Althouse: "... ten years ago..."

May 13, 2019

"... ten years ago..."

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“I used to be a corporate attorney for Coca-Cola. I worked eighty hours a week. Then one day I asked my boss for a single Friday off and he said ‘no.’ So I left my dog with my brother and flew to Europe. That was ten years ago. It’s been super fucking chill.” (Barcelona, Spain)
A post shared by Humans of New York (@humansofny) on May 10, 2019 at 8:20am PDT

32 comments:

Kate Danaher said...: So what changed, other than the city? It was all about him before, and it's still all about him.; 5/13/19, 5:21 AM
Clyde said...: Do these people who claim to work 80-hour weeks actually WORK 80 hours a week or just BILL 80 hours a week? Also, you'd think someone who works that hard for the company would be so indispensable that the boss would say, sure, dude, take that Mental Health Day and then come back and keep burning your candle at both ends for us. Apparently that was not the case.; 5/13/19, 5:33 AM
Mr. Groovington said...: “It’s been super fucking chill” translated “I really fucked my life up”; 5/13/19, 5:46 AM
Rory said...: "I used to leave my dog alone all day. Then I abandoned my dog entirely."; 5/13/19, 6:11 AM
rehajm said...: I wouldn't say I've been missing it, Bob.

-Peter, Office Space (1999); 5/13/19, 6:14 AM
Tom T. said...: "My wife and kids still haven't found me."; 5/13/19, 6:25 AM
Mary Beth said...: "I used to leave my dog alone all day. Then I abandoned my dog entirely."

The dog abandonment bothered me too. He might be chill, but he's not cool.; 5/13/19, 7:05 AM
PJ57 said...: As someone who worked to grow shareholders flipping value all flipping weekend, fantasies of escape is sometimes all that keeps us going.; 5/13/19, 7:25 AM
Birches said...: And yet he sits on a park bench in NYC with an expensive leather jacket and boots? I'm going to call BS on this.; 5/13/19, 7:48 AM
MacMacConnell said...: Evidently you can't buy jeans in France that fit.; 5/13/19, 7:52 AM
MacMacConnell said...: Or maybe it's a EU problem.; 5/13/19, 7:55 AM
Wince said...: “I used to be a corporate attorney for Coca-Cola."

He looks like the guy "Ellis" who...

Thirty-one years ago this guy negotiated a Coke from Hans Gruber in Die Hard.; 5/13/19, 8:19 AM
mockturtle said...: Doesn't he miss his dog?; 5/13/19, 8:34 AM
D 2 said...: We are all dispensable. The market can absorb your 80 hours of ceaseless toil or she will persist with 0 hours of your effort to make it all work. From what I understand: people with a desire for soda are still finding a way to get their want satisfied in 2019, regardless of the 0/80 differential of his being involved since 2009.

Life's a journey not a destination sayeth S Tyler. Let some find meaning in the 80 hours down at HQ, let others find it relaxing on a park bench. The dude abides, the corporate lawyer can abide, the dog can abide, the pilot flying to Barcelona can abide, the park maintenance staff can abide. There is nothing new under the sun.; 5/13/19, 8:35 AM
CWJ said...: Clyde got to this before me. I encountered quite a few 60 hour a week claimers over my three corporate careers, in five companies, in four states. They invariably wanted you to know it. I was not one of them. But funny thing was whenever I did come in early or work late, or come in on weekends, they were almost never around. I generally had the place to myself. Is 80 hours a week the new standard bullshit claim, or was this guy just one upping the 60 hour claimants around him?; 5/13/19, 8:36 AM
Anonymous said...: Yeah attorneys can confuse billable time with clock time. Based on my experience with American me moving to Spain, there's a fair chance he's gay, and Catalonia is the spot. Just a guess.; 5/13/19, 9:09 AM
Michael said...: That is not NY. And after ten years at a company he should not have to ask for a day off, he should simply take one. Clearly not an 80 hour a week guy.; 5/13/19, 9:12 AM
Michael said...: Corporate attorneys don’t bill hours. They are salaried.; 5/13/19, 9:13 AM
Ryan said...: I quit my big firm job 3 years ago after 10 years and started my own law practice. Love it.; 5/13/19, 9:36 AM
Rick.T. said...: Stuff (weathly) white people like?; 5/13/19, 9:36 AM
rcocean said...: Do these people who claim to work 80-hour weeks actually WORK 80 hours a week or just BILL 80 hours a week?

Nobody can do productive "brain work" 80 hours a week. They're at the office 80 hours. How much of that is actual productive work? Maybe 20 hours.; 5/13/19, 9:40 AM
MikeD said...: If y'all wanna read about a similar, yet much more ennobling, life experience I'll suggest, as Insta did, you read Chris Arnade's essay at First Things.
https://www.firstthings.com/article/2019/06/back-row-america; 5/13/19, 9:45 AM
Clark said...: I put in plenty of 80 hour weeks during my years at a big NY law firm during the 80s and 90s. That would be hours at the office. Hours billed would be a smaller number—but not that much smaller. 7 days a week, working till after midnight many nights: that could go on for weeks at a time. When the deal was done you could dial it way back. But only until the next deal got going.; 5/13/19, 10:17 AM
PM said...: ˙He said, sitting on his bed.'; 5/13/19, 10:54 AM
Yancey Ward said...: At least he isn't complaining about the lack of a Father's Day card from his dog.; 5/13/19, 11:06 AM
Yancey Ward said...: I only put in 80 hours of work in a week once in my life when we had a short deadline to get a sufficient quantity of a drug candidate ready for a large scale toxicology study got suddenly scheduled at the last moment.; 5/13/19, 11:09 AM
Amadeus 48 said...: On the other hand, I am in Barcelona at the moment and it’s great. But I am a tourist. And retired. And here for three days with my brothers on a trip to Spain to get reacquainted. There is a limited amount of stuff to do and the place is full of global tourists. So many that they are financing the completion of the Gaude’ church in six more years. Graffiti is in, as you can see in the picture. Lots of great food.

Time to move on.; 5/13/19, 11:40 AM
Robert Cook said...: "And yet he sits on a park bench in NYC with an expensive leather jacket and boots? I'm going to call BS on this."

1. That's not NYC.

2. He didn't say he stopped working entirely. Presumably, he's working at a new job for fewer hours a week than his corporate law job required, giving him more time to actually experience and enjoy his life.; 5/13/19, 11:47 AM
JML said...: Not much of a dog dad. He should have brunch with the cat sister - maybe she'll throw a fork at him too.; 5/13/19, 12:08 PM
reader said...: My husband typically works sixty hour work weeks. In the past that would include two or three hours each night with his computer on our couch after our son was in bed. Eighty hour weeks were infrequent. There was the time his company was working on finalizing a settlement prior to an earnings call. He went to work Monday morning, came home Tuesday night at midnight for a shower, returned to work, and finally came home Wednesday at 10:00 pm. He was back at work bright and early Thursday morning.

If he asked for a day off they wouldn’t deny it. But he wouldn’t ask for a day off if it would cause difficulty at work.; 5/13/19, 12:48 PM
Ann Althouse said...: "And after ten years at a company he should not have to ask for a day off, he should simply take one."

He didn't say how long he worked there, only how long ago he quit. I would guess that he retired. At what point do you have enough to retire? It's a balance that includes how much you're enjoying your work.; 5/13/19, 2:35 PM
Bilwick said...: "So what changed, other than the city? It was all about him before, and it's still all about him. "

Who should it be all about, and why?; 5/13/19, 3:13 PM