Conference Calls

I've been pretty excited to get back to work since my previous employer called me and asked me to come back for some future projects. I love programming, LOVE programming. I hate conference calls, HATE conference calls. Unfortunately to get to the fun programming part I have to endure many conference calls. "Requirement meetings," "System Improvement meetings," "Team Development meetings," "Feasibility meetings," "whatever the heck you wanna call this meetings." What they usually mean to me is sit on the phone for hours while several people two to three times my age decide if a dropdown should be labeled "Approver" or "Controller." All the while I'm thinking, ok you guys table that and talk about it later because the effort on my part is negligible. Then when it comes to real questions like, "Is is possible to select multiple status in the report'?" I say "yes, that's easy" and then they go on and talk about something so boring again.

I'm certain that desk toys were invented solely for the purpose of keeping yourself awake and somewhat amused during a conference call. I do not have enough desk toys! Thankfully though I don't have to endure too many long winded conference calls. It seems after 6 hours of conversing with people, you'd think I have a significantly sized to-do list. It really only tops at about 10 items, only one involving some significant work. But in the end, I get to meddle around in the code and that's where I'm happy.