"Hello, You've Reached the Winter of Our Discontent."

With all that has been written by me and others lately (I'd insert links but I just got home from the office and I still have deps to read over) about the source of Lawyers unhappiness I think it basically it all comes down to one thing. Billable hours. (I know I'm acting like I'm some existentialist genius for realizing this but hang in here with me).

Now, I'm not talking about the firm montra that you always need to be billing more, we all know when we get into this that the hours are insane. No, what I'm talking about is more the effect Billable hours have on your perception of time.

Who could ever enjoy themselves while living their life in 6 minutes intervals in which they stress out about things that in the grand scheme of things aren't even important and then documenting those 6 minute intervals only to then later type the 6 minute intervals into a computer? When you get to the point where you're upset you "wasted" 6 minutes if you were at the office and didn't bill something isn't it a bit depressing? Shouldn't you allow yourself some time which is just for you everyonce and awhile?

Sadly, while I recognize the problem and how it's starting to effect me, I'm still a slave to the firm and I'm about to start reading deps because I'm missing work Monday for surgery and possibly Tuesday and I want to get a small jump on my February billing.