Yeah, it is what my colleagues and I often do over lunch break. Since it is a break, it is outside of work, right?
I rechecked my contract and under the terms of the contract, if it is specific to my work at my employer, they could claim it, but frankly we prefer to release everything that isn't specific to our industry open source anyway, so.....
But then Americans have these funny "all your intellectual property are belong to us" clauses in work contracts....