Pearls of time management from author and MacMerc contributing editor Brian Burnham.
Most of your time is lost during unstructured time. While we all need ‘down time’ to recharge, open ranges of free time can quickly go to waste on unproductive activities.
Sing it, Brian. I just frittered away my first free Sunday in a long time, gallavanting about the Web instead of doing even one of the millions of things I was supposed to do.
At least I learned some useful stuff. You know, stuff you can use to beef up your trivia reputation at cul-de-sac barbecues, like, what was the REAL story behind the Trading Spaces episode in Puyallup, Washington, the one where Pam Herrick didn’t want her brick fireplaced painted, touched, or otherwise molested by diva designers.
When designer Doug Wilson insisted painted bricks was the only thing that would separate Pam’s living room from caves inhabited by lower animals, Pam’s neighbor and mother of four Laureen Jobes gently counseled him like a toddler who needed a nap. (Yay, Mom!)
She told him that even without painted bricks the room would be great! And it was okay to be unhappy! And how she knew he could come up with something even better! Like covering the fireplace bricks with fabric instead! Or even carpet!
So after slamming the door on his way out (Laureen said he was “just a little cranky“) Doug got over it and whipped up a design for a wooden fireplace facade instead, which I thought looked okay. (If you could get past the brown Holodeck grid on the walls.)
And then during “the Reveal,” Pam was so upset by the changes to her living room that she went off camera and sobbed, and later sniped at poor, loyal neighbor Laureen, because Laureen didn’t save her living room from the diva designer.
Since then Pam’s been villified all over the internet, and given the nickname “Crying Pam.”
Well.
Turns out she and her neighbors were TOTALLY set up by Doug Wilson!
Wilson knew Pam and her hubby had a contract with the show in which the show promised not to paint the fireplace and Doug Wilson knew that WEEKS before he even set foot in Puyallup. He just pretended he was hearing about it for the first time, because he loves The Drama That Is Interior Design.
And unless being the Trivia Queen of our cul-de-sac barbecues is My Only Life Goal, I better get me some of that structured “down time.”