The Panda Bear on Yahoo, Lack of Leisure, and the Diet Project

The Panda Bear has read about Yahoo's decision to stop allowing people to telecommute.    The Panda Bear has not read about the details of this decision but just from the headlines this decision rings about everything the Panda Bear dislikes about modern leadership in organizations.    It does not treat people like individuals-good workers loose benefits because of the incompetence of others.    Rather then go after the bad workers, the organization punishes everyone.   Secondly, the Panda Bear strongly believes that the CEO of Yahoo will be telecommuting some of the time.   Modern leaders seem to feel they don't have to follow the rules they set for us peasants.      There are very few people in leadership positions that the Panda Bear respects.

The Panda Bear is an office worker but she does not telecommute.    Her job is still very paper based and it would be hard to do at home.   However, the Panda Bear dreams of flexible work scheduling.   The four day work week or the four and a half day work week!.  To have greater freedom on how one works their forty hours.  How nice not to be charged time off for going to a physician's appointment,   The Panda Bear believes that the five day work week is both for her personally and her work extremely inefficient.  

The Panda Bear's supervisor was in the kitchen and she was asking the Panda Bear and other coworkers why people don't like to work.   The Panda Bear said sometimes it wasn't the work itself but the fact people feel that their lives are restricted because of long work hours.   People don't live by work alone.

The Panda Bear Blog is a blog that believe work and fun go together.   Of course, the Panda Bear has become more critical of her work environment in that "fun" means eating high caloric food in a job that involves sitting at a computer all day.    She told the heads of her organization at a group meeting that many people in offices need watch their weight-the office should be more diet and exercise friendly especially since the organization is self-insured(Overweight employees increase healthcare costs).

Seriously, while the Panda Bear confesses she has ate many and  has enjoyed office sweets, she feels she would be a healthier person if there was less food available in offices.  Also the Panda Bear (unfortunately) has body type that does not require a lot of calories.  She can't eat most of the food in offices without gaining weight.    The office has been a source of junk food for the Panda Bear that she does not eat at home.   It has reinforced Panda Bear's tendency towards emotional eating. To increase her diet resolve, the Panda Bear tells herself that she is not a dog-she does not work for a food reward.   The Panda Bear reminds herself that offices used to reward people by giving cigarettes;it might be fun to smoke and sociable to smoke at work but it is an unhealthly pleaure

Therefore, the Panda Bear has began the Diet at Work Project.   She has vowed to go 365 days without eating any food at an office event except food that she brings.   The Panda Bear feels it would really be a blessing if the office never fed her again and showed their appreciation in other ways.  

The Panda Bear on Washington's Birthday, Henri the Chat Noir, and Mindfullness

The Panda Bear Blog is a blog about the musings of an average office worker who wants more from life than sitting at an office desk and doing(hated) household chores.

The Panda Bear''a last weekend was a three day weekend in the US.   To the Panda Bear, the Monday holiday in February will always be George Washington's birthday not President's day. George Washington deserves his own day; he was our first president and the father of our country. He set the tone for the other presidents to follow including Abraham Lincoln. In the Panda Bear's opinion he is the greatest President of the United States.

The Panda Bear believes that George Washington has lost some of his status as  greatest President of the United States because he owned slaves. The Panda Bear does not wish to minimize this serious flaw but she thinks Washington should be judged by the standards of the time. A very interesting book on the subject is An Imperfect God: George Washington, His Slaves, and the Creation of America by Henry Wiencek.

The Panda Bear received this call for a slow weekend  from a meditation web site:

"This year, I am determined to be more unproductive. My goal is to do less and less – to move slower and slower until everything stops. I and the whole world will come to a sweet and silent stillness. And in this stillness, a great shout of joy will arise. We will all be free..."

From the Ox and Window, by 17th century Zen master Hakuin Ekaku

The Panda Bear feels it is worth noting that Zen comes from a very busy culture.

The Panda Bear shared this quote with some of her friends where they all said it was hard to slow down.

The Panda Bear has read alot of about being mindful(living in the present moment) which is a part of the philosophybehind meditation.    However, right now the Panda Bear has some respectful disagreements with the philosophy during the winter.   The short days make the Panda Bear tired at night.   It has been snowing heavily for the past couple of weekends and the Panda Bear has been shut in her apartment doing her hated household chores.    She has tried to be positive about these chores but at times her body rebels.   Practically everyone the Panda Bear knows has had the cold or the flu.   The bad weather and illnesses has interrupted the Panda Bear's limited social life making her feel lonely.   How bad can it be for the Panda Bear's spiritual development to yearn for spring and the long days that make one feel there is life after work?   In the spring, summer and early fall the Panda Bear admits that at times it is easy to live in the present moment-during the winter she finds it hard.

