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Coffee Break: Printable WiFi Password Sign


Something I've been meaning to do forEVER is create a cute little framed picture for guests that has the WiFi password on it, and this $2 option from Etsy shop Wander Print Creations looks fabulous (and is priced right so you can change it as needed).

I could see it working with a variety of frames and general decor, also.

It's $2 at Etsy.

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157 Comments

  1. I read Princess in Theory over the weekend- so cute! I also read Happily Ever After Playlist, which I loved. What uplifting/fun/happily ever after books have you read recently? I’m leaning in hard to up lit/romance books because everything feels miserable.

    1. I read Evie Drake Starts Over awhile back, which was cute. Also got a kick out of The Unhoneymooners. I’m sure if you are into cute romances you have tried the Jasmine Guillory books (The Wedding Date series). If not, try those, with the caveat that I could not get into the last one, Royal Holiday, but enjoyed the others. If so and you like them, her newest book is coming out in a couple weeks and sounds like what you are looking for!

      1. I love her books! I also liked The Unhoneymooners and her new book, Honey Don’t List.

      2. Have any of you read Beach Read by Emily Henry? It was recently recommended to me, and I am considering it on audiobook.

      3. Reposting due to nesting fail above.

        Have any of you read Beach Read by Emily Henry? It was recently recommended to me, and I am considering it on audiobook.

        1. It’s on my wish list! I hadn’t thought of getting it on audio but I like that idea

          1. I’m going to pull the trigger. Julia Whelan is narrating, and I find her voice very soothing.

    2. I got it too! Haven’t finished it yet but I already checked out the next two from the library. It’s been ages since I read a modern romance and it’s delightful.

      1. I am SO into modern romances, and diverse modern romances! I also liked her Civil War book, A Civil Union.

    3. I love this thread! I just finished the happy ever after playlist too! I really liked it and bought the authors first book called The Friend Zone (focuses on the character of Kristen from Happy Ever After Playlist I believe). Haven’t read it yet though.

      I also LOVE Jasmine Guillory’s work. I would start from her first book The Wedding Date and go from there! I also just read Evvie Drake Starts Over and enjoyed that as well (actually listened to that one on audiobook and it was good in that format)!

      Curious to hear others suggestions as I love this genre and want to keep this going but with more BIPOC authors!

      2. I LOVED Friend Zone. They’re standalone novels, but so you know Friend Zone occurs before the events in Happily Ever After Playlist.

        Right Swipe and its sequel, Girl Gone Viral are both written by a South Asian former lawyer. I LOVED them.

        Get a Life, Chloe Brown is written by a black author and I really liked it. There’s a sequel coming out in the next couple of weeks.

        I just read The Boyfriend Project by Farrah Rochon and didn’t love it, but others seem to like it so it might be worth a try. I found the writing really cliched, which is saying a lot for a romance novel. ;)

        I haven’t read it but The Worst Best Man was written by a WOC. So was Recipe for Persuasian. So was Pride Prejudice and Other Flavors. So Was Intercepted and its sequels.

        I also liked Stories for Punjabi Widows, written by a South Asian woman who lives in Singapore. She also recently wrote The Unlikely Adventures of the Shergill Sisters.

        If you want other diversity in romance:
        – The Kiss Quotient and its sequel is written by an Asian author with ASD (formerly known as Asperger’s)
        – When Kate Met Cassidy is a lesbian contemporary romance
        – Red White and Royal Blue is a gay contemporary romance

        In terms of other diverse novels that are pretty light, the Perveen Mistry series is about the first female solicitor in India.

        1. Sloan, if you are really into light and romance right now, in my search for some of the books you just recommended, I just learned of Audible Escape. First month is currently free and then $6.95 if you already have audible. Appears to be unlimited romance and feel good books. Maybe you already know about this and I have been living under a rock, but for a prolific reader, if you enjoy audio books, this seems like like a great deal on the surface.

          1. I like the idea of Audible Escape! I read faster than I can listen, so I end up buying (tons of Kindle sales on romance) or checking out, but for longer books it’s great.

