Syudi Roll-e

I'm becoming so addicted to my work that some of my officemates have given my name a new definition. Roll-e, in their dictionary, means "someone who works without eating." So when break comes and someone has not yet logged off from his workstation, the others would tell him, "Syudi (Don't be), Roll-e." (I've been assuming syudi is a Cebuano word, but as I am writing this, I realize it may be gay lingo.)

They invented the term, though, out of misconception. I eat, of course. It's just that in my first day of live work, I told my fellow newbies to go ahead for lunch. I decided later not to follow them outside the building and ate instead at the office pantry. When they came back inside, I was already back in my cubicle, hunched in front the PC. And when the afternoon break came, I didn't go out at all. I told them what really happened a day or two later, but the Roll-e definition had caught on.

With the way I've been holed up in my cubicle, however, I might as well not be eating. My office hours is from nine in the morning down to six in the afternoon, but I stay until nine or ten in the evening. Some older officemates have been warning me about being burned out, but I'm not really trying to kill myself or anything. I'm just indulging myself while I'm still fascinated with my job.

But if you think I'm being too workaholic, wait till you meet my officemate M. She does early OT, from eight to nine a.m., and she stays late in the evening. I always leave the office ahead of her. Once last week, she even stayed until one in the morning.

What we do is more because of passion for our work than for more OT pay. We only get paid for OT until nine in the evening, and last week, my plotted schedule was only up to eight p.m. The extra hours is charity work. I don't mind not being paid for those hours. I enjoy my work and I learn a lot. It's both challenging and fulfilling. I'm a fish in water. I'm a carabao in a muddy pond. I get nourished more by my work than by food.