Enjoy your day tomorrow.

Viel Spaß!

Tomorrow will be a perfect day for flip-flops in New York.

But a swimmingsuit in Germany is allowed as well.

I go for a picnic tomorrow. My day off as well.

An old friend of mine often said, ‘You can sleep/rest when you are dead’. I did not agree.

Did you enjoy your day off ?

P.S: I love your stories in the NRC.

Knowing life in horeca touches the extremes, it still puzzles me why nobody is commenting the long hours your collegue had to work. Do you collegue finds it normal she had to work a double shift?

Lieve D

I guess we all consider it normal.

And that's exactly what worries me. Nobody objects until they have to do it themselves. So I sincerely hope all of them will experience the exhaustion after working a double shift in a physical job.

Lieve D

I often worked that long. In an hotel. As a barkeeper.. A waitress.. Undercover of course.
If you ever want me to have a word with your boss -

Lieve D.

And what do you expect to change then?

Lieve D.

Our whole economy is based on overtime. Which employer has exactly the amount of people for the work he has? They always tend to have less. Maybe it's a rule: always hire less people than you need. Don't forget some people like to work more to buy a car or expensive shoes they really need or to pay for their honeymoon.

There is a difference between doing some overtime and working double shifts. The first is still justifiable , the latter isn't, I would even call it dangerous ,it's exactly because of the fatigue that people start making mistakes.
But still, try to imagine a life in wich you work double shifts on a very regular basis.
First of all your job will become so absorbing, you will have no time nor space left to take the necessarily distance between yourself and your activity, that means no time for selfreflection or cultivating a healthy sense of being 'under cover', wich I think is a crucial condition to maintain a balanced relationship with the world.
Secondly such a life means you will have very little time left to maintain personal relationships , wich are also very important for someone 's wellbeing.
Third there will be no time left for someone to broaden their life with hobbys and other interests.
This I call a demaged life in wich some of a human being most elementary rights are being violated.
So yes I certainly hope people will stop considering it to be normal.

Lieve D.

I´ve got some news for you: most employees dont´t have a choice because they need the money.And in the majority of cases employers don´t change anything until mistakes have already been made. So perhaps you should start hoping for something else,otherwise you will be badly disappointed.And who wants to be disappointed?

@ Manon

I am very well aware of this, all I am saying is we shouldn't consider it to be normal. Otherwise we can as well cut back the social rights and install the 16hour workday as the new rule.

I'm working in a hotel (yes, we all know by now) and I work from 9am until 2pm. Yes, I can talk my way into some internet time (and lunchbreaks which I use for personal things), but that's oke. I don't get payed by the hour, so doing this many hours is stupid, but luckily I can say this isn't my job, it's just a fling. Not too many time for personal things, that's true, but who needs friends when they have guests.

Lieve D.

To keep in mind that something should not be considered to be normal is useless because it doesn´t change anything.If you are not satisfied with a given situation you normally have to act to change it.

And therefore one needs first a mental change: stop thinking it's normal.

Where is Ilanit? She is a specialist in mental change, isn't she?