    4. My #1 recommendation for romantic escapism, is Rebekah Weatherspoon’s Rafe: A Buff Male Nanny. I describe it as pure wish fulfillment for exhausted professional women. It’s a romance about a high-achieving Black surgeon and single mom of twins with a crappy ex-husband who reluctantly hires a buff, tattooed, and highly recommended biker/nanny to look after her girls. It’s low on conflict, sure – the biggest issues are around the fact that he works for her and that he is over-protective in dealing with her ex and has to learn to respect her boundaries – but it’s well-written, has funny and well-developed secondary characters, and you know, sometimes you just need an uncomplicated and soothing read.

      She worries about whether he’ll be intimidated by her career, but he isn’t, because he’s secure in his masculinity and his passion for caring for kids! She doesn’t know if he’ll know how to care for her Black daughters’ hair (he’s white) but he was actually raised by a Black stepmother, acquired his child-rearing skills by looking after his little half-sisters and has mad hair-care skills! What if he can’t cook? Oh, of course he can cook!

      Is it all a little unrealistic? Sure. Are you actually reading a book called Rafe: A Buff Male Nanny? Yes, you are. But it’s good, escapist, very NOT clean fun.

    5. Jenny Colgan’s newest book just came out a couple of weeks ago! I started it last night and intend to finish it before I go to sleep tonight. She’s one of my favourites. Mhairi McFarlane’s books are great too.

    6. I liked The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion, and I second the rec for Evvie Drake Starts Over (first recommended by someone else here)

    7. I just finished reading the Crazy Rich Asians trilogy, and it was the perfect read for right now. Totally light and frothy!

    8. Sweet Magnolias on Netflix is the show equivalent of uplifting/cute/happy books. It’s only 10 episodes, so it’s a nice short escape. I started watching it this week and highly recommend for something sweet and distracting.

  2. Decorating with words, even for something functional, is still a hard nope from me. l fully recognize that I’m the curmudgeon on this though.

    1. Is it bothering anyone else that the wording on this isn’t centered? And also overlaps the border?

        1. Or for $0 you could go download some clip art and make it yourself and center it! These aren’t even physical signs they’re selling, they’re just PDF files with editable form fields.

      4. I don’t think this is an actual photograph of the printed product. A lot of illustrations of custom-printed things on Etsy are photoshopped.

    2. this is cute and I would find the energy to do this if I had a lot of guests, or if I rented out an Airbnb maybe. In real life, I have this info handwritten on an ugly conference notepad.

        1. +1 I work in cybersecurity and we have a printed sign with our home wifi password in our guest bedroom. We’re giving the password to guests anyway, so I don’t see the harm in having it written down. Normally the concern with putting something in writing is that it might be lost in a public space but a) this wifi sign definitely never leaves our house and b) even if it did, and someone found it on the street, it would be meaningless, since it doesn’t have the network name and you have to be in close physical proximity to our house to use our wifi. And our wifi password isn’t used for anything else and can easily be changed if we have any issues with anyone gaining access to it improperly.

      2. I work on the basis that writing stuff like this down on paper is about a million times safer than storing it in my phone somewhere. (That said, I now do the latter… whoops.)

      3. What makes me scream are these impossible to memorize and difficult to type WiFi passwords. It is not that big a favor to display in a frame when I have to type it 5 times on an ios device that doesn’t even have a “display characters” option.

        1. Yes. You can make secure passwords that don’t look like they were generated by a cat landing on your keyboard.

          There was a joke going around about a woman who saw a requirement for a password to have at least seven characters, so she wrote something like MickeyMinneyGoofyDopeyDocSneezyGrumpy, and it’s like… that’s actually a very secure password!

    5. Welcome to our home, we’re so glad you could come over. Now, please get on the wifi and don’t talk with us. Glass of wine with your internet?

      2. We live in a place with terrible cell phone reception. When we have friends over, I usually mention this to them and offer our wifi password, especially if they have children who might be home with a babysitter, so that they don’t miss a call or text that might be an emergency at home. Just offering another perspective.

        1. +1. We have everyone who visits our house connect to our WiFi when they come in because cell service is so terrible (on all the major networks) where we are. If people aren’t on the wifi they will miss calls and texts.

