Chaotic Not Random

So I was sitting in my cubicle last week, simultaneously reading Tuesday Morning Quarterback and Mirthful Ones, when my boss poked her head in. I caught her in my peripheral vision and alt-tabbed to the accounting software.

I'm pretty good at the alt-tab maneuver. Speed is important, as is the ability to hit the alt-tab keys without looking, but advanced practitioners realize that the trick is to always know what programs are open on your computer and where you are among them, like how Magic Johnson always knew where his teammates were so he could hit the open man with the no-look pass. It doesn't do any good, after all, if your boss walks in and you alt-tab away from The Onion to ESPN.com, does it? Even worse is when you fail to notice a pop-up and end up alt-tabbing to an ad for herbal Viagra. Always know your position relative to safe programs and how many alt-tabs you need to get there. As we will see, however, even the most blister-quick and self-aware alt-tabber can get caught.

Anyway, my boss poked her head in and said, "Can I talk to you for a minute?"

This worried me. I've seen people get fired at my company, and that's how it begins -- they get asked if they have a minute, they follow the boss back to a conference room where the cute HR girl is waiting, the door closes, and five minutes later they're cleaning out their desk with their final paycheck sticking out of their back pocket. My heart twisted in my chest. I didn't want to get fired in front of the cute HR girl.

I followed my boss back to the conference room and was relieved to find the cute HR girl absent. My boss closed the door and sat down, looking at a sheaf of printouts.

"The IS department started tracking Internet use about a month ago," she said. "In terms of time spent, you are one of the top five in the company."

That's ridiculous, I wanted to say. There's no way that anybody -- let alone as many as four anybodies -- spends more time on the Internet than I do. I didn't say that, though. Instead, I rearranged my face into an approximation of sheepishness and took my reprimand like a little boy caught filching Nilla Wafers. What could I say? Sometimes you just get busted.

I spend at least two hours a day surfing the Web, oftentimes three hours or more. That's not three hours solid, of course -- I break that browsing time into dozens of chunks ranging from a few seconds to several minutes, marbled among bursts of actual work like the fat in a cut of prime rib. In the two years I've worked at my job, I've worked about 45 hours a week to do a job that would only require 30 or 35 hours if I didn't waste vast stretches of time reading blogs and napping on the toilet. I estimate that over the last two years, I have stolen over $12,000 in unnecessary overtime pay.

"You're not fired," my boss said, "because you do good work. But you can't work overtime anymore without special permission. And I expect that this will be a one-time conversation."

I nodded assent, mumbled an apology, and rearranged my face again, this time into an approximation of chastened repentance. I went back to my desk and closed down Tuesday Morning Quarterback and Mirthful Ones, and since then I have barely surfed the Web at all except for work-related purposes and during my lunch break. My productivity has soared. I'm going to start casting around for another job next week.