alt Hacker NewsI think they’re saying that you could say “I’m going for a smoke break” at work and it was at least tolerated. I don’t think you can say “I’m going for a walk” the same way.
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Why not? Ive been doing it for years, when I worked in office. Get someone to go with you. Or walk to get food/coffee/whatever.
Indeed.
It has varied a bit depending on the timeline, but: Going out for a walk (or to just change environments and very passively stare at nothing) has been less socially-acceptable than going out for a smoke, in my experience.
One of these things is weird, or perhaps inducing of ire ("How dare he just go outside when he feels like it! What is he even doing?").
The other is, at worst, both understandable and disgusting ("Of course he's out there again with that filthy habit!").
I've worked a number of places where smoking on site wasn't allowed, and it was well accepted that if you wanted to just disappear for 30 minutes once or twice a day no one would care.
"i'm going to go get a coffee" works fine in my experience
We still use the same phrase today "Smoke break?" "Yep" though none of us smoke any more, and some never did.