Give it a rest

Stop and smell the roses

Fourth of July. Time to kick back and relax.

My phone buzzes. Several times. In quick succession. Emails have arrived. Maybe messages from friends or family?

Nope. Updates about work topics from LinkedIn Groups.

Saturday night, out late. Coming home from a fun party with friends. Feeling good and a little tired. My phone buzzes. Did I forget something at the party? Is someone checking to make sure I got home OK?

Nope. It’s my gas and electric bill.

As long as I’m on the smartphone, I check Twitter, looking for a laugh. Most of the posts are earnest messages about industry trends or professional development.

To all of the above, I say: Give it a rest. I know, or at least I hope, most of these posts and emails are pre-scheduled for delivery. No one is really sending out bills or “5 Ways to Improve Your Presentation” in the wee hours of the weekend.

At least they shouldn’t be.

Just because digital delivery and social media have the capability for 24/7 connection doesn’t mean they have to be used 24/7.

Consider the receiver. Why not give us all a little time to unwind from the week.

If you feel compelled to post at all hours, and on off days, at least make it funny or lighthearted or otherwise appropriate for downtime.

Let’s keep the work in the workday. And help us all put a proper end to the week with work-free weekends.

That would be a more social thing to do.

62,391 emails

I have become a very orderly person. By necessity. When you're a one-woman office, you get all the perks and all the work. Multitasking is my middle name. Laundry and research. Vacuuming and conceptualizing. Emails and teleconferences.

So the first thing I do every morning is check for emails and clean out my inbox. If more than a dozen have collected overnight, I start to hyperventilate, thinking something has gone seriously wrong with a project.

So when I used my father's computer recently and saw an inbox stuffed with 62,391 emails, I was gobsmacked. I didn't think that large an accumulation was even possible.

Now, I do a lot of online ordering, and every order automatically subscribes me to one or more newsletters or emails or other customer-relationship vehicles. This makes me religious about hunting down and clicking the teeny tiny "unsubscribe" links at the bottom of the page. Just about every time I get the immediate response: "Please tell us why you want to unsubscribe."

I never have because I don't know exactly what to say. "You and thousands of others send me too many emails." "I find your constant messages a distraction while I'm working." "I just wanted a pair of jeans, not a relationship."

Now I have the perfect response: "I don't want to follow in my father's footsteps."