At work, the Panda Bear resolves to have an upbeat attitude.   It is hard to do-the office is stuffy and the Panda Bear does not have easy access to a window.    She and a coworker created a wall of plants to give themselves something pleasant to look at during the day.    The Panda Bear has held the same type of job for over eighteen years and it has gotten old.   She tries to tell herself the numerous disappointments in her job in the past don't predict the future disappointment.

The Panda Bear feels she needs political skills.   Everything the Panda Bear reads about office politics says she should be making her boss look good.    The Panda Bear thinks she does make her boss look good in that the Panda Bear does a good job.    However, the Panda Bear has a hard time flattering bosses particularly since the Panda Bear often feels overworked and under appreciated.

The Panda Bear has found a cat on the Internet that shares some of her ennui. It is Henri Le Chat Noir a melancholy French cat. The videos on the site are funny. The first two are the funniest and are located at the bottom of the page.

 

The Panda Bear on Improving Working Conditions and Bathroomn Remolding

The Panda Bear Blog is a blog about the a stressed out average office worker and her observations on life.

The Panda Bear has not forgotten her dear and valued readers.   Her New Years resolution was to cultivate her inner hippie and embrace change and social improvements.    Therefore she has gotten involved in workplace reform.   She has volunteered to help with some groups that want to make laws to change some employment practices.

Though the Panda Bear is on a bottom level job in her office at meeting she very tactfully confronted the heads of her organization regarding improving health conditions where she works and making the office more exercise and diet friendly.    The heads said they would listen to her ideas.

All through this whirlwind of reform activity, the Panda Bear has continued with her hated household chores.    The Panda Bear and Mr. Panda have done some needed repairs.   There is still much work needed to be done.

The Panda Bear plans to start regularly blogging again.

The Panda Bear on Rousseau, Adsense, and Competition

The Panda Bear is starting this post during lunch in the office kitchen trying to look very important.   She is using her spiffy netbook which has impressed the IT department  at work.    As readers of the Panda Bear Blog already know, the Panda Bear is stalled in her daytime career.    Though she works for a large major organization, the Panda Bear now works in a small office of about thirty where she is one of the seven lowest level workers in a group of about thirty-five.  It is possible to tell who are the lower level workers by the red at lunch sign at their desks.

The Panda Bear Blog is a blog about a lowly office worker.    It is a blog about being a confused humble bear who is in the lower percentages of human society.    At work Panda Bear keeps thinking  of Rousseau’s saying that “Man was bore free but everywhere he is in chains.”   The Panda Bear feels like shouting from her cubicle “Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity.”   Then she remembers that this was from the FRENCH revolution and the Panda Bear is an American (also the French revolution came with a lot of violence against innocents unfortunately).

However, the American Revolution was founded on the idea of liberty and equality.   Where is it in the work place?   Most big organizations the Panda Bear has worked it has been quite clear that the well being of some individuals is worth more to the organization than others.     Also the American Revolution was founded on the principles of free speech and due process.   Most people don’t have these rights while at work unless they are covered by a union.  Most nonunionized large organizations in the United States are run like feudal empires

The Panda Bear thinks employees should be able to freely discuss the terms of employment, pay, and working conditions without free of repercussion especially outside of work and on the social media,.   The Panda Bear thinks transparent working conditions and pay would result in much better treatment of workers.   Truth should be a defense to the accusation that an employee is being negative.   Employers should be held accountable for their treatment of workers; if employers were justified in their actions they have nothing to be afraid of in making information on how they treat workers public.

Of course, the simplest solution for employers is to give workers more time off where  they are able to enjoy the freedoms of the United States.     The Panda Bear does not think giving the workers letting go early once or twice would undermine the US economy and would make people much more relaxed and happy.

Since the Panda Bear Blog is a blog about a little humble Panda Bear dealing with the powers that be, the Panda Bear regrets to report that she was thrown of the Google Adsense program.    The reason they gave was invalid click activity (Adsense pays out per click).   The Panda Bear did not knowingly violate Adsense policy.   She suspects that one of readers may have made some invalid clicks and her blog did not attract enough visitors to make Google Adsense feel that her blog was worth keeping in their network.   However, now the Panda Bear Blog has  banned from Adsense forever (she is told Google never changes its mind).

It is fortunate for the Panda Bear that there are competing ad networks which the Panda Bear could join.   Choice and options are the advantages are being in an economy where there are competing companies.

However, the Panda Bear plans to stay away from pay-for-click advertising and she joins different networks to boost blog readership.    She thinks the pay for click advertising is too easily open for fraudulent activity and she does not plan to pursue pay for click advertising until the blog is more established.