Time Wasting Away

Okay, I haven't much time in my running around like a crazy this week in NYC (ThrillerFest, seeing sister, doing some touristy things with buddy author Camille Minichino, etc.), so I'm turning to the biggest time suck of all -- next to carrying for a newborn baby, that is -- and checking the internet for lists of "10 Biggest Time Wasters."

Wow. About 416,000 entries. Obviously, one could waste (ahem, "spend") a lot of time culling through these lists, making a chart of which ones show up most often on the lists, separating "workday" time wasters from "lifetime" time wasters from "momtime" time wasters...

I'll not do that, not having that much time right now, but ran over to Time.com to view the Biggest Time Wasters at Work. According to a survey of 300 employees (which doesn't sound like a large data pool to me, but who am I to say?) the biggest time wasters were:

• “Water-cooler conversations” or chatting with co-workers (14%)
• Computer and software problems (11%)
• Meetings (11%)
• Web surfing (9%)

Then, on Freelance Writing Dreams, there's a post about How to Banish Time Wasters and Get More Writing Done, that suggests things like:

• Nix the television obsession
• One browser at a time
• Organize your day
• Get your STUFF in order

More details at the article, so click the link if you dare... ;-)  As for me... I'm typing this at my sister's when I should be doing a little catching up! so, good-bye computer, it's save and shut down for now.

Comments

[Pat morin]

Must be hard to write about time-sucking when you're conferencing and visiting your sister (hope she is doing well). Gives us the other end of the spectrum: non-time-sucking.

[Samantha Gluck]

Hi Ann...thanks so much for mentioning our Banishing Time Wasters post on FWD. I think people find success in avoiding time sucking activities or behaviors in different ways. Would be fun to see the creative ways other people get more done and stop wasting time.

Personally, I've begun using mind maps (I use iMindMap) to organize each day and for organizing and planning big projects. It's been a great success for me. I've only been using them about 4 months, but it's made such a big difference.

[Ann]

Hi Pat!
That's an excellent topic for a future post! :-) The whole week disappeared in a big blur and I'm still racing to catch up. Such is my fast-forward life these days...

[Ann]

Hello Samantha!
Thanks for dropping by the LadyKillers. :-) Hope you find it interesting enough to drop by again sometime. I'm catching up, and just scurried over to iTunes to read about iMindMap. Hmm. Interesting. And free. Well, heck, what's one more app on the iPhone, right? I'll give it a try. Thanks for the suggestion!