Do you ever find yourself wishing you could clone yourself to get things done? Most of us have more to do than we have time or energy to do. Since cloning is still the stuff of science fiction, at least for humans, let's take a look at ways we can actually do more than one thing at a time. It is possible to multi-task and get more