I Know Why the Caged Office Worker Sings

I spend most days in an office. Sometimes I get to leave. Do "field work." But many of my days are spent sitting behind a computer, reading publications, writing summaries and correspondence, looking at the clock every fifteen minutes.

What am I looking forward to? Usually? Lunch.

The reason that people that work in offices get fat isn't because they don't get exercise. So many places now have workout areas. Or gym memberships. Or insurance breaks for those who join gyms. Or let people leave for 2 1/2 hours in the middle of the day when their underlings are looking for them to ask questions in order to finish that project that is due? You know?

Wait, that's just me.

Anyway, I look forward to lunch. I look forward to dinner, too, but only because it is something I do after I leave the office.

We have nothing else to look forward to. No other major breaks from the grind. No other time-waster that is so universally recognized. No other time in which we can sit, unmolested, at our desk. Left alone with our left-overs and thirty minutes to read Defamer or Television Without Pity.

So we rock out at lunch. We go out to lunch. We escape. By car, by foot and by calories.

We spend the morning dreaming of cheese sauce and french fries. Of ranch dressing and onion rings. Of hamburgers, hot dogs, cashew chicken and nachos.

Because, for the most part, we have nothing else to look forward to during the day.

I gain weight when I don't have field work. I gain weight when I sit here all day, day after day, with nothing to do but read and write. I gain weight despite time on the treadmill because the only thing that will feed my soul is a nice 6 inch sub with chips. And a pickle.