Overworked is your middle name

In these troubled times, a man must do everything he can to keep his job lest he end up just another depressing statistic/exemplary member of a vibrant homeless community. Given how high the stakes are (trash as clothing is so 2001), it can be tempting to work your face off an effort to stay at the top of your boss's do-not-fire list. When you wake up under your desk at 3 AM covered in highlighter fluid, though, it's time to reassess your priorities; things have taken a bad turn. Sound familiar? Check our checklist to find out if it's time for a vacation.

You dream about your boss.
You know the dream. The one where you're in the shower, and suddenly your boss shows up and demands a rewrite of the report you submitted weeks ago. You flip out and reach for the nearest towel, but he (or, if you're lucky, she) takes no notice of the awkwardness of the situation and instead berates you for not using Times New Roman (Ed Note: Obey). Unless this dream turns into a hot fantasy involving soap on a rope and domination by a woman in a power position, you're in desperate territory. When even sleep isn't safe anymore, it's time to take a break.

Portions of your face twitch uncontrollably.
Once your friends start mistaking you for a stroke victim, you need to face the fact that you've been logging a few too many hours under the glowing light of the office fluorescents. At this point, your only options are to spend a week "working from home" or check yourself into a rehab facility, and until the 12 steps are covered by your crappy healthcare plan, it looks like you're in for five days of reality TV and mid-morning naps.

People have started to comment on your paper coffee-cup fortress.
Art is a valuable pursuit, but not when it's made out of moldy sandwich wrappers and taking over your workspace. It doesn't matter how many extra projects you complete ahead of schedule if you become the office hoarder by working so hard you're unable to dispose of your trash in a timely and civilized manner. Sure, every once in a while it's fun and healthy to work out your mental roadblocks with a little pencil architecture or stapler

Every conversation you have begins and ends with "at the office" or "while I was at work".
Just like nobody wants to talk to the guy who can't complete a sentence without mentioning his Warcraft avatar, the always-talking-about-work dude becomes the no-longer-has-friends dude faster than you can say "avatar". If your dinner companion's eyes glaze over every time you open your mouth, then you're well on your way to becoming a one-trick pony who is likely to find himself the proud owner of the loneliest fantasy football league.

You're more turned on by pivot tables than by the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders.
Yes, we know. It is super awesome when equations update themselves at alarming speeds, especially when it leads to a pat on the back from the boss and the possibility of a raise when the economy rebounds in 2011. But there is no excuse for letting work take the place of more earthly pleasures, even if it seems like The Most Important Thing Ever right now. Excel will never love you back the way you want it to, and it gets mad insecure when you dabble in Open Office. You don't need that kind of stress in your life.

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" Best Job in the World "

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Reuters - Winner of "The Best Job in the World" competition Ben Southall (L) of Britain carries his girlfriend …

Wed Jul 1, 5:36 am ET

SYDNEY (Reuters Life!) - It may sound like a paid holiday, but the winner of "best job in the world" said he intends to work hard promoting tourism to an Australian state as he set off for his first day in the office: a tropical island.

Briton Ben Southall flew out on Wednesday to Hamilton Island, in the Great Barrier Reef, to start his six-month caretaker duties, for which he will be paid A$150,000 ($121,000).

Southall, 34, was picked from 16 finalists in a highly publicised contest that was part of an innovative marketing campaign by Tourism Queensland which attracted almost 35,000 video entries from some 200 countries.

"Everyone's promoting this as the ultimate six month's hammock time," Southall told Australian media.

"To me and to the rest of Tourism Queensland we know that it's a job. We know it's a real position and there is a lot of hard work to come. I've got to be an ambassador for Queensland, selling it to the world."

Southall's duties include exploring the islands of the Great Barrier Reef and reporting back to Tourism Queensland and the world via blogs, a photo diary, video updates and interviews.

If he wants, he can also clean the pool and feed the fish.

Southall, accompanied by his girlfriend, said he was looking forward to living on a "nice piece of paradise," but added he would miss his mother's cooking.

"I probably will miss my mum's Sunday roasts, but I'm going to be learning new foods on the barbecue, I suppose," he said.

The "Best Job in the World" campaign began in January, and within days was one of the most popular items on the Internet, highlighting the marketing potential of social networking sites such as YouTube and Facebook.

Tourism Queensland hailed the advertising campaign as an enormous success, calculating the $1.7 million spent had reaped almost $200 million in global publicity.

The campaign also set a record at the Cannes International Advertising Festival in June when it took out an unprecedented three Grand Prix awards in recognition of the global media exposure it generated.

($1=1.240 Australian dollar)

(Writing by Miral Fahmy; Editing by Jerry Norton)

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Jobless rate jumps to 7.6%, 598,000 Jobs Lost

Jobless rate jumps to 7.6 percent, 598K jobs lost

By JEANNINE AVERSA, AP Economics Writer Jeannine Aversa, Ap Economics Writer 9 mins ago

WASHINGTON - Recession-battered employers eliminated 598,000 jobs in January, the most since the end of 1974, and catapulted the unemployment rate to 7.6 percent. The grim figures were further proof that the nation's job climate is deteriorating at an alarming clip with no end in sight.

The Labor Department's report, released Friday, showed the terrible toll the drawn-out recession is having on workers and companies. It also puts even more pressure on Congress and President Barack Obama's administration to revive the economy through a stimulus package and a revamped financial bailout plan, both of which are nearing completion.

