I guess when you're paid hourly it matters, but ya, my work day is a bunch of 20 to hour long blasts of coding, interspersed with wandering around the office or bouncing on the giant yoga ball they gave me instead of a chair. Dunno how someone could keep on the screen for more than a couple hours straight.
The only place I ever actually coded for 8 hours straight was a place in which I loved the work and I actually felt valued on a day to day basis. During crunchtime (which only happened once or twice every few months) my manager would wait around after-hours so we could leave together and I wouldn't be the only one left in the building while the cleanup crew went to work. In hindsight I now acknowledge this behavior as his way of showing support even if it meant him just catching up on news and Facebook or writing boring emails while waiting for me to be done coding for the day. He taught me a lot about managing people, and in turn I taught him a lot about being on the cutting edge of our industry. This was a very small company trying to modernize itself in the face of daunting competition.
This was the best position I ever held and was my first role as a lead. The CEO did not know much about technology but seemed to have an innate trust in me that I appreciated greatly. Granted this gave me the ability to use whatever technology I wanted so I was having a lot of fun with the day to day coding. I wouldn't even eat lunch some days just so I can finish up the task at hand before sundown. Sounds horrible but was (and still is) an incredibly exciting experience.
On the other side of town, however, where I worked for Fox Studios (yes I'm calling them out!) I and the rest of the Contractor Army would be critiqued and yelled at by executive management on a weekly basis, like clockwork. Even though they gave me all the money and resources in the world, I hated coding every second I spent at that job. Instead, I spend a lot of time walking around the lot in hopes of meeting movie stars or something.
I always figured it was the domain you worked in that made it fun or boring, but I'm starting to realize it's a lot more about the environment and people you are around that can make or break your work life.
