It’s true, I swear.
Directly in front of me is sits a wide USB-C monitor, where I focus my attention and my work. Slightly to the right of it sits my open laptop, where I move less needy applications and ongoing tasks. And only very slightly to the left of that laptop rests Wismo, a 15lb cat. She prefers to curl between my mouse-hand and laptop, which is like trying to fit into a pair of pants you wore pre-quarantine.
Once, while I was actively working in my Outlook Inbox, Wismo’s back paw dropped its weight on my Esc key – or some still unknown keyboard combination – and absolute panic ensued! I watched my curated list of emails – some saved since 2019 – vanish as quickly as cards are shuffled. Ctrl-Z ! Ctrl-Z! SHIT! Deleted Items Folder? NOOO! Why aren’t they there?! And what exactly am I missing?!
Thankfully, magically, Wismo had archived my messages instead of deleting them into the abyss with tens of thousands of other emails. How thoughtful. I select my 17 emails from the unemployed Archive feature; Drag-and-Drop back to the Inbox where my email to-do count goes up right in line with my blood pressure.
For me, the perils of working from home are mostly pet related. Cats throw up. A lot. (“Hang on, I’ll BRB!”) They walk across desks and inconsiderately drop pens, spill coffee, paw at water glasses, bomb video calls and delete emails. The dog barks when Amazon and other like deliveries are fulfilled, which is pretty often in this age of ordering. “Sorry, I can’t hear you. My alarm dog is barking. Yes, again.” The dog-walker is quarantined while waiting on Covid results, so “I need to walk the pup at lunchtime.” Then to eat lunch at my desk. While my cat jabs at my fork (we both like chicken).
There are other obstacles. Neighbors hire whistling construction crews (“Oh, you can hear that?”). New co-workers never seem to be busy on the same workdays (“Come see this!”). Tech gurus forget which headphones are paired and miss VoIP calls … well, that one’s all me. But the cat will fall asleep, and the dog will stop barking, and I’ll throw on headphones with concentration. So, call back. Email again. I’ll be ready this time, I swear.