Fake training, a supposed errand to run or fake imperatives... How can you escape your lunch break with your colleagues without looking like a boor?

At the beginning of summer, Romain (1) arrived at his new company, a few minutes' drive from a medium-sized rural town. At lunchtime, you either have to go to the break room or go home, as there are hardly any restaurants nearby. The thirty-year-old quickly realized that he would have to be cunning to avoid lunch breaks with colleagues. "They're very nice, but we don't have the same interests," he says. "In the dining room, there's a TV, and they watch lunchtime game shows. It's their ritual. And since they watch TV, they don't talk to each other."

So to avoid the Twelve Midday Blows and the like, the man who loved sharing a meal with his colleagues at his previous company prefers to take a back seat. "Either I have a picnic outside, in a park or near a lake, or I take my car and take the opportunity to run errands in town. In that case, I skip lunch."

In France, the average lunch break is forty-seven minutes. While some people love team lunches, which sometimes allow for gossip (which is said to promote social relationships and even be good for health),