As the upper end of the economy begins to stir, down here at the generic cigarette end of things, we're still waiting.

The funny thing is, many of us didn't start the game with a big pile of chips — just a high school education and a certain facility with tools or just the willingness to go somewhere five days a week and do as we're told.

Unlike a lot of writers who hymn the joys of good, honest work, I've always hated to work and am perfectly capable of living a life of leisure bounded by books, naps, quiet reflection and, on occasion, the consumption of draft beer among friends.

Writers, particularly those who shout opinions in newsprint, are expected to urge the joy of work on people the way a guy on television urges you to buy a potato peeler that will turn cooking into a ballet of joyousness.

Not me. I applaud every effort anyone makes to get out of work. I'm a solid white-collar worker these days, but I retain the memory of awful manual labor jobs I had, jobs where the pay didn't approach the work involved and an employee's only chance at sufficient rest was to just plain cheat, to lie, to take extra breaks and goof off whenever possible.

This does not make me unique, unless in the sense that I'm willing to say that I support loafing on the job, something most everyone does but almost no one admits.

Shhhh! Even in the darkest depths of your own unuttered conversation, the person who wrote the employee handbook may be listening. As context, I've watched upper-management people spend months writing an employee handbook, a kind of loafing only one step above actual sleep.

And you would think, as we wait for the recession/depression/end of the world to turn around/slow down/finally run aground, that those of us whose work does not involve seminars and something called "facilitation" would be working even harder, striving to stay employed.

Far from it. Down here where discourteous bosses call truck drivers "wheel holders," we're doing as little work as we can.

And why not? Our health insurance costs more and does less. We haven't had a meaningful raise (or any raise) in a couple of years. The company doesn't provide a pension. The company laid off three guys last year and kept you and your buddy, Ray, and the two of you are now expected to do the work of five "associates."

It worked, at least partially, but you and Ray are doing the work of maybe four people, three when the boss is out sick or at a "facilitation seminar."

The recalcitrance of you and Ray is not, as the boss would no doubt say, "good for the company," but you and Ray know the company would spit you out like wad of gum on the smallest of provocations, so you are having a bit of trouble working for the common good of the banks and the stockholders.

It is my great good luck to have what my grandmother would have called "a taste for low company," and more and more, my friends who sweat for a living are telling tales of loafing that make up a veritable Arabian Nights of goofing off.

A lot of our fathers and mothers gave a lot of loyalty and a lot of free overtime to their jobs, in return for which they worked at the same place for 30 years and came out with a pension. During our time at work, we've been de-unionized, un-pensioned, bought out, taken over and thrown onto unemployment because the guys in the suits have been playing with paper profits again.

This morning, eating at a storefront diner offering a $1.99 two eggs, toast and coffee special, I got to thinking about this as two wheel-holders, neither of whom is named "Ray," talked of longer routes and longer days and less pay and a boss who spit out the word "employee" like it was a mouthful of spoiled tuna salad.

The boys were headed to a town 40 miles away to make a delivery, and they spoke of their boss.

"He doesn't know how long this is gonna take," one said.

And the other one, the one not named "Ray," he just laughed and put a little more hot sauce on his over-easy eggs.

To find out more about Marc Dion, and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit www.creators.com.