Surviving summer in work
When I was a student, I worked every summer in a fish and chip shop. I didn’t mind the work, and it felt good to be earning money for once.
In fact, it would have been quite bearable if not for the holiday-makers. In they came, feet sandy from the beach, big smiles on their sunburnt faces, to order ice creams and fish and chips. The smarmy so-and-so’s.
Somehow work seems harder to bear when everyone around you is on holiday. Working in an office during the summer months was tough. Half of my colleagues were away, while the other half were either talking about their upcoming fortnight break or returning from a week in the sun with stories to make me green with envy.
So how do you survive a summer at work when everyone around you is on holiday? Here are five ideas that helped me through.
1. Make the most of the weekend
Don’t fritter away the weekend with housework or TV. If you don’t have to work the weekends, make them count. Pick up your local tourist brochures, get outside, and go exploring. Visit your nearest castle, park, woodland, beach, museum, swimming pool or art gallery. Plan a day trip – it doesn’t have to cost anything, and if you’ve done something fun it will help to combat the feeling that you’re missing out come Monday morning.
2. Use your evenings
Long summer evenings are there to be enjoyed, and if you’re tired from working all day, you have the perfect excuse to chill out in the garden (or your nearest green space) with a cold drink and a good friend. Anything that gets you out of your usual work-eat-sleep routine will help you to enjoy the summer while it lasts.
3. Plan a treat
Can you take a Monday off? Planning a long weekend will give you something to look forward to. Even if you can’t take a day off, there’s nothing to stop you packing up the tent at 6pm on Friday and camping out until Sunday evening. If you work in an office, this is definitely a good plan. Pick a destination or activity, and you’ll have your own ‘holiday story’ to tell at coffee break.
4. Get stuff done
If you have a heavy workload, the summer can be a blessing. With your chatterbox colleague away for two weeks, you can catch up on those accounts without interruption. Do you have a big project that you can’t seem to get to grips with? While your boss is away and there are less last-minute requests, use the opportunity to get your teeth that project at the bottom of your daily ‘to-do’ lists.
5. Work outside
Why not? Take your chair and your pad of paper outside. Or fix an umbrella as a sunshade above your laptop. You might just start a trend. If you are temping, change your job searches from admin to garden maintenance, construction or play-worker. Okay, if you work in a hotel kitchen, this one might not be do-able. But you can still take a walk on your lunch breaks, right?
The point is: us Brits love the summer. It’s a rare pleasure, and if you’re stuck inside at work, it can feel that the gift of sunshine is beaming down on everyone but you. The trick is to grab as much summer as you can in-between your working hours. And if you can find a way to work and enjoy the summer at the same time, well done! Let us know how you managed it…
To read more summer articles click here
Written by Becky Matyus. Posted on 25th June.
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