Day 96 - TGIT!

Today is the 5th day of the 14th week, the 6th day of the 4th month, the 96th day of 2023, and:

• Army Day
• Charlie the Tuna Day - Sorry, Charlie
• Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Day
• Drowsy Drivers Awareness Day
• Fresh Tomato Day
• International Asexuality Day
• International Day of Sport for Development and Peace
• Jump Over Things Day
• Maundy Thursday
• National Alcohol Screening Day
• National Burrito Day
• National Caramel Popcorn Day
• National Employee Benefits Day
• National Siamese Cat Day
• National Student Athlete Day
• National Tartan Day
• National Twinkie Day - but they actually do go bad
• New Beer's Eve - the day before Roosevelt signed The Cullen-Harrison Act into law, which started the process of ratifying the 21st Amendment to repeal the 18th Amendment [Prohibition]
• Plan Your Epitaph Day
• Teflon Day
• Waltzing Matilda Day
• World Table Tennis Day
• the full moon was at 12:37 AM EDT this morning

We are about to embark on an acid test of my resolution to write everyday, and my readers' tolerance for opening the blog and only seeing a picture.  Today is the last day of work before a week's vacation.  I don't have a lot planned, it isn't like I'll be traveling, but definitely the regular scheduled programming is about to be interrupted...

The thing about not having defined plans?  The hours just kinda seem to flow past and vanish. Many times I have settled in on Friday night, exalting in having a weekend to myself, and then find that I am wondering what I actually did for those 48 hours.  Lazily, I googled not noticing the passing of time, expecting to find variations of "time flies when you are having fun" so that I could share some fun memes and rattle on a bit in that vein.   Instead, to my surprise, there is an actual medical condition called dyschronometria. and it is linked to dementia and Alzheimer's.  Just the thing to find out when I have vivid memories of dealing with my mother's dementia, and already worry whether or not I will become my kids' problem

Gee, thank you so much Dr. Google!  

There are other reasons for the changes in the way we perceive the flow of time, of course, much more likely ones too.  Vacation time and weekends are usually unstructured and spent in doing things one enjoys.   Some of it could be the mind's reaction to simple information and attention demand overload.  So what is the solution?  It always comes down to management-speak about setting goals, establishing priorities, and techniques for doing so - altho I had never heard of "eat the frog" process before!

When you actively dive into organizational development, you become immediately aware of how many "sure-fire" management processes there are out there for increasing productivity, equating that with personal achievements and satisfaction.  Most are actually fads and many of these have cute little descriptions and this is one of them.  "Eat the Frog"  is  apparently based on the "old saying" [which I had never heard before ], that goes like this:  "If the first thing you do each morning is eat a live frog, you'll have the satisfaction of knowing that it's probably the worst thing you'll do all day"  The guy takes an entire book apparently to inform avid readers the way to make sure you get difficult or important things done is to get them over with first thing in the morning.  The thing to remember is the common denominator of every management theory is the concept of using your time effectively and measuring your success in doing that by productivity. 

Do I really need to be "productive" outside of work?  I've always commented that I work to live, I do not live to work, so why would I evaluate the use of my time by a measuring stick applicable to the office?  Do I  really have to have "something to show for" my time?  Are those hours spent in my 2nd Life or napping really wasted just because more time passed than I thought at the time?

Dear Dr. Google:  Thank you very much for your suggestions.  I think I'll stick to my original premise that "time flies when you are having fun" and just enjoy my time off.