The Secret of Doing Less

The main complaint most of us have about switching from Daylight Saving Time back to Standard Time is how early darkness comes.

We should be happier about it. After all, when the light starts to fade, don’t we all start thinking about supper? What’s so bad about an early supper?

Instead we whine.

The Georgia legislature has passed a bill making Daylight Saving Time permanent. So have 19 other states. The problem is, it can’t happen until things change on a federal level.

Personally, I don’t care if we go to permanent DST or not, I just want to stick with one or the other. But until that happens, here we go again.

Darkness is setting in mighty early.

I’m learning to work it to my advantage though. For starters, happy hour tends to start when the sun goes down.

I’m completely good with the concept of ‘it’s 5 o’clock somewhere,’ but the truth is, in the middle of summer you’re likely to be involved in some project at 5 o’clock with another 3 hours of daylight still left.

So let me line up the Standard Time day of a retired man. Feel free to adopt it as your own.

8 a.m. - get up and make coffee. Hit the email. I get newspapers and newsletters in my email, so this can take a while.
10 a.m. - finally finish off the coffee and morning reading. By now, the stock market is open, so let’s see what’s happening there.
11 a.m. - realize you’ve skipped breakfast and start foraging the fridge and pantry. But don’t eat yet. It’s not lunch time until…
12 noon - eat lunch. Golf may also occupy this time slot, but let’s say it’s a no-golf day.
1 p.m. - start thinking about the things you want to accomplish that day, but don’t actually begin doing anything because you need to:

- buy a new meat thermometer on Amazon
- go get a key made at Home Depot
- buy a new phone charger on Amazon
- clean up the photos on your phone
- buy some new printer cartridges on Amazon
- run to the grocery store (drive, don’t actually run)
- buy a snazzy new corkscrew on Amazon

This is not an endorsement. But if you’re a wino, you need this in your life.

Now. It’s finally time to get something done.

Let’s say today’s activity is splitting some firewood because you took down that tree over a month ago, and the wood has been piled up on the side of the driveway ever since.

Don’t actually begin any task without first announcing it.

“Well, I think I’m gonna go tackle splitting and stacking that wood out there!”

Makes it official.

Only then can preparations be made for accomplishing your task.

You’ll need water. You’ll need your chainsaw. You need ear protection. And eye protection. You need gloves. You’ll need to set up the splitter.

Uh-oh. No gas for the splitter. Run to the gas station. Don’t actually run… (have I used this already?)

Get to work and work until dark.

Upon concluding for the day and going back in the house, your wife may ask you something like, “Did you get it all done?”

“Nope, ran out of daylight.”

Then she’ll say something like, “Well, you didn’t start until 4:30. You didn’t give yourself much time.”

Oh, crap. She may be catching on.

Ah well, worry about it later. Time for happy hour.