  3. I posted last week about a thank you gift idea for a friend who is helping me move furniture. I was going to do a bottle of wine, but I just learned that she is not drinking any alcohol right now. Food and restaurant gift cards are also out. Any other ideas? I’m looking in the $20-$30 range.

    2. That’s way too much of a gift for moving some furniture unless you’re talking about a dramatic, hours-long process. I would feel embarrassed if someone gave me a $30 gift for moving a dresser from one room to another.

      1. It will be an hours long process and I can guarantee she will not be embarrassed. She is a good friend and we are going through tough times. It’s okay to lift someone’s spirits.

        1. Try including context if you want good advice. You’re also overthinking this massively. Buy some flowers, chocolate, or write a handwritten note and call it a day.

        2. I don’ t think flowers and a note are appropriate here. I would do something like a spa set or candles or some Audible credits or a combination to suggest you are thanking the hard work with a relaxation gift.

    4. In this situation I would welcome a potted plant, nice candle, or bag of good coffee. Or a book, or bookstore gift card as Sloan Sabbith suggests.

    5. Trader Joe’s – a potted orchid (one of the big ones) and a box of sea salt chocolate caramels.

      And the only time someone helped me move (it was a last minute help-me-pack before my cross country moving truck arrives in 8 hours oh my god….), I gave my dear friend the additional gift of anything that I discovered I no longer wanted (if she wanted it) and things that were not allowed on the moving truck. So my friend was thrilled to get all of my alcohol, cleaning supplies, lots of food, and random things like my home waxing kit.

      And this is only something you should get away with in your 20’s, if you really can’t afford to hire movers. I was a broke grad student.

  4. Since I’m going to be WFH fo quite awhile, I’m looking for an office chair to use on a carpeted floor. Doesn’t need to roll. I just need something more comfortable than the horrible wood chair I’m using, preferably with some back support. Looking to spend under $100. Thanks!

    1. I just bought a “gamer” chair from a major retailer. It was $120 on sale and it is a rather hideous color but it is shockingly comfortable.

      1. +1 to gamer chairs. Designers and decorators would definitely not approve, but I noticed a huge, positive difference in the way my body felt after using one.

  5. Hi imaginary internet friends,
    I know sometimes we have shared blogs we like. I’ve been very into (literal) gardening lately and stumbled upon a blog called The Art of Doing Stuff whole looking for tomato staking advice. It’s a very detailed DIY blog about all kinds of things – lots of gardening but also chicken keeping, cooking, and building stuff.

    I really like all of her advice so far, and she is hilarious as a bonus, so I highly recommend.

          1. Did you get “frozen yogurt tampon” as the suggested video? I just watched that and was LOLing at my desk.

    2. I love this:

      “ By the end of the summer you’ll have straight, tall tomatoes which get a lot of air circulation and a lot of sun. They’ll be bald at the bottom and producing healthy tomatoes at the top.

      Hypothetically of course.

      Because this is gardening and all hell could break loose at any moment. A wild band of twirling goats or screaming aphids could come barreling through your garden destroying everything in its wake.

      You just don’t know.”

      https://www.theartofdoingstuff.com/turns-im-never-really-satisfied-anything-including-tomatoes/

    3. She’s brilliant. I found her blog around the time I found this one, so eight years ago? Nine? Go back through the archives. So much to read!

  6. Curious for thoughts on this. I’m involved in publicizing something in my organization that was named after a prominent African American woman. The name was selected quite a while ago. I’ve been copied on multiple email threads in the last few days discussing how this is a great time to be publicizing the choice of the name. All the people involved in the naming decision and the publicity, including me, are white. To me it feels extremely tone deaf and cringey and has a vibe of “who cares that police are shooting unarmed black people, we’re naming this [fairly unimportant thing] after a black woman!” But maybe I’m overreacting?

    1. I think if you say “this initiative was named after ___, the first African American woman to ___,” without much additional fanfare, that would be educational but not performative.

      1. Yes, it will be written as you suggest, not trying to tie it to current events at all. I wasn’t suggesting we not publicize the initiative, which is moving forward and needs to be publicized, it’s more just that seeing a bunch of white people gleefully crowing about how this is such a GREAT time for us to be naming something after a black woman feels extremely gross to me.

