The most unproductive day

Monday Oct 26 is 'most unproductive day' - Telegraph

According to the Telegraph (see above) Monday October 26th is the "most unproductive day" of the year.

I must have blinked. I missed it. Personally, I was very productive in my work on Monday.

If I missed it, the thesis must be wrong. At least, that's my theory.

Actually, it's not entirely bogus.

Seasonal Affective Disorder (S.A.D.) is a very real physiological phenomenon, according to the Mayo Clinic:

Seasonal affective disorder (also called SAD) is a type of depression that occurs at the same time every year. If you're like most people with seasonal affective disorder, your symptoms start in the fall and may continue into the winter months, sapping your energy and making you feel moody. Less often, seasonal affective disorder causes depression in the spring or early summer.

Don't brush off that yearly feeling as simply a case of the "winter blues" or a seasonal funk that you have to tough out on your own — you may have seasonal affective disorder. Treatment for seasonal affective disorder includes light therapy (phototherapy), psychotherapy and medications. Addressing the problem can help you keep your mood and motivation steady throughout the year.

And I'm living proof (at least in my own mind) that this is a true, actual phenomenon.

I like summer. Sunshine. No wind, no rain, nor dark of night ... as The Supremes say. At least during the hours when my body protests that it should be daytime, except that there's no sunshine.

But when Winter comes, I tend to get a little hunch-backed, and spend too much time thinking about blue skies, walking to the office from my car without getting wet, and going to the office AND going home after work in the sunshine, rather than in the dark.

That's why, when I transferred to my new office four years ago, I chose the work station which was closest to the door ... and to the light which is always on over the door.

The rest of my colleagues prefer to work in an environment without overhead lights. When I leave my desk, I enter the TwiLight Zone. Literally. They all have their own personal desk lamps glowing, but these are pitiful zones of light. Walking down the aisle between cubicles is like driving down a country road, where the only light comes from Mercury Lamps atop tall poles which our rural brothers position at the turn-off from the dusty gravel track which wanders from one homestead to the next.

My colleagues are nice people, but they're all virtual Troglodytes. It is as if they feel agoraphobic, fearful of the boundless open areas; they prefer the artificial boundaries established by the limited glow-ring of their 40-watt Halogen bulbs. Intense sunshine where their attention is fixated; everything in the shadows just does not exist. The 21st Century Cave is not for me.

But getting back to the main theme: although I prefer sunshine on my shoulders (makes me happy!), I can still enjoy a productive day under the mere influence of a few fluorescent tubes above my desk. So did Monday make me blue? No. Actually, I did accomplish my daily self-imposed productivity goals, and the day was rewarding. Fun, even: I think a person should find work that they enjoy, and when I do my job to my own personal standards, I enjoy the day.

I believe that the theory that "October 26 Is The Most Unproductive Day Of The Year" is pure bull-pucky. Some of my most unproductive days this year were during the height of the summer, and the reasons had absoutly nothing to do with the length of the daytime, or the amount of light impinging upon my own workspace.

Still, I know that if I did not have bright lights shining on me all day, it would be a total bummer, man!


PS: Dude, do NOT build your own ultra-light airplane and fly it back and forth across the rocky shoals of the California Coast. Think: Icarus, okay? You're, like -- not high enough, and not light enough, no matter what you're smoking.