10 signs you've been working from home for too long

"We've acquired a lot of baggage in our two years of WFH." Photo / Getty Images

Two years ago working from home orders were issued and it became the new "normal". But doesn't it simultaneously feel more like 63-years? It's remarkable how time sighs when you're limited to government-sanctioned fun.

That fateful day two years ago, people packed up their offices and moved to what was then mainly just a human resources acronym: WFH. And 730 days later, they're still at it.

It is beginning to show – but not in the ways it used to. Telling yourself it is fine to have a mimosa for breakfast as a reward for getting past Monday, or answering Zoom calls wearing nothing other than a large bib with the outlines of a shirt and tie drawn on to it, was lockdown behaviour.

In March 2022, the signs you've been WFH for too long are much subtler. More profound. Sadder, really. If any of the below affects you, please send a Microsoft Teams request to your HR adviser, who won't be able to speak to you anyway, because she's in a different timezone and you've never met her or her seven predecessors.

1. You were actually recalled to the office eight months ago but, having completely forgotten where it was, haven't even attempted to return – save for that one day when you spent nine hours walking between every business park in the area and asking the receptionist, "Is this where I do the typing and the calling and the meeting for the moneys?"

"Oh Clarence, just Google it!" friends at home insist when you explain the situation as if you're somehow thick. But how are you expected to do that when you can't even remember the company name, eh? Idiots.

2. You greet Mostafa, the courier delivery driver who is one of 19 that serve your postcode on random rotation, thus:

"Mosteopath, you absolute legend! Very fine win at the weekend was it not? How are the kids – has Scarlet's rosacea cleared up yet? Oh the poor thing, it can hang around. Listen, we must have you and Jane over for a midweek risotto or Friday curry at some point. Got time for a beverage now, in fact? We haven't yet discussed Sunday's Peaky and if it's anything like the last series, you and I are going to have very terse differences of opinion about Stephen Knight's narrative arcs! Ha, OK bye."

3. You greet your old deskmate of eight years, Joanna, the godmother of your eldest son, who still works with you but you don't speak to more than once a fortnight on the phone, thus:

"Um, hello… female colleague. Say, it's nice to catch up with you. Sorry, how do I do this? OK I'm done. Bye."

4. You once interrupted a high-level Zoom meeting with a potential client "to see to an urgent problem at home". The urgent problem in question was that somebody in your street Whatsapp group had posted the words, "Anybody got any semolina?" But you would die for Ethel at No. 24 at this point, so had no real choice.

5. You long ago appointed your 4-year-old lurcher, Linda Barker, to the position of associate transformation officer (culture), making a full business case and salary request with your superiors in the process, just to have somebody to celebrate payday and moan about the bosses with. On the 30th of every month, you have a beer with lunch, Linda has an ice cube, then you shoot the breeze. "Rough month. Janet was a real bitch in the town hall, right L?" What you like about Linda is that she really listens.

6. You briefly have an anxiety attack about whether Linda will make a formal complaint against you for saying "rough" and "bitch" in her presence, as these are offensive terms to her kind and you are not au fait with the sensitivities of office politics in 2022. It was careless and you will take some learnings.

7. You have started referring to face-to-face meetings as "3D, multisensory Zoom chats", even if it's a pub lunch.

8. You're utterly at a loss as to why the producers on Mastermind rejected your first choice specialist subject of "Changes to the bin days (general waste, recycling and compost) in streets under the Town Council jurisdiction 2020-2022." You're even more at a loss as to why they rejected your second choice, "My own kitchen, spice cupboard excluded."

9. On days you are in the office, you connect your smart doorbell up to your second monitor, because once a Neighbourhood Watch officer, always a Neighbourhood Watch officer. Also to see if Mostafa is around.

10. You recently found yourself saying the sentence, "Yeah, I can understand all the stuff about defiance and rhetoric, but the thing I most admire about Volodymyr Zelenskyy is actually that he's always down there on Zoom, but he manages to change his T-shirt every few days" out loud.