Game, Sir? No, Sir - that's a bar chart, Sir...

Bored at work? Addicted to computer games? Fed up of jumping guiltily every time your boss walks into the room and having to hastily shut down your game window so you don't get caught out? Me too. If Big Fish Games had never been invented, I would be much more productive. I hear there are some people who truly love their work and would never find it tedious, but suspect these are a) dull as dishwater, b) exceptionally overpaid or c) lying. Or all three. Although I would have thought that b) precludes a), but what do I know about the world of work? Not too much, as it happens, although I try to get at least some of it done in between hidden object games, Prison Break marathons and street dance (yes, really ... although an accurate description would involve adding the word "pitiful" somewhere, as opposed to dance). Anyway, all is not lost, fellow lazies - for some marvellous chaps at CantYouSeeImBusy.com have solved our problem with a cunning plan. They have created games, inspired by old style arcade games that many of us grew up with such as Breakout and Tetris. Fine, I hear you say - but what's so interesting about that? Well, you may like this, workshy ones - all the games are disguised as Excel and Word documents so your boss will never find out! These games follow the general gist of the classics they copy, just played against what look like genuine office applications. Tidy. In Leadership, you have to direct a spaceship between two lines of a graph and Breakdown (based on the wonderful Atari Breakout) sees the player having to hit lines of text to make them disappear, rather than the original bricks. According to the Dutch developers' website, "all the games at CantYouSeeImBusy.com are designed in a way that nobody can see that you’re gaming. In fact, your boss and colleagues will think that you’re working harder than ever before." Hmmm. I can see two major flaws there. Firstly, that the games sound less than inspiring, and secondly, most bosses would be suspicious if a previously lackadaisical employee suddenly stopped surfing OnlineGames.net and started gazing intently at pie charts. Especially when their job role doesn't even involve pie charts. And the conscientious part of me feels that it's a bit, well, irresponsible to encourage people to play computer games when they are being paid to work, even if it is all intended as a bit of fun and they would do it anyway. Maybe I am just an old stick in the mud. Well, we can't all be perfect.

In defiance of being made to feel like a naughty schoolgirl, I prefer to opt for the good old-fashioned work avoidance techniques - day dreaming, copious note taking/ internet research (hey, why do you think I like to blog?!), toilet trips, cigarette breaks, offering to do the coffee run etc - personally. And if that doesn't work, then never fear. Just swap desks so you face your boss, look engrossed, quizzical, thoughtful and serious at appropriate/ equal intervals, and keep your Big Fish pop-up window open. After all, if it's good enough for me...

For the hidden games, see www.CantYouSeeImBusy.com

For hidden object games, see www.bigfishgames.com