Marla the Blogger

My in-laws are visiting for the weekend; when I told my coworkers they were coming, I usually got sympathy or jokes; however, I'm always quick to admit that I get along with them very well and they are good house guests. Because we live so far away from friends and family, we get frequent visitors and, well, some people are better house guests than others.  I recently went to Cincinnati for business and a few extra days of visiting friends and stayed with my brother-in-law and his wife. They are always very generous about letting me stay with them and I try to make sure I'm a good house guest in return. Here are a few things I try to do when I'm staying with someone else that I've learned from having good house guests:

• Make your plans/expectations known in advance - if you have something specific you need to do or want to accomplish with your visit, let your host know ahead of time so they can plan appropriately. When people come to visit us, if they tell us in advance they want to tour Fenway Park or visit the Old North Church, we're happy to plan for that. What's harder is when they show up and say they want to see something "historic" and then leave it to us to figure out all the details.
• Go out of your way to help - even if you know your offers to do dishes or pay for groceries will be refused, it's still nice to try. If someone is generous enough to let you stay with them for a few days, it's always nice to offer to help out around the house or minimize your impact on their expenses while you're there.
• Be flexible - we all have our own favorite routines and schedules, but just because you usually watch your favorite reality show every Tuesday night at 9 in your pajamas doesn't necessarily mean your host will be up for it. Consider that you are interrupting their routine as well and try to be understanding if your usual habits have to be put on hold during your visit.
• Know when to stay somewhere else - this may be difficult to suggest, but sometimes the best visit is one where you aren't the house guest. It may be more comfortable for you (and your friends or family) if you actually stay at a hotel nearby instead of at their house. You can still spend a lot of time visiting with them, but you may find the visit more pleasant for both groups if you're not crammed into close quarters or sleeping on the world's most uncomfortable sofa sleeper.

I usually try to keep up on current events; I listen to the news on the radio in the morning and evening and read the headlines online throughout the day. Plus I occasionally read the paper and catch some cable television news. It seems like lately, though, there has been a lot of bad news being reported. I want to keep up with what's going on in the world, but hearing so many depressing stories can be, well, depressing. So today I decided to come up with some ideas to stay informed without letting getting caught up in too many negative thoughts:  

• Limit the amount of news - Most stories that happen overnight will be reported in morning news and whatever happens during the day will still be news in the evening. I'm going to try to stick to listening to/reading news no more than twice a day so I'm not dwelling on the information too much or hearing the same bad news over and over.
• Seek out some good news - Believe it or not, there is good news to be had. Do a search online for "good news" or "happy news" and you'll find some websites that publish just good news stories.  
• Focus on the good news in your world - Who's getting married? Having a baby? Just got a promotion at work? I'm going to check in with friends and family more frequently and ask them what good news they have to share. 
• Try to take the long view - Try to think back to something that was terrible when it happened, but years later doesn't seem nearly as bad. In my early twenties, I was engaged to be married and then the wedding was called off. At the time I thought I'd never recover, but a year later I started dating my husband and we've been happily married now for seven years. Most people don't even know or remember that I had been engaged to someone else first.  Bad news might seem terrible today, but weeks or even months from now, it might be insignificant.  

I'm not going to hide my head in the sand and pretend that bad things aren't happening. But I think by limiting my exposure to news, and bad news specifically, it will help me keep things in perspective and not dwell too much on the negative. Life has a lot of ups and downs and I think in the end, the positive outweighs the negative. I'm going to keep that in mind and focus more on the good news.

I'm always looking for more ways to save time and make better use of my time; this week I read two different articles on time management. On the Start Making Choices website, there is an article suggesting I should Become a Mono-Tasker and focus on doing one thing at a time. Also, on Working Moms Against Guilt, one of the blogs I read regularly, they have a post on How to Squeeze More Out of an Hour, which advocates doing more than one thing at a time. So, which approach is better? With our over extended schedules and never-ending to-do lists, is it better to only concentrate on one thing at a time to make sure you do it quickly and correctly? Or should you try to maximize your limited time by multi-tasking? Actually, I think that both approaches are correct. When I first read each article (quickly, I may add) I thought: wow, these are really different points of view.  But then I re-read each of them more carefully, and realized both approaches can work.

Why should you "mono-task"?  Well, quite simply, the more distractions you have, the longer it takes to do something and the more likely you are to make errors. I find this is true for me both at work and at home. More often than I like, I start working on something, get distracted by a phone call or email or request from my husband or son, and then I have to ask myself, "now, what was I just doing?" And the older I get, the longer it seems to take for me to remember and get back on track.

What about "multi-tasking"? There are certainly some times when it is appropriate to multi-task. As it mentions in the post on getting more out of your time, it makes sense to "[d]o mindless jobs when you can be interrupted." One of the suggestions I already do: make phone calls while doing a mindless task. I frequently make phone calls while folding laundry. I think it's the perfect mindless task for it, because it's quiet so the other person doesn't hear you clanging dishes around or anything in the back ground. Another multi-tasking technique I'm going to try to do more is doing something productive while you're waiting. For years I've noticed that my dad almost always has something to read with him, so if he's stuck standing in line or sitting in a waiting room, he isn't just waiting idly but reads. I've never been good about remembering to carry a book with me, but I usually have my checkbook and could pay bills or, a good example from the article, write thank you notes.  And, the second article does advocate mon-tasking as well: working on projects that need your full concentration when you won't be interrupted.

I think both mono-tasking and multi-tasking can help you be more organized and use your time better.  I have to admit, I do more multi- than mono-tasking, but I agree that there is a real benefit to focusing on one task at a time. I'm going to try to employ more mono-tasking and cut the distractions out, especially at work. But, for more mindless tasks or other time "wasters", I'm going to also keep multitasking so I can get more out of my time. What about you? Are you a mono-tasker or a multi-tasker?