It is Tuesday morning, and I am currently writing this from my familiar, slightly uncomfortable, and highly questionable seat on the train to Brussels. The rhythmic, mildly depressing clunk-clunk of the Belgian railway system is the soundtrack to my current existence. I am embarked on my bi-weekly pilgrimage to the client's office. It’s a two-hour journey each way, which means a grand total of four hours per commuting day of my life are entirely sacrificed to the gods of public transport today. Four hours trying to work in the train, hoping the Wi-Fi holds up long enough to actually get some work done, or at least pretend to.
In our current hybrid working world, the corporate overlords have decreed that we must grace the office with our physical presence for a minimum of two days a week. Tuesday is the non-negotiable anchor day. It is the day the whole team gathers, breathes the same recycled office air, drinks the questionable machine coffee, and collectively pretends we couldn't have done exactly the same work while wearing our sweatpants in the comfort of our own living rooms. But the real strategic puzzle? Choosing that elusive second office day.
Speaking of office mandates, if you think two days a week is a logistical puzzle, you should hear the absolute chaos currently unfolding at my wife's company. Management recently dropped the bomb that employees are now expected to be in the office for an average of 2.5 days a week. You would think they had asked the staff to permanently relocate to a labor camp in Siberia or give up their firstborn child. There has been a massive, unyielding wave of protest sweeping through the company's communication channels.
The loudest, most dramatic complaints are coming from a very specific demographic: the employees who had their first child during or shortly after the COVID-19 pandemic. In their eyes, coming to the office for two days is practically a physical impossibility, let alone stretching it to a mathematically confusing 2.5-day week. The internal message boards are on fire with people asking, "But how are we supposed to arrange this? How can we possibly manage the complex logistics of childcare, school drop-offs, and commuting all at once?"
My wife, meanwhile, just watches this unfold with the cold, hardened stare of a veteran of the parenting trenches. We had our kids before the pandemic. You know, back in the dark ages of antiquity when society simply expected you to sit at your desk four, or very often five, days a week. We had to arrange daycare, school runs, sick days, and after-school activities while commuting every single day, uphill, both ways in the snow (or at least in the relentless Belgian rain). The mental gymnastics people perform to convince themselves that leaving their house twice a week is a fundamental violation of their human rights is truly spectacular to witness. The twists and turns in their logic deserve an Olympic gold medal in cognitive dissonance. Sometimes, the way people's minds work is just incredibly heavy to process.
So, while my wife's colleagues riot over an extra half-day, I am sitting here trying to figure out when I will make my second appearance in Brussels this week. Let’s break down the menu of options:
Monday: The absolute last resort. I only go to the office on a Monday if I receive a direct, unavoidable summons from the client. Otherwise, it is firmly off the table. Mondays are hard enough without adding a four-hour commute to the mix.
Wednesday: The hangover handicap. I actively dodge Wednesdays like the plague. The reason is incredibly simple and entirely self-inflicted: Tuesday night is pool night with the guys. It always starts with the famous last words, "Just a quick few frames, I'll be home early." Before you know it, it’s past midnight, I am questioning my life choices, and my alarm is maliciously set for slightly after 6:00 AM. Trying to survive a four-hour round-trip commute on a severe sleep deficit, surrounded by overly energetic morning commuters, is a terrible idea that I avoid at all costs.
Thursday: The Agile trap. Thursday is an acceptable option, but certainly not every Thursday. I categorically refuse to commute on the last week of a sprint. That is when the dreaded Sprint Retrospective and Review meetings happen. Frankly, I couldn't care less about attending those in person. It is a recurring Groundhog Day featuring the exact same people complaining about the exact same trivial things sprint after sprint. At home, I can mute my microphone, furiously type away at actual work, and take notes in absolute peace without having to fake a sympathetic smile.
Furthermore, this specific week, Thursday is an absolute logistical nightmare. I have a strict appointment at the notary at 18:30. In a perfect, theoretical world, I get home from Brussels around 18:00. But relying on the Belgian trains to get you to a legal appointment with only a 30-minute buffer is sheer madness. You can practically guarantee that my evening train will be delayed by a "person on the tracks," "signal failure," or whatever excuse they pull out of the hat today. (Mental note: I still need to actually read that dry, jargon-filled notary document. I guess I know what I'm doing for the remaining hour of this train ride).
Last week, however, my sacred Friday routine was completely destroyed. I had to attend the mandatory training session (the infamous "vormingsmoment") just so I can legally teach my oldest son how to drive. Thankfully, we drive an Electric Vehicle. There is no clutch to burn out, and no gears to grind into a fine metal powder while I sweat profusely in the passenger seat clutching the door handle. Just smooth acceleration, one-pedal driving, and a lot of hoping he actually looks in his mirrors before changing lanes. But even without a manual transmission to master, the administrative hoops to get him behind the wheel are very real, and it cost me my quiet Friday in the office.
This week, Friday poses an entirely different challenge. My oldest son has an away game starting at 20:00. The logistics dictate that they need to be present an hour and fifteen minutes early. Add a thirty-minute drive to the opposing team's venue, and we are suddenly looking at a hard 18:15 departure time from my house. Again, if I am commuting back from the capital on a Friday afternoon, that timeline is dangerously tight and leaves zero room for error.
Choices have to be made. The notary appointment definitively trumps the away game on the priority list, meaning Thursday is entirely scrubbed from the schedule. So, the ultimate showdown boils down to the sleep-deprived Wednesday or the time-crunched Friday. I think Friday remains the best option. The kid can easily catch a ride with one of his teammates to the game, and I will just drive over later once I’ve successfully navigated the evening train roulette and made it back to my hometown.
And if you think this week requires logistical gymnastics, just wait until next week. Next week, we return to the true, undisputed Belgian national sport: train striking.
The unions have graciously announced yet another week of strikes. We are looking at three full days of absolute gridlock and cancelled routes. I have been keeping a personal tally, and since the start of 2025, they have racked up more than 40 strike days. Given that they conveniently only ever strike on weekdays, that number represents a massive percentage of the working calendar. Between the mandatory office days, the EV driving lessons, the notary, the late-night pool sessions, and the endless strikes, managing a normal week feels like a full-time job in itself.
Cheers,
Peter
