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  • At the height of it I used to smoke about 15 ciggies during a normal working day, but most of the rest of the company seemed to smoke and so often we had impromptu meetings outside. It wouldn't be unusual to smoke 2 or 3 one after another whilst chatting to colleagues and/or more senior people. Can't think how many decisions were made standing in an archway cowering from the rain with a ciggie in hand. Then at 6pm the ashtrays would appear on the desks although I think that stopped somewhere around 2005 or so. The non-smokers would never say no (we did ask) but then I wonder how much of that was pressure from the senior people who wanted to smoke at their desk.

    Frequent breaks from a computer are a good thing. Despite not smoking for 15 years I still regularly get up from my desk for a 5 minute break at least every hour. It's amazing how much work your brain does subconsciously when it's not forced to look at the task at hand. Usually it's to top up water or get a fresh coffee.

    Whilst temping in a year off from University I remember working in a shipping company at a chemical depot. I never found the official smoking area (and might not have been able to use it as a temp) and going off and coming back on the site was a full 30 minute job so I just stopped smoking 9-6. (Illicit smoking on that site could have ended in a very large explosion.)

    Favourite office smoking room was one of the smoking rooms at Bell Labs in Murray Hill, NJ. Looked like it hadn't ever been cleaned and you could lose a finger in the gunk stuck to the walls. Amazingly comfy huge brown (naturally) leather chairs though.

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