          1. It is okay to do good things but if this thing is the only thing the organization (and this group of white people) is doing to be anti-racist, it is woefully inadequate and you will likely get called on it.

        2. I think you’re feeling embarrassed because you’re an all white group, and rightly so, even if you’re doing good works. You should take your internal discomfort as a sign that you need to do more diversity recruiting in order to have a group that more fairly represents society at large.

      2. I’d add some info about when this decision was made so it does not look like you are trying to profit off of suffering. I understand the concern.

        Maybe [Organization] is pleased to announce that in February, the Board of Directors unanimously voted to change the name of [old name] building to [new name] building.

    2. I’d be the voice right now recommending that your company be extremely savvy about anything you say publicly. I’m really skeptical about companies jumping on bandwagons right now.

  7. Where do you all go for analysis about finance/the market? I’m interested in websites, podcasts, anything.

    Reports are stating that we’ve been in recession since February. I would have expected March, when the shutdowns started! I want to learn more.

    1. Since working from home, my husband has taken to recording/watching “Halftime Report” on cnbc. You have to keep in mind that the analysts on this show are holding a specific position in stocks and want that position to do well and make money for them/their investors. However, I occasionally watch with him during our “lunch break” and it’s actually refreshing to hear a semi-intelligent debate happening on TV.

    2. I subscribe to and really like the Seeking Alpha daily newsletter. It’s super digestible with one-paragraph current economic and finance event summaries, links, and market data. I almost always read the whole thing.

    3. Money Stuff by Matt Levine is the greatest. Like I love it so, so much. He’s brilliant.

  8. Just two things I thought readers might appreciate – as we were getting dressed this morning, my in house lawyer husband made a high sigh and said, “I miss wearing suits and ties.” So, it’s not just us ladies that miss getting dressed up!
    Two, as people do start to return to work, for any people in your life who want a cloth face mask but don’t want any overly design-y one, the website Proper Cloth has masks in basically dress shirt material (they appear to have two very odd looking patterns, but the other ones are plain material). My husband’s arrived this weekend and he’s a big fan. I plan on getting my (very conservative dresser) dad one for Father’s Day.

    1. “As much as I hate working at home, I think that working in a shared indoor space is the most dangerous thing we do,” said Sally Picciotto of the University of California, Berkeley, one of the 18 percent of respondents who said they expected to wait at least a year before returning to the office.”

      Can someone send this to my boss, who is desperate to get us all back ASAP?

      1. Not an expert, but it seems like a pretty logical take to me. I know coronavirus is more infectious than flu, but I have never gotten flu from an airplane or a grocery store or a shopping mall. I have gotten flu from my co-workers multiple times.

      2. I’m waiting for the moment when bosses say, “hmm, all the work got done while everyone was working from home, and we pay $xxxxxxxx in rent on the office building every month. Maybe we should rethink that.”

        That actually happened at my old company. The managers in their 60s didn’t believe anyone would actually work from home. The managers in their 40s wanted to offer more flexibility to attract talent. So we compromised on a 1 day per week WFH plan (for employees who had been there at least 6 months and had “meets expectations” or higher performance review ratings), and it went so well that when the CEO asked for ideas on how to save on real estate costs, our 60 something manager suggested cube sharing and office sharing, where each person in a share worked 50% from home. They’re still doing it 5 years later and it’s working well. Some staff they wanted to keep needed to move away from the area, and they’ve let them work 100% remote. This would have been absolutely unheard of 5 years prior.

        I expect most companies are going to see the light on this. Commercial real estate is incredibly expensive and it’s going to become really obvious to companies that they don’t need to spend that much.

        Here in CA a lot of employers were pushing for people to return, then the governor made a law that said anyone positive for COVID would be presumed to have caught it from work if they were required to work at a workplace rather than at home, and it was therefore covered by workers’ compensation. Suddenly many of those same employers shut up about their employees returning!

        1. I agree, this is the most logical way forward. All of these partial occupancy plans are so silly and convoluted. Why do I need to be in the office just so I can videoconference with the half of my team that’s WFH that day?

