Monday, October 17, 2005

Working Hard

Last Friday I decided to keep a log of what I'm doing every minute of the day at work. Even bathroom breaks get recorded: 4 minutes - potty break. I figured that if I did this for a couple of weeks, I could better see how I'm using my time and how I could be more efficient. (Because I don't feel like I've been getting much done lately. Somehow every little task seems to stretch out into hours of alternating between working and engaging in highly distracting non-work tasks.)

So I'm at the end of Day 2 of OCD record keeping and I've gotten more done in the last two days than in the last two weeks. It turns out that the very act of recording my activities makes me work WAY more efficiently (because I don't want to write down "web surfing and eating dry cheerios - 2 hours"). Ed pointed out that it's like the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle. That was a pretty good observation, but not nearly as good as the last time I worked quantum physics into a conversation:
Ed: (name withheld to protect the innocent) says completely contradictory things. They're so contradictory that I can't understand how she can even believe them both at the same time.

Me: Oh really? Was she trying to tell you that an electron is both a wave and a particle?

1 comment:

Becky said...

Great Quantim Phisics usage!!! I have noticed that recording will change your behavior--that is why it is a great technique for helping to improve diet...well, unless you are willing to lie to yourself -- I suppose if what you write is unconnected with your actions, then it wouldn't matter very much that you were recording. Perhaps the key is to study delusional people...