The latest net total of job losses was far worse than the 524,000 that economists expected. Job reductions in November and December also were deeper than previously reported.

With cost-cutting employers in no mood to hire, the unemployment rate bolted to 7.6 percent in January, the highest since September 1992. The increase in the jobless rate from 7.2 percent in December also was worse than the 7.5 percent rate economists expected.

All told, the economy has lost a staggering 3.6 million jobs since the recession began in December 2007. About half of this decline occurred in the past three months.

"Companies are in survival mode and are really cutting to the bone," said economist Ken Mayland, president of ClearView Economics. "They are cutting and cutting hard now out of fear of an uncertain future."

Factories slashed 207,000 jobs in January, the largest one-month drop since October 1982, partly reflecting heavy losses at plants making autos and related parts. Construction companies got rid of 111,000 jobs. Professional and business services chopped 121,000 positions. Retailers eliminated 45,000 jobs. Leisure and hospitality axed 28,000 slots.

Those reductions swamped employment gains in education and health services, as well as in the government.

Just in the 12 months ending January, an astonishing 3.5 million jobs have vanished, the most on record going back to 1939, although the total number of jobs has grown significantly since then.

Employers are slashing payrolls and turning to other ways to cut costs - including trimming workers' hours, freezing wages or cutting pay - to cope with shrinking appetites from customers in the U.S. and overseas, who are struggling with their own economic troubles.

The average work week in January stayed at 33.3 hours, matching the record low set in December.

With no place to go, the number of unemployed workers climbed to 11.6 million.

Over the past 12 months, the number of unemployed has increased by 4.1 million, and the unemployment rate has risen by 2.7 percentage points.

Job hunters also are facing longer searches for work.

The average time it took for an unemployed person to find any job - full or part time - rose to 19.8 weeks in January, compared with 17.5 weeks a year ago, underscoring the increasing difficulty the out-of-work are having in finding a new job.

Workers with jobs saw modest wage gains.

Average hourly earnings rose to $18.46 in January, up 0.3 percent from the previous month. Over the year, wages have risen 3.9 percent.

An avalanche of layoffs is slamming the nation from a wide swath of employers.

Caterpillar Inc., Pfizer Inc., Microsoft Corp., Estee Lauder Cos., Time Warner Cable Inc., and Sprint Nextel Corp. are among the companies slicing payrolls. Manufacturers - especially car makers - construction companies and retailers have been particularly hard hit by the recession. Talbots Inc., Liz Claiborne Inc., Macy's Inc. and Home Depot Inc. are all cutting jobs. So are Detroit's General Motors Corp. and Ford Motor Co.

Americans cut back sharply on spending at the end of last year, thrusting the economy into its worst backslide in a quarter-century. The tailspin could well accelerate in the current January-March quarter to a rate of 5 percent or more as the recession drags on into a second year, and consumers and businesses burrow deeper.

Vanishing jobs and evaporating wealth from tanking home values, 401(k)s and other investments have forced consumers to retrench, which has required companies to pull back. It's a vicious cycle where the economy's problems feed on each other, perpetuating a downward spiral.

Many economists predict the current quarter - in terms of lost economic growth - will be the worst of the recession.

With fallout from the housing, credit and financial crises - the worst since the 1930s - ripping through the economy, analysts predict 3 million or more jobs will vanish this year even if lawmakers quickly approve Obama's stimulus plan, which has ballooned to more than $900 billion in the Senate.

Obama has repeatedly pressed Congress to swiftly enact a package of increased government spending, including big public works projects and tax cuts, to revive the economy and create jobs. He says his plan will save or create more than 3 million jobs in the next two years.

But the recession has proven stubborn. Despite record low interest rates ordered by the Federal Reserve and a raft of radical programs, including a $700 billion financial bailout, consumers and businesses face high hurdles to borrow money. Foreclosures are skyrocketing, home prices are sinking and Wall Street remains on edge.

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Job Losses

Report: New York to lead US cities in job losses

Sun Jan 18, 7:33 pm ET

NEW YORK - Only five metropolitan areas in the U.S. will escape job losses this year, according to a forecast released Saturday by the U.S. Conference of Mayors.

New York is expected to take the biggest hit as thousands of jobs are lost on Wall Street. Big financial firms are slashing workers as they cope with bad debt. Other companies have gone under, like Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., which filed for bankruptcy in September.

The New York area is expected to lose 181,000 jobs in 2009, the report said. Consulting company IHS Global Insight produced the report for the group.

The Los Angeles area is expected to see 164,000 lost jobs, in part because of the huge drop in home prices that has punctured the California economy.

After New York and Los Angeles, the Miami area is expected to see the greatest loss, with a decline of 85,000 jobs. Chicago and the surrounding area are next, with losses projected at 80,000.

Unemployment is expected to top 10 percent in 70 areas, from already hard-hit cities like Detroit and Cleveland to places that had until recently been prosperous like the Riverside-San Bernardino area in California. Other big cities like Denver and St. Louis are expected to see unemployment rise above 9 percent.

Ithaca, N.Y.; Fairbanks, Alaska; and St. George, Utah, are among the handful of the nation's 363 metropolitan areas expected to see employment remain flat or increase slightly.

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