          1. +1 I prefer the office but I really don’t get the utility of being in the same building if we still aren’t able to be in the same room

          2. My office is allowing people to come in, but there aren’t any in person meetings allowed. So you STILL have to video call colleagues, even next door.

        2. It’s already happening! I work at a university, so it’s not so much that we would give up the space (we own the land) but more that office buildings would be repurposed into other things. My department has already been switched permanently to WFH so our office space can be used for other things (in the short term, student housing as they try to reduce the population density in the dorms, but in the long run probably other things). It’s very weird. I liked WFH when it was a privilege, but now that I don’t have an office space to go to at all I really miss it :/

        3. From my office window, I can see two new office building towers being built. By my company. As our new headquarters. We won’t be working at home.

      3. This is what I think b/c when you are inside, you are breatheing other people’s breathe, so if there is Corona in their breathe, you are breatheing it in if you are close to them. In our office, there is air condition that works in the summer, so my Dad says he wants the manageing partner to have the building install a HEPA filter in our office to make sure it filters out the Corona Virus. The manageing partner says since we work in a tall building, the ENTIRE building has to be retrofitted to install HEPA filters, b/c our air gets mixed w/other people’s air b/f it goes out the roof. The landlord said he will need to pass along those costs to the tenant’s, but it is worth it. I recomend other lawyers make sure they have HEPA filters in their offices unless they just want to work at home. FOOEY on that! My home is for ME, not for work, unless all I have to do is bill my cleint’s. That I can do from home. YAY!!!

  10. Does anyone have any favorite eyebrow pencils? Boy Brow just highlights my sparse eyebrows, and smudges in heat. TIA!

    1. I’ve been pleasantly surprised with the e.l.f. brow gel. I’m a sweaty person and I haven’t found it smudgy, though I do use a setting spray.

        1. The e.l.f. brow pencil *is* pretty decent, however. Especially for the price. I haven’t noticed any smudging (though admittedly I haven’t used it much recently, since I basically never leave my house.) Anastasia is good as well, but not *so* much better that it’s really worth the additional cost, IMO.

    4. I use an Urban Decay double-ended one and like it a lot. One side is a primer that fluffs up a bit.

    5. Trish McEvoy makes a really nice retractable brow pencil with a really sturdy spoolie on the other end. I’ve tried and failed to find a cheap dupe and have concluded that this is just one of life’s little luxuries.

      1. I’ve heard it’s a dupe for the Anastasia Brow Wiz, although I can’t confirm, having never tried the Anastasia.

    7. I love ColourPop Brow Boss pencil, they are about $5 each. This is a twist-up pencil, has spoolie on the other end.

      On the spendier side I love the Chanel brow pencil (has spoolie) and Jane Iredale pencil (no spoolie), both of which require sharpening with sharpener.

    8. Actually pretty happy with my $3 ELF one, which doesn’t smudge and comes with a spoolie.

  11. I have signed up for the vaccine trials here in the UK. They’re prioritising healthcare staff (more likely to benefit plus more likely to come into contact with the virus and therefore test the vaccine) but I hope I get picked to take part. It includes an antibody test and then if I don’t have antibodies the ‘control’ is a different vaccine that I didn’t get as a teenager (it wasn’t yet standard but they made it standard for 18 year olds a few years after I was 18).

    2. I would do that in a heartbeat. Thanks for volunteering, and let us know if you’re chosen!

    3. I hope the Oxford vaccine makers will consider trials in the US or Brazil. My understanding is that the situation in the UK is getting under control enough that there may not be clear evidence of the vaccine working or not working (because even in the placebo group, not enough people will catch the virus).

    4. I think this is my brain being slow today but I’m not understanding this: “the ‘control’ is a different vaccine that I didn’t get as a teenager (it wasn’t yet standard but they made it standard for 18 year olds a few years after I was 18).” Could someone explain? (Or, for the redditors in the group–ELI5? ;) )

      1. I assume it’s double-blind, so they need to give a shot of some kind to the control group, and rather than injecting something inactive they decided to give a vaccination that a fair number of the population might not have so there would be some utility even to the control group.

        1. Seems like adding another variable in there (the different vaccine) would make it impossible to tell the actual effects of the new vaccine.

