Tuesday, March 04, 2008

A Moofer?

I found out today that I am a "Moofer". One of my favorite monthly, (bathroom) reads is Wired Magazine, and today I read in the column "Jargon Watch" about a new term: Moofing.

Moofing v. Derived from the acronym for mobile, out of office. Moofers abandon the workplace between meetings, taking laptop and BlackBerry to the local Starbucks or anyplace else where they can escape interruption by talkative coworkers.

I remember reading in another Pastor's blog about the importance of stepping outside of the church office to do work in the marketplace. Their church actually opted out of having offices in order to force them into the public square.

I have gotten very comfortable taking my Motorola Q and my laptop, out of the office, allowing me not only to escape interruptions, but more importantly to be a part of the people's lives that I seek to shepherd.

I love that technology allows me to work on research and messages while living in the very world that I seek to impact through my research and messages.

7 comments:

Christine H. said...

So that explains why I can never reach you on the church office phone!!!

Seriously, I think that's awesome that you get away from church. You're there enough as it is!

Ryan said...

Yeah, I probably don't even need an office phone. I've gotten one message in the past three months on that phone, and the message was intended for Maria.
Even when I'm at the office the secretaries do everything they can to keep from putting calls through. Which makes sense I guess. If I'm in my office that means that I'm either counseling someone, or that I have a limited time to prepare for something coming up, and am crazy busy.
For what it's worth, I hate voicemail, but love texting and getting e-mail on my phone. It's amazing what I can accomplish with text messaging.
I'm thinking about changing my voicemail message on my cellphone to state: Please do not leave a message. Hang up and text or e-mail your message.
But I guess that would be anti-social...Like listening to voicemail is so much more social...
I usually run to answer my phone when I hear it ringing out of fear that I will miss it and will have to check my messages.

All that to say that one is better off following the ways of my good friend Freddy: Hang up and call back again, until someone answers :-)
Seriously, in 22 years of friendship I think I've received two phone messages from him.

mandrews said...

I guess that means I should never try calling you again. It's funny because I like getting voicemail because it makes me feel important... but then again so do text messages... I guess they are probably better because you can check them whenever you want (like in class... it's hard to check a voicemail in class...)

ATSmith said...

Love the mobile thing ... not so much on the couch at home :)

Anonymous said...

I can't wait to use this term on Glenn. I may get to teach him something techie finally. And I have to agree with Amber. The Moofing has stop at some point in the day. The Blackberry can be too easy sometimes. But then again now that I have my Centro I tend to just "work" when Glenn is.

Mom Martha said...

It just bugs the dickens out of me to be visiting with someone while they continue to check their text messages and then quickly text back while pretending to continue talking to you. hmmmm...there is a time to hang it ALL up and be present when face to face. :)
Mom

Mom Martha said...

Come on...you are SLACKING on updating this...:)