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I dropped over to see a friend recently and did a double take when I saw his garage full of furniture, tools, garden equipment, old posters and stacks of cardboard boxes.
"You're not moving, are you?" I asked him.
"No," he answered. "I needed to take out the Christmas stuff, so I had to make a choice. I decided to take the whole day, empty out the storage shed and put everything back so I can find stuff when I need it."
I looked around. "What was your other choice?"
He laughed. "Take half a day to get the Christmas stuff out, and then spend another half day the next time I needed something from the back of the shed. And another two hours here and another three hours there. I decided to just Pay the Man Once."
It got me to thinking, "When am I doing things on my projects where I'm paying over and over again instead of just practicing Pay the Man Once?
The games business traditionally shuts down for close to two weeks this time of year. After the crunch to ship games for the holidays, the time with our families is more than welcome.
But how much better could 2009 be -- and how much more family time might I be able to free up -- if I followed my friend's example?
What if I took just one day of that break to save several days of my time in 2009? What would I do?
Is there any way you could spend one day over the end-of-year break that you know would save you at least 2 days in 2009?
What would you like to do with your family or friends on those extra days you'll save next year? If you schedule the time off right after you "Pay the Man Once" you'll be a lot more likely to actually use the vacation.
And when you go on that vacation you'll remember how you got that time in the first place.
I'm going to make a list so I can make a good choice for myself. As soon as I find my notebook. It's around here somewhere. Oh, yeah... it's under that big stack of stuff I brought back from conferences this year. Or maybe it's...
Copyright (c) 2008, Don Daglow
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