          1. The control vaccine is proven to be safe and they have good data about what (if any) minimal adverse effects it has. You can’t just give someone an injection of saline because they wouldn’t have the arm soreness you get with a normal vaccine. The whole point of controlled trials is that people can’t know which group they’re in, because it might affect their behavior and thus the results (eg., if people knew they got a placebo they might be more likely to stay home).

          2. They could easily give them an immunologically inert solution that still has arm burn. The preservatives in hydroxocobalamin burn a lot like a vaccine, for example.

      2. I am guessing that this is an attempt to improve recruitment by providing a benefit to volunteers who get randomized to the control group. “You will either get the investigational COVID-19 vaccine or another vaccine that will benefit you” is probably more enticing than “You will either get the investigational COVID-19 vaccine or a placebo.”

      3. Normally for a double-blind trial you’d use a placebo. They’ve decided, instead of giving a vaccine of nothing (because unlike a pill you can’t inject sugar into people) to give the Meningitis ACWY jab. This became standard for people starting university when I was halfway through my studies – but I never got it. I’m now unlikely to need it as that kind of meningitis tends to be caught most often by people living in crowded conditions (e.g. students) and I live alone, but it still feels like a win-win to get either the Covid jab or a jab that I missed out on getting as a teenager.

        The idea is that they then compare the % of the group who get the Covid vax and later contract Covid with the % of the group who get the Meningitis vax and later contract Covid. If the percentage in the latter group is significantly higher (and the make-up of the the two groups is the same), boom, proof that the Covid vax is (a bit/ quite/ very) effective.
        They’ll be using serological tests throughout the study period to find out if subjects have contracted Covid.

        One of the reasons for prioritising healthcare workers is to increase the likelihood that they come into contact with the virus – so it’s not quite a ‘challenge’ trial but it’s a similar idea. That said, although the situation in the UK looks under control right now (especially in Scotland where we have had two consecutive days of 0 days) the virus looks like it’s back in London already – not a surprise after the VE Day parties and the crowded beaches on May weekends. (And Cummingsgate).

        1. The Oxford vaccine makers have announced that its now only 50-50 whether there will be enough cases to test the vaccine. https://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-disappearing-so-fast-oxford-vaccine-has-only-50-chance-of-working-11993739
          I didn’t say the UK has eliminated the virus or even close, but it takes a pretty significant degree of community spread to really test it. A vaccine trial in NYC in March would have clearly given results. It’s unclear if a vaccine can really be tested in most of the US and UK now. We will see. I certainly hope for definitive positive results, but I’m not optimistic.

          1. Oops this was supposed to be a reply to the person at 4:26 saying the UK doesn’t have COVID under control.

        2. You can inject inert substances into people, I promise! This seems sketchy to me as study design.

      4. Thank you, all, for the explanations … somehow I couldn’t get my brain around the idea of adding in another variable for no reason related to the study at hand. And it does seem like it might be problematic but I’m not a scientist, so, I’ll let the scientists figure that out!

    1. This is good news, but they are only talking about people (children and young adults, especially) who will remain asymptomatic or develop extremely mild illness (like common cold symptoms). So called “pre-symptomatic” spread (in people who will get more seriously ill) is definitely possible and has been well-documented.

      1. I guess…it just made me think of how much people sacrificed under the belief that asymptomatic spread was a serious concern. We already knew about those who would get more seriously ill, but I’m thinking of how much serious economic damage occurred because people were afraid that this could infect a large segment of the population (which I don’t think those are predisposed to become seriously ill are). I’m also a leeeetle curious about the timing…so this is suddenly not as much of an issue RIGHT around when protests are happening?

        *adjusts tin foil hat*

        2. There’s a huge difference between mild symptoms and no symptoms. Easy to say “I just have mild cold symptoms, not covid symptoms” and that would drive infection

        3. We didn’t know at the time. We had to assume that even asymptomatic people could be carriers until we could show otherwise. It sounds like we’ve now had time to gather information and can more confidently say that asymptomatic (not pre-symptomatic) people don’t spread it.

          And we couldn’t tell who was asymptomatic or pre-symptomatic, until, you know, some gets sick and then it’s too late. So there’s that.

