I get enough email during the day, most of it pointless. It's hard enough to concentrate on my work (I am an executive assistant and by its very nature my work is mundane, pointless, and therefore kind of tough to get worked up about) without that battleship gray message box popping up every other minute to announce, "New mail has arrived. Would you like to read it now?" to which I have to respond "Yes" or "No" by clicking my mouse in a little gray box. I am offered no options for what I'd like to respond, which is, "Hell no", "Go away" and "Leave me alone", respectively. I am interrupted by this box dozens of times each day, and I don't dare turn it off. Without it, I'm left to rely on my own brain to tell me when it's time to check for new mail, and I might miss important messages (notifications that my boss has mail, for example).

I am a good executive assistant, and a good executive assistant not only keeps up with her own mail, she also keeps up with her boss's. So I'm interrupted tens of dozens of times each day by another box popping up to remind me that my boss has just received mail that hasn't been replicated to my site, so I should contact my site administrator (a short little man who naps in the computer room and emerges occasionally to inform us all that the server is down/threatening to go down/melting down), or simply click "OK" (as if there's another option. Why not give me a "Shut up and go away" button - I guarantee you, when that software is made available, it will go further in boosting employee morale than any Dunk-The-Boss booth at the company picnic ever conceived), and go into my boss's mailbox to see if what he's received is interesting or not. If it's even remotely interesting I will read it, then forward it to my boss (which is in itself a waste of time, as he's already received it but can't open it himself because that's my job) adding a pertinent comment such as, "You might find this interesting," or "Please advise", the latter of which is an all-purpose phrase to be used liberally any time action on his part is required but I'm too tired at the moment to tell him what that action might be.

When I finish wading through electronic mail, there is paper mail to be dealt with (when you're as big as my boss is, you don't open your mail. Your assistant opens it, either responding to it outright or attaching summary notes explaining what it means, which are then placed in your IN basket so you can glance at them before writing detailed instruction in the upper left hand corner such as, 'For Our Files', as if there exists a filing system you've built together which has deep significance for both of you. Trust me, you haven't, and there isn't), and the phone, which constantly rings. Not only for me, but for my boss and -- you guessed it - I answer for him. When you're as big as he is, you don't answer your own phone, either. I find out who is calling, why they're calling, then explain to him who they are and what they want, whereupon he tells me to take a message and explains how I should respond to that message on his behalf by writing detailed instruction in the upper left hand corner such as 'For Our Files'.

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