Wow. This is my life.
If anything goes wrong, it’s 100% my responsibility and I’ll be the one catching hell, but it happens so rarely that I feel incredibly lucky in my job.
I still don’t like it, though. It has no fulfillment to it, no challenge, no real potential for learning or growing. Meh.
Could you figure out a way to do some sort of free-lance consulting BS from your current job? (No ones gotta know) Then perhaps you could be on the clock doubletime, or at least supplementing your income, while keeping yourself active and engaged.
Same deal here. Tapioca and I are pretty much neighbours. I spend quite a bit of time twiddling my thumbs waiting to solve the next management issue usually cause by upper level managers who ‘know better’ and ignore the culture or the circumstances under which we work. Other than acting as this interface (now if I could only figure out a way to apply my cultural learnings to my next job), I spend my time doing some minor administrative stuff, studying, and occasionally teaching (this function will increase quite a bit in the next while).
Where I work, we call this the “Golden Handcuff”.
I guess that’s the difference. While I have a great deal of time on my hands, I am still learning quite a bit in my job. If it were too easy and I wasn’t learning, I’d probably be less motivated. As it is, tickets vary greatly in difficulty so I get to learn more pretty much every day. Just… only for a few minutes a day. 
Hm. Yeah, I’m sure this is rough. But I must say this thread kinda reminds me of a bit of dialogue from Broadcast News, between William Hurt’s sleek newsreader Tom Grunick and Albert Brooks’s smart correspondent Aaron Altman:
Anyway, perhaps this thread would be better placed in MPSIMS, rather than the Pit?
Yes, the way things are going, that would seem to be the case. Moved.
I’ve got a job I hate that I can’t afford to quit, a job that uses none of my strengths, exposes all of my weaknesses, and bores the shit out of me. I’m swimming in debt from medical expenses (not my own), I hate my house, and I live in a cultural backwater.
I can’t be unemployed and I can’t start over in a field I actually give a damn about because I have a disabled dependent who needs all the cash I can rake in.
Rough? I don’t know. But it’s not where I wanted to be, that’s for certain.
I agree pretty much with this. I guess most folks would love to have jobs that not only paid well, but that were fun, exciting, stimulating, rewarding, etc. But I don’t know all that many people who find themselves in such positions. Hell, not too many people are able to find jobs like that that pay poorly!
Before you complain too much, think about how much worse things could be, instead of simply just complaining that things are not better. I know my attitude towards work often improves when I see laborers working, and I see how hard they bust their asses to make a fraction of what I make to sit on mine…
You might find your perspective improves if you examine your priorities and consider what you expect from your job. If you want your job to provide you considerable personal growth and fulfillment, then you are likely going to remain disappointed in your present position. However, if you view it as a means to an end, and think how your pay (and other possible amenities such as job security, benefits, vacation, flexible schedule, etc.) permit you to pursue other interests at home, with friends and family, wrt hobbies, you might appreciate what you’ve got.
It takes a degree of discipline (which I lack) to use downtime while at work productively. Depending on your work station you could read, journal, teach yourself a foreign language, exercise - the possibilities are considerable. Or you could hang out here with us!
Just FYI, jsgoddess, my comment was directed only at Lobsang. Your complaints don’t sound minor to me – they’re about more than just doing nothing and being paid ‘too well’. Not saying people in his shoes can’t complain, but those working their asses off for too little pay are probably gonna want to slap him upside his head.
In a totally nonviolent and nonPitworthy way, of course.
And on preview, I agree with those recommending finding outlets at work. I wrote a novel and an online drama series at one job back in the late 1990s, and despite that extra stuff kept getting promoted. Ah, those were the days!
You know, I’d completely understand if someone wanted to whap me upside the head, too.
It is a luxury to hate your job. I’m lucky to have mine.
I once had a job in a store in a mall that was going through a legally nasty bankruptcy. It was owned by a group of lawyers.
Several partners all owned the store, and all had different ideas of how the bankruptcy should procede. One INSISTED that the store stay open, another INSISTED that the stock be returned, or sold by sherriff’s auction, still another partner wanted to just close it down and let the auditors sort it out.
Other partners had waivering opinions.
The outcome was. I sat for 8 hrs a day in a store, that had no stock, no telephone and no electrical service, but WAS open. It was interesting when the odd curious person wondered in, and asked what we sold. “Nothing!” I would happily reply"Can I wrap that up for you?"
I wasn’t paid all that well, but it gave me plenty of time to study.
This lasted for nearly 4 moinths
Once in a LONG while, you just gotta love lawyers…
Regards
FML