Month: March 2019

The Things You Should Have Handy in Your Work Desk

I was inspired to write up something about useful items and supplies to have in your desk at work after I reached into mine earlier and found a few candy boxes given to me by my supervisor sometime around Christmas. Were these candy boxes useful to me? Well, not at first. But a few times when I’ve needed a burst in energy or simply found myself too hungry to focus on my work, I dug into them. So, yes, they were useful.

After digging around in my desk and asking a few of my coworkers what all they have in theirs that they find quite useful from time to time, I’ve come up with quite an interesting array of things that you may not have thought about for your desk.

Computer mouse

Don’t leave this thing out unless it’s connected to your computer and your company owns it. If it gets taken then or something is spilled on it, that’s up to the company to replace it. But if it’s yours (which mine most certainly is, because I’m picky about mine), I store it within my desk when it’s not in use. No reason to leave it out.

Pens and lined paper

Duh, right? Well, you’d be surprised how many people don’t have their own and have to ask coworkers for either of these items. There is such thing as keeping organized on your computer if you can manage all the documents, but sometimes good old pen and paper are just quicker, easier, and the way we’ve always done things.

Passwords

You’ll always be glad to have a small notebook or pad of index cards with your passwords on them. Obviously you were told when growing up to not make all of your usernames and passwords the same (and you probably still did it anyway). But some of yours will be work related where you didn’t create them. Some of them will be updated passwords with a different year. Some will be entirely different for whatever reason. There’s no way to remember them all without some form of tracking system, and this is one of the easiest and most useful ways to do it.

Snacks

Yes, I stole this one from my supervisor putting candy in my desk. Snacks are fine so long as they don’t melt to your inner desk. They’re quite handy in boosting your mood, quenching your appetite, and even giving you a bit of energy to get back at the job when you’re feeling drowsy or off. Why not, right?

Road Trips

I’m a big fan of road trips, and yet I’ve never actually gone on a real road trip myself. How is that possible?

Growing up, we’d make a 3-hour trip to St. Louis at least once a year to see the Cardinals play and visit the STL Zoo. I vividly remember those small little weekend excursions to the city. We would always pack up our suitcases, a few pillows to rest our heads on in the car, and whatever handheld video game system we had at the time (likely GameBoy Colors). And within the first 30 minutes, we would undoubtedly stop at some gas station for beef jerky, sodas, and candy boxes.

While I know I reminisce on the trips simply because I was young and innocent and with my parents, I really do know that I’d absolutely love to travel the US by car to invoke the same sense of childlike wonder and pure fun experienced riding in a car with friends. It would certainly help to be able to switch off driving with everyone, to the point that it wouldn’t be taxing for anyone to drive so long as we switched shifts often enough.

The other part about road tripping is how cost effective it can be with multiple people. If you’re taking a van or SUV with a few friends and everyone can fit their gear in, gas is split amongst the group, and so would camping costs if you pulled over at a KOA for the evening. From there, it’s just setting up camp, hanging out, sleeping, and getting on the road again.

While I may not opt to take some candy boxes along at this age, I definitely would still grab a few sticks of jerky along with a six pack for camping.

I know it’s cliche, but at some point I really have to take a trip out west with a handful of friends and just rough it for a week or two. It’s the best way to take on such a road trip, being able to stop anywhere you like, sightsee, camp anywhere, eat whatever, and honestly save a heck of a lot more money than if you were to do it with only one other person or if you were to fly to a specific spot.

The more I write about this, the more inspired I am to get something planned with a handful of friends for this summer. I know it’s not always easy for people to take off work at this age, but if we could make it work, it would be a trip of a lifetime.