Time after time

A few years ago I read the book 168 Hours: You Have More Time Than You Think by Laura Vanderkam. I tallied my hours for a week, twice actually, to get a sense of where my time was going. Didn’t much help. Three years later I’m back in the same boat, wondering how minutes can evaporate so quickly. I’ve seen shower steam hang around longer.

Example. The boys are in morning summer camp (update, it’s all good, no harm no foul, but my evaluation of the summer camp will be quite pointed as to the necessity of weekly reviews), so you’d think I’d have more functional time. Alas no. Those glorious hours are spent catching up on work that simply cannot be done with the yammering and bickering dulcet tones of young sons in the background. It’s work that needs to be done and gets higher priority as I get paid for doing it, but everything else on Ye Olde To-Do List stagnates. There’s stuff on that list growing moss, and don’t tell me to drop them because they really do need to get done. In the meantime I have a full shelf of borrowed books I don’t have time to read and still go to the library to find more. It’s an illness, I swear.

A couple months ago I was lamenting my lack of time and was bitten by the mouths of babes.

A: Mom, could we do XYZ?
Me: Dude, how much time do you think I have?
A: All the time in the world until you die.

Crap.

Little poophead was right.

So I’m going to do the 168 Hours Challenge again (info in the right sidebar at that link). Starting tomorrow. Truth, didn’t see that coming when I sat down to write this, but hey. Why not. I’m curious to know where my hours are going.

And because I suspect a lot of others are curious as well, I challenge you to join me. For a full week, tally your hours (you can get the detailed info through the link above) and see what comes of it. I’m going old skool and using paper to track this. You can post your comments on my Facebook page, or here, or use smoke signals but not if you’re in Colorado and no promises that I’ll see those because it’s a little breezy here.

I truly don’t think I’m wasting that much time, but dang I could be wrong. Curious to see the cracks through which my minutes and hours fall.

How about you?