Work friends are a weird thing. Sure you go to lunch together, you go out to drinks. Dinner occasionally. Maybe a waterpark or two. You share the ins and outs of your lives. Troubles with kids, the spouse. But are you really friends? Like real friends? Like call to pick you up at 2:00 in the morning when you hooked up with the Miller Light guys and aren't quite sure where you are but know that you have to go home to get ready for the 6:00am conference call with Belgium friends?

Or is it some other weird relationship that defies a label. Like trying to determine what to call the man in your life after the age of 35- a boyfriend, man-friend, lover, main squeeze, special friend, partner, hostage???

Work friends are tough to quantify. Mostly because they come and go. Sometimes with little notice. Sure it's a little different with LinkedIn and all the other social networking sites where you collect old colleagues like baseball cards only to fan them out and pull one in times of need...like a job or just someone to meet up with for a beer and to reminisce about the "good ole days." How good we had it, with company picnics and stock options and a living wage. Oh, the good old days.

But are they real friends?

When a work friend leaves suddenly, with seemingly no reason or explanation, it's tough not to feel a little bummed. A little sad. After all how often as an adult do you get to make new friends? Sure you have the couple friends, your kids' friends' parents friends, the book club friends but none of whom do you spend so much time with. None who slog through the thick and thin. None who know without a doubt just how weird that girl from marketing is...you know the one who repeats everything she says but under her breath in a weird sing-song way.

So I guess yeah- they're as real as it gets.