I was out this evening having a nice drink when I got a text in my phone.

“Hey, it’s me, the project manager who has a well established reputation for not respecting people’s personal time. Do you have time to get on a team call?”

I looked at my Old Fashioned between amused and annoyed, knowing fully well that this was a call that could wait until tomorrow or that he was looking for answers he could get from someone else. “No, I’m not home”, I finally answered after what must have been an agonizing five minutes for him. “Might get there an hour or two from now” and left it at just that. I had just paid my tab and knew fully well I’d be home within the next 10 minutes but I’d decided to be an asshole and see how he’d handle it. Ten minutes later I got up to go home, looked at my phone… and no answer.

I got home and didn’t head to open the work laptop. Instead, I opened a beer and started watching some TV. I checked my phone again and still no answer to my earlier response a solid forty minutes before. At this point I know that either: 1) it’s not really urgent 2) he’s fucking pissed I did not drop what I was doing for whatever he wanted 3) got some other poor schmuck into whatever panic call he wanted to do at that particular point of the evening and never bothered to tell me “we’re good, no worries”.

A bit over an hour later I logged on to the work laptop and checked the different chats going on. There had been clearly some activity to get status from people that were online around the time of the text message. A general status message had been sent a bit later by the project manager to the wider team. So that’s what he wanted me for. I see the project manager online. “Hey, I’m around now. What’s up”, I asked.

Ten full minutes pass and I finally get a “Oh, don’t need you. All good”, and nothing else. Just as I fucking thought. Dude tried to fuck my night just to get status about something and got it elsewhere.

Ten years ago I would have rushed home, or even worse, have him dial me in to the oh-so-important call. Now? Fuck that shit. Fuck that fucking shit. It’s never worth it.

Work will always take from you what you let it take. What I’m giving them is exactly the forty hours a week they pay me for. Want me to provide after hours coverage? Great, I’ll start working that day in the afternoon. If not possible I’ll be taking those extra hours off on Friday to have a long weekend. Looking for volunteers for the weekend? Make me, and if you do, bet your ass my next weekend starts Thursday. I’m not asking. I’m telling.

As for that guy, I hope I came across as someone who is not committed to go the extra mile and sears into his mind the fact that he doesn’t get to call me after hours.

That was the fucking idea.