Like anybody working from home (WFH) will tell you, it gets boring after a while. Yeah, it’s great to wake up at 7:00 AM and be at work by 7:01 AM, but there’s something to be said about the commute to and from work with the rest of the rat race. There’s also a certain buzz in the workplace that you just don’t get when you work for yourself. I miss all of that, and until recently, have been working without it.

Late last week, I was lying in bed around 4 AM and trying to find a way to get this feeling back. The obvious solution was to get another job in Corporate America (which I’m working on). The less obvious solution occurred to me just as I was drifting off to sleep: Go where the people are. And that’s just what I did.

Knowing that I would be more productive with a change of scenery, I set out to find a coffee shop, book store, or whatever, that I could work from for a few hours each afternoon. In my search, I remembered that there was a Barnes & Nobles nearby that had a Starbucks in it as well. Perfect! After purchasing pre-paid credits from AT&T’s WiFi service, I was online, in the corner of the coffee shop. The place was a buzz with people. There was a man and women near the windows. The man appeared to be interviewing for a position with the woman’s company. A young woman, on her lunch break, was resting her head against a window while talking with her significant other on the telephone, and in the farthest corner of the coffee shop was a loud gentleman on the telephone with his business partner talking about a deal that they thought was going fall through.

I felt involved. In the middle of this loud, bustling coffee shop I was revitalized. I felt as though I was again part of something and accomplished twice as many to-do list items as I had the day before. Since that day, I have been back to the coffee shop in the bookstore twice, and was just as productive each time I was there. For the price of a venti skinny cinnamon dolce latte and about $5 for the WiFi access, I was guaranteed 3+ hours of productivity each time I was there.

Now I know that it may not seem like a large price to pay, but $9 a day eventually adds up, so I have decided to continue looking for nearby WiFi hotspots (preferably free) in bustling locations. Luckily, I’m 10 minutes from an incredibly large shopping mall and business area so it hasn’t been an exhausting search. If you’re like me, and work from home, but yearn for a change of scenery, get out of the house and work remotely for a day. It makes such a difference!