        4. Yep, you’ve got a tin foil hat all right. Of course it continues to be an issue even amidst the protests. Public health officials aren’t too happy about the protests from a public health standpoint. You know that.

    2. I already saw on Twitter there were errors in this article and they are already walking it back.

  13. Ladies with advisory practices, how do you make it work? My midsize regional firm holds itself out as having dedicated, separate litigation and advisory attorneys, but I’m learning everyone does some litigation. About 60% of my work is advisory (specialty area that’s fairly broad; think trusts and estates, corporate governance, employment, etc.). The other 40% is from me getting pulled into general litigation matters. The entire firm knows I don’t want to litigate- go to court OR motion practice- but more senior partners either keep coming back (“I know you don’t want to do this, but”) or clients ask other partners to staff me on the matter.

    I’m a junior partner and technically have authority to say no to work. I want to start saying “no” to litigation entirely and if a client begs, I’ll advise/review but want out of wading through discovery or researching MSJs. Does this sound realistic? How can I make this happen?

    1. You make it happen by building up your business in advising so you aren’t saying no because you don’t want to you’re saying no because you don’t have time.

      1. +1. If you don’t have enough work to keep you busy and are turning down litigation, it could become an issue. Coudl you find some area of specialization (e.g., writing briefs or become an expert in one particular subject where you’d right that section of a brief) so that it’s not a flat “I don’t do litigation” but more that you’re the expert in X (and don’t get sent to argue piddly discovery motions.)

  14. Curious what everyone thinks will happen to major cities if most companies move to 100% remote. I think a lot of us enjoy WFH life, but what about our downtowns? The structure of our cities? I’m picturing the downtown of my city the way it was on Sundays in the Before Times—kind of eerie, lots of empty buildings and not much else going on. If it’s going to be like that moving forward and no one will be there to populate the high-rises and eat at the Sweetgreens, what happens to all those spaces? Do they turn into residential buildings? Do cities start to restructure themselves without a true downtown?

    1. I really hope this doesn’t happen, I think having vibrant downtowns is important. But yeah, those retailers that rely on foot traffic from office workers are scr3wed.

    2. I think everything gets less expensive. It’s not going to be empty storefronts and unoccupied office buildings, but the rent on everything – restaurants, luxury apartments, normal apartments, office buildings, shopping malls – will drop until it hits an equilibrium point. Plenty of people will still want to live in a big city, will have to go into the office, or will want the flexibility of being in the city in case they take a job that requires them to be in the office.

      Most likely, companies will not move to 100% remote. They’ll want a base of operations and people will need to come in who can’t do their jobs remotely. Even ‘remote’ workers might come into the office on occasion. True remote workers might fly in every few months.

      1. +1 – 100% remote isn’t going to happen. People aren’t doing this by choice, and some of this is only working b/c everyone IS working remotely. We probably will end with more people able to work remotely, but it won’t be 100%

    3. Unpopular opinion here, I think, but I don’t think 100% remote is going to happen. There’s actually been a pretty big backlash to it within my company, because a lot of people are parents with no childcare and so are (understandably) less efficient right now than they would be if they could send their kids to daycare and go work in an office. Even for companies and employees for whom it’s working very well, I see it being offered as a perk for hiring and retention, and possibly as a way to deflate wages (eg., we’re giving you this perk of working remotely so we don’t have to pay you as much) but I don’t see it becoming a mandatory, permanent thing for every employee.
      I think if we were talking about doing this COVID social distancing thing for 5 years, it might be a different story. But it seems increasingly likely we will have a widely available vaccine by next summer, and I think if that’s the case we’ll get back to normal fairly quickly.

      1. Lack of childcare/daycare is a separate issue though. With the kids out of the house, I don’t see why people wouldn’t be able to work just as effectively from home.

