Dagwood on Task Management

Yesterday's Blondie:

There are so many opportunities open to us. We can pretty much do whatever we want to, and with much of it — family, work, church, community — other people ask a lot of us, too. If we're not careful, we can easily spend our time doing things that just plain aren't important.

Peter Lynch once paid a consultant to help him become more effective at work. The recommendation was to start the day by listing everything that he could do that day, then rank the list by order of importance. Start working on the most important task and don't stop until it's done. Move on to the second task. At the end of they day, you'll know that however much got done, you did the things that were most important for you to do today.

Some things aren't going to get done. Face it. Accept it. As long as you're doing things that are more important, it doesn't matter. Focus on the most important things you can do — what will make you the happiest, make the biggest difference, and have the longest impact — and let the rest go. It's just distracting you.

The Sam's Club Moment

Photo: Josh Lewis

When I first moved to Colorado Springs, I stayed with a friend from college until I was able to get my own apartment. He wouldn't let me pay rent, so to thank him, I bought him something I knew he'd been thinking about buying himself for a while: a membership at Sam's Club.

We stopped by to do the paperwork, and he asked me if I was going to get myself one. I wasn't; this was the first I'd ever been in Sam's Club. I wasn't familiar with them, and I didn't know that I'd ever use it. He convinced me to walk around the warehouse with him before I made up my mind.

We started out, and I wasn't that impressed. I kept focusing on the cost. NutriGrain Bars for $5.99. (Sure it's more, but I can get them for $2.00 a box at Albertson's.) Cheerios for $7.99. (Half that at Albertson's.)

Halfway through, he got me to see the light, and I'm thankful to this day that he did. I was looking at it from the wrong angle. I needed to look at the value, not the cost. Yes, I could get a $4 box of Cheerios at Albertson's, but I'm going to spend $8 on Cheerios anyway as soon as I buy two boxes. Once I've spent $8, do I want to own 26 oz of Cheerios, or 37 oz? It's about making your money do more for you.

I started getting really excited, and ended up getting myself a membership as well. I also picked up as much of the grocery shopping as I could instead of stopping at Albertson's on the way home. (I wasn't ready to buy milk there. Yet.) Two memberships, groceries, and $20 cash back came to about $120.

On the way home, we stopped by Albertson's so I could get milk. I wanted to see how long it would take for the Sam's Club membership to pay for itself. What I had just bought at Sam's Club — just the groceries — came to over $160. I was astounded. I had no idea the membership would pay for itself and more on the first trip.

I've been sold ever since. Sure, there have been times I've gone overboard and bought things I shouldn't have. (It takes a long time for two people to go through 5 lbs of shredded cheese.) But it's either been worth it, or it makes for a good story. Now, my wife and I are working on gaining and understanding of just how fast we go through things, which will let us know how much we need to keep on hand. More on that later.

Gruntspeak

I came across this cartoon on Friday, illustrating the grammatical gymnastics involved in carrying on an entire conversation with one word. Go ahead and check it out. I'll wait for you.

(BTW, it just took me five tries and the help of the spell checker to find a form of "grammar" that A) fits my usage and B) is already a word.)

It reminds me of a conversation I had with my best friend when we were teenagers. I don't remember who grunted what, but here's the gist of it:

"I'm full."

"Me, too. That was a good meal."

"Totally. The pork chops were very tender and savory. Slightly smokey, and just a hint of lime."

"I agree. And the mashed potatoes were well-seasond and had just the right amount of lumps."

"They were very good. Excellent meal, Mom."

"Yes, Mom. Thank you."

"So what shall we do now?"

"Well, we could play some more hackey sack."

"Nah, I'm too full for that level of physical activity. As much as I enjoyed dinner, I'd prefer to only enjoy it once."

"Good call. We could play video games."

"We spent most of the afternoon playing video games. My thumbs are still sore. Go to the mall?"

"We could... I don't have any money, though. I couldn't buy anything."

"Oh! There was that movie you wanted to see. The one with ... whatsherface."

"That's right! I'd forgotten about that. And I'd just been talking about it while we were playing video games. Let's do that."

"Who's driving?"

"We're here. I'll drive. Do you have a card?"

"...Not on me."

"Not a problem. We can grab my mom's. Watch it at your place or mine?"

"Yours. My sister's probably still watching TV."

"Alright! Let's go."

At which point, we pushed back our chairs and got up to leave. My mother, who had been looking back and forth at us during the whole exchange, burst out laughing. "What was that?"

"We were figuring out what to do now. We're going to go rent a movie and watch it here. I'm driving, we'll need to borrow your Blockbuster card, and excellent job on the marinade. Very tasty."

Tim Allen would be proud.

Monday Night Football Redux

Just a quick note that we're back, safe and sound, from the Broncos-Raiders season opener on Monday Night Football. It was Denver's first win on the road on MNF since 1998 (I love some of these strung-up statistics), and Oakland barely avoided their third consecutive shutout on Monday Night.

The seats were great (thanks, Dave!) and it was interesting to see the differences in what the game was like. The Black Hole and Mile High each have their own flavor.

I can't wait to watch the highlights on AppleTV tomorrow so I can see just what happened with some of those plays.