WhaHappen?

Sometimes we just need to look beyond the dull routine of going to work and dealing with the same people, day in/day out. Mix it up and take in the details; find subtle similarities in objects, situations and people. Look at your surroundings with fresh eyes and the world might appear a little more colorful, musical and entertaining.

Look to the sky for inspiration. Remember when clouds looked like something other than an indication of whether we need to grab an umbrella? When we were kids we could easily point out which one looked like a whale, a heart, a face. It’s like Mother Nature using cloud play-doh and showing off different shapes just to amuse us. Keep an eye out for them and start a photo collection. Here’s a perfect photo of the night sky’s smiley face.

If you don’t get to spend much time outside trying to mentally morph clouds into recognizable objects, then this is what you can do in the office: Pretend your work environment is a sitcom. This worked great for me at my last job. My daily experience was a cross between the humorous detective squad room banter of Barney Miller and the prank-filled absurdity and human drama mix of M*A*S*H. Think about which TV show most resembles your worklife. Download and save the theme song from that show; that way you can start and end your workday hearing it. (Preview it here at Amazon: All-Time Top 100 TV Themes)

And speaking of theme songs, everyone should have their own personal theme music. There are people I know who clearly should have theme music playing as they walk by. Some people just drip hip, so for them I’m thinking Mims’ “This is Why I’m Hot!”

My own theme song is Swing Out Sister’s “Am I The Same Girl.”

Another thing that’s entertaining is to spontaneously sing apropos lyrics. In other words, breaking out into a song to match the moment. For example, in a crowd – I might want to sing Stealers Wheel “Stuck in the Middle”.

And as I’ve mentioned before, I can’t help but notice when regular mortals resemble celebrities. So I’ve asked my co-workers which actors would play them in a sitcom. I worked with someone who was a dead ringer for David Bowie. Another guy insisted that he be played by Denzel Washington, but everyone else agreed that he was Cuba Gooding Jr. material. I want Lucy Liu to play me on my imaginary sitcom, even though I don’t look like her.

Lucy Liu

DEFINITELY not Lucy Liu

It’s also fun to pretend to have an accent. I once asked my co-workers to speak to me with a British accent for the day. (I love the British folks and all things U.K., by which I mean Jason Statham). Popular accents in the U.S. to mimic are: Boston, New York, Texas and California (? – hey man, like, what accent, you know, like dude I dunno whatcha talkin’ ’bout). I picked up the following video from Jon Brown’s blog 1000 Tiny Things I Hate. The post is titled “LAUNCHING INTO AN ACCENT MIDWAY THROUGH AN ANECDOTE, REMEMBERING YOU’RE NOT VERY GOOD AT ACCENTS, THEN SLOWLY ABANDONING IT”

Try any variation of these tactics to make the day a little more interesting. It’s a habit now to match theme music to certain people, so every time I see them I hear the appropriate song in my head as they walk by.

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