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SLIGHTLY DEPRESSING realization: The average American works 1,797 hours a year, according to a 2008 ranking of the world’s hardest-working countries done by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development. For the record, we came in at No. 9.

Though math is typically not a writer’s strong suit, let’s give a few equations a whirl: 1,797 divides out to be about 35 hours a week. However, though seven hours are, on average, spent at work, you can tack on two hours for a back-and-forth commute (unless you’re really lucky) and add in eight hours for sleeping. That only leaves seven hours a day for everything else. Plus, thanks to BlackBerrys, mobile phones and wireless e-mail, even those precious seven hours are probably infringed upon by career-related matters, despite any efforts to the contrary.