Novice Pop

What Would You Do If You Only Needed Two Hours Of Sleep?

Word on the street is scientists are developing a new drug that would allow people to get by with just two to four hours of sleep a night. The drug would place a patient/user into a synthetic sleep that would supposedly be deeper and more re-energizing than the real thing. The reasoning behind the drug’s creation is due to the fact that we live in a world that, despite technological advancements that are supposed to make everything easier, requires us to do more and live a 24-hour lifestyle.

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Creative Block? Try Sleep Deprivation.

As a designer and illustrator, I pay my bills by coming up with new ideas for displaying and communicating information, whether it is instructions, a story, or meaningless babble such as this. And from time to time, as any creative will tell you, I have to deal with the dreaded creative block, an invisible force field through which original, intriguing ideas cannot pass.

I have numerous tools for fighting off this fiend, ranging from strategic thought processes to alcohol, but with the arrival of my son, I am now able to add an additional weapon to my arsenal, sleep deprivation.

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Time Management Tactics

The Baby-due-date countdown continues. There are ten weeks left in my wife’s pregnancy, and that’s only if our little bundle of joy is born on his due date. Honestly, I think he’s going to be a little early, which means we have less than ten weeks to get ourselves prepared, and we have yet to do the following:

• Empty the room that will become his of all the unpacked boxes remaining from our move.
• Prime and paint the room
• Assemble the crib and dresses
• Pre-register with the hospital, so time isn’t wasted filling out forms when it comes time for Owen’s arrival
• Sign up for and take various courses at the hospital, such as birthing, infant CPR, etc.
• Acquire all the other various items we have been instructed the we “MUST HAVE” for his arrival by numerous not-to-be named parties.
• Install the car seat in at least one of our two vehicles.

And I’m sure that more items will have to be added to this list as time progresses.

At first glance, ten weeks seems like plenty of time to get all these things done, but when you add to that list all of the current tasks and responsibilities we have right now it has gotten to be pretty overwhelming. We both work 40 hour weeks, and on top of that I put in an extra 25-40 hours a week freelancing, no to mention the fact that we’re still in the process of trying to get situated in our new house, a task much more tedious than I ever anticipated.

All this has made me look at ways to better manage our time. How can we maximize the productivity during the time we have available during our coming days in order to ensure that all of the tasks we need to complete get finished?

I’ve put together a list of strategies and ideas for helping do just this. Some of these are tactics I already put to use in my professional life, some are suggestions from friends and coworkers, and others are ideas I found while researching the topic.

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