Years ago I thought it might be really neat to become an Efficiency Expert when I grew up. This was before I figured out that there was probably math involved, so I went another direction.
The concept still fascinates me, though, and I try to do as many things as I can in the most economical way possible. The way I see it is this: the more time I save on the unimportant, the more time I have for other things. If I'm going to waste time, I want it to be a really enjoyable waste of time, like sleeping late, or laying around reading a book and watching junk TV.
I started this program way back in High School, maybe even Junior High (that's what we called it back in the middle of last century. None of this Middle School nonsense.) If I was given an assignment that was due in a week, I never spent time messing with it ahead of time. The night before, I put in an all-out effort, probably spent about half the amount of hours on it as if I had done an hour a day, and, voila!, it was done. I didn't even waste time sleeping much that night.
These days some people that live in this house don't appreciate my great saving of time and even give it other names, like "Procrastination" or "Deliberately Driving People Crazy." They say things like "When you are supposed to be somewhere at nine o'clock, you can't leave here at nine o'clock and expect to get there on time!" And, I'm ashamed to admit it about someone I love, but this person has even been known to lie about what time a plane is taking off. Can you believe it? How much time is wasted by people arriving early to places and then sitting around waiting for all the other people to get there, anyway?
And what about things like housework? I could do it everyday, and it will just have to be done again the next day or so, or I can wait until I know someone is going to come over and all of a sudden, I'm Super-Martha and can get it all done in about an hour. Most of it, anyway. At least what's out in the open. Now which is the best use of time?
Think of all the time people waste doing things and undoing the same things and then doing them again. Like making the bed. You're just going to get right back in. Or getting dressed. When my boys were little and we had to be someplace early in the morning, I got them dressed the night before, let them sleep in their clothes, then took them right from the bed to the car, handed them a peanut-butter sandwich to eat on the way, and off we went. I don't know why everybody doesn't save time like this.
And filling the car up with gas. I'm not too fond of doing it, so I do it as infrequently as possible, thus saving aggravation as well as time. Okay, I may cut it a little close sometimes. Like today, you know that little indicator thing above the rear-view mirror? It said we had five miles more to go before empty, but it was really more efficient to stop and get the bread first, even though it was a couple of miles out of the way because then after we got gas we could head straight home. But that indicator thing kept nagging me and it did say "Zero miles to empty" about a mile before I got to the right gas station. The van has a twenty gallon tank and the pump said I put in twenty and four/tenths gallons, which is the most I've ever put in before, but we got there didn't we? Some people get so nervous!
I'm really more professional than some people give me credit for. There is a business model called Just In Time that saves manufacturers a pile of money by waiting till the last minute to do things and/or pay for things and they save on storage space too. Sound familiar? It was probably thought up by an Efficiency Expert. Who knew I was so far ahead of my time?
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