        1. I am going to make a list of reasons why my work is not going just as effectively from home as a midlevel associate:

          -no proper space to work in. 700 sq ft apartment isn’t cutting it.
          -no proper office equipment (large scanner, printer, etc)
          -my files aren’t here
          -communication with difficult to get a hold of partners is even harder
          -communication truncated in general at all levels
          -limited opportunities for brainstorming, collaboration, informal mentoring, relationship building, or shadowing other attorneys
          -isolation, no energy, no sense of community, no rapport building with your colleagues which is important for collaboration and forming strong relationships (especially if you’re new)
          -no mental separation between work and home. Really not wanting opposing counsel/filing deadline stress in my living room, where I’m supposed to relax

          For a few weeks/months it’s tolerable. For one or two days a week, sure. But it’s so ridiculous to me how people are pretending like nothing would be lost if everyone went 100% remote.

          1. Sure, those are all valid reasons. But I’m not in law and my career is neither stressful nor something that I need to escape from, so I personally don’t share those concerns. I also don’t rely on my workplace to supply me with friends so I’m happy to opt out of the forced social interactions.

          2. Cool. Happy for you. Hopefully now you see why some people aren’t just as effective working from home. You also need to understand that there’s a difference between needing to collaborate with your coworkers and using work to supply you with friends.

          3. Nope, modern technology means we can collaborate just as effectively from anywhere. I work for a company that already had a very liberal telework policy and there are many ways to include remote employees. Unless you’re looking for an excuse :)

        2. I think a lot of execs are equating “people are not productive working from home right now” to “people are not productive working from home.” I don’t think those two statements are equivalent, because of childcare as well other issues like mental health, but a lot of higher-ups at my company (and I imagine other companies) seem to think the former implies the latter. I actually think we will have less ability to work remotely when the pandemic is over, at least at my company.

      2. I agree. We are back in the office (with the ability to work remote if needed), and literally everyone came back the first day. It was like the first day of school. Everyone was so happy to be there. It is just difficult to do something like prep for a trial or bounce ideas off of someone from home. We also all actually like each other. My previous firm was very into working from home, and it was actually a terrible place to work. You never got to know anyone at the firm really, and it was just very lonely.

        1. That’s cool, but a lot of people think differently and don’t care to rush back for the office social life. Good thing your firm allows remote if needed still.

          1. There’s a difference between “office social life” and struggling to effectively collaborate with your colleagues because you’re disconnected.

    4. Just isn’t going to happen. Chiming in to say I *really* don’t enjoy WFH life. While it might be a pleasant change for a few months, it’s not sustainable long term. There will always be a need to congregate in person with your colleagues at least some of the time.

      I’m glad that so many are having a positive experience working from home, but it’s really not ideal for everyone. I would love if instead of just jumping immediately to WFH as the solution, people would think about other ways to make our working lives, and work/life balance better. Enjoying not having a 1 hour commute? Well, next time a public transit initiative comes up in your city, support it. Like the freedom to do errands and make it to appointments? Okay, how can we foster a culture that doesn’t require “butts in seats” to be the measure of productivity? Like having more time in the day to focus on your personal life and to go to the gym? More reasonable expectations for productivity (especially for those who bill) would go a lot farther than WFH.

      I know I’m not answering your question directly, I just cannot imagine that this will ever actually happen and hope it doesn’t.

      1. WFH has actually been a lot more “butt in seat” for me since that’s where all communication takes place. I also am more on call and busier so it hasn’t really led to more time in the day for personal things. Also, I had a lot of flexibility and work/life balance before. But WFH has still great been because I don’t have to physically spend any time in the office. Going into the office is just a huge drain, even with a short commute on public transit.

  15. Any recommendations for white or neutral summer-weight bedding, either quilts or duvets? Ideally something I can order online. I’d prefer no patterns, but I do like those thin textured quilts that add a little visual interest.

    1. Mine is all white from target. You could try there or the company store. Matelesse (sp)
      Is also a good option & lots of online options are available.

    3. A little spendy but Parachute has some lovely lightweight bedding. I have a robe from the “cloud cotton” material and I’m tempted by the quilt.

  16. Can you recommend a destination for a ladies’ weekend getaway that is within driving distance of both Dallas and Houston, but that isn’t Austin or New Orleans?

      1. +1 Riverwalk is great. The hotel at La Cantera is beautiful and they have a great spa if you’re into that. It’s not downtown close to the river walk but we found taking an Uber downtown was no big deal.

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