Happiness is a Home Office.

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A messy desk with a lava lamp!

To all the millions of you working from home: Congratulations!  You probably love it, hate it, and fight with it occasionally.

I sure do.

What’s good about it?

Peace and serenity. Well, yes and no. It IS indeed quiet here much of the time. Fridays mornings are killer; the landscapers make LOTS of noise. And there's garbage and recycling pick up too. No client calls on Friday mornings. The few times I tried, I wound up grabbing the phone and running from room to room to escape the noise as the gardeners worked their way around the property.  In addition, they would then move on to the house directly across the street and start up the mowers and blowers there. 

More noise: Yesterday, a car blew by doing at least 60, followed by a yellow Corvette doing the same. 

A neighbor had issues with his car alarm for a few months; I complained. He didn’t like my complaint and said maybe I was going over there and setting off the alarm. At any rate, it seems to be quiet now.

But that’s not the only distraction. There’s my dog. Nah, he’s not a distraction; he is welcome break!

There’s all the “toll free calls” that come in several times a day on the land line. I ignore most, but once in a while it's fun to take a break and either ride them with the con until they hang up or blow off steam at them.

Then there's a certain room; at the other end of the house, there’s …the kitchen! I’ve worked hard at staying out of there but oh, who wants to leave dirty dishes? And while visiting there I’ll just fill up a small bowl with some puffy cheese doodles. After all, they’re mostly air, right? Oh, if that’s the case, shouldn't a bigger bowl be used?

Needless to say, I don’t buy a lot of carbohydrate laden snacks anymore. Give me twelve raw almonds and a glass of water instead to take that hunger pain away.

Then there’s the urge to clean the house. Oh heck, I’ll be honest here. There’s no urge!

So what’s so wonderful about my home office? 

Sitting next to a window (and it can be opened and closed too). I survived years of no view in my corporate life, and folks, I can tell you first hand that it’s not healthy.

• I can have my lava lamp on my desk.

• The freedom to make a mess whenever I want and not having to worry about “important visitors from abroad” coming to the offices.

• The view. Parents with strollers and dogs stroll by in the mornings; in the afternoons, there’s kids walking home from school. 

• The privacy: Reading blogs out loud just before publishing them, which often leads me to polish them a bit further. Yes, I spend too much time on them! But most importantly, reading out loud helps to catch mistakes.  Proofreading your own words is NOT easy!

• Listening to music. Not talking about big hair and heavy metal stuff here. My selections run from Contemporary and Alt Country to Little Steven’s Underground Garage to 60's on 6 on Sirius/XM to my local Classic Rock station plus I have a few favorite stations across the pond that are streamed on the Internet. The music fuels me and gives me ideas. It may even make me work faster and more efficiently! 

Hope you got a few new ideas here! Would love to hear about your home office; I welcome your ideas! The Ramones poked fun at corporate life in this video, which probably marks the only time Joey sported a tie! Oh, and take a break and stop by and visit... at the website, Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ ...Thanks!