on the amount of time I take off and what I was up to while I was away, I've actually forgotten how to do parts of my job and have to retrain myself. Sounds crazy, right? We take time off to disconnect from work and enjoy ourselves, so much so that we forget how to do parts of our job when we're back. When I return, I often have to work harder to catch up. Reacclimating really sucks.

My colleagues and I often rant about how arduous it feels to take time off. When we're off it's like a fantasy, life feels so great. But when we return, it's a harsh reality check. Life no longer feels great. We end up regretting taking time off because of that polarizing feeling. I also feel resentful when I return that the job isn't more forgiving to me when I leave for a while. So given all that I've said, now you can understand why some people cannot easily decide to take time off from work.

It has nothing to do with whose vacation days it is. I'm given more time off than I can find time and energy to spend.

Sounds like kinda a shit work arrangement if you don’t have a stake in the company..

Believe me i get it, i work at a creative service agency/consultancy for Fortune 50 enterprise organizations, it's the same here. But as a manager i set the expectation that we are all in support of each other, and that if one person takes vacation one week and has the team support, its expected they return the favour when others go on vacation.

This type of work is intense and stressful, its up to management to set the culture to allow that. Even though I am no longer client facing, i will readily jump in to support if somebody were to go on vacation or mental health leave.

Also even in house it's not like work stops and you are not a burden to your co-workers either or you're not coming back to a full inbox. Somebody's gotta do the work.

And if you are able to fully leave without anybody missing your presence, then how much of a contributor are you really to the company?

I work in project work.
I've just learned to embrace the full inbox. Maybe it's just me getting crusty but as far as I'm concerned it's management's responsibility to ensure shit doesn't go sideways while I'm on vacation, not mine. I can't predict or account for every single issue that may show up. People taking vacations should not be some sort of surprise.

I've also learned to stop putting phrases like "If you need urgent assistance contact person X in my absence" because customers think everything surrounding them is urgent and that contact person will get absolutely bombarded when 95% of things could simply wait a week with no issues.

I've also made the mistake long ago when I was younger and more eager of reading, answering emails, sometimes going even as far as to spend a vacation day working (without getting it back). Now, fuck that. That sort of thing has absolutely ruined vacations for me, put my mind in a sour mood many times when it's actually supposed to be resting. It helps that I take vacations like fishing and camping where there is no cell service, so they have no choice but to figure it out without me.

I'd counter that with: if your missing presence is that noticeable, how poorly managed is your company? If someones planned vacation creates that much of a mess, what's gonna happen when someone suddenly quits or dies?

I had a lot of time for introspection and thought, especially in 2021. I feel the opposite though - unsure of my next steps in my career and what I want to do in my industry going forward. Still trying to figure it out.

I took a week off last October and another week off during Christmas. A few days tacked onto weekends so far in 2021. I don't feel rested and recharged as things start to open though. I feel burned out, but it may be due to the fact that aside from four months last year (March to July), I have been in the office and things have never really slowed down. I work in consulting so you are either stressed if you have too much work, or stressed if you don't have enough coming in.

It's annoying when I take time off, then come back and find out the guy that worked on my project fked it up and then I had to spend the next week fixing it. This guy is supposed to be more senior than me, lol.

Unless you're doing some kind of work that isn't project based, it's hard to come back with an empty plate. Often times, you just have 500 emails in your inbox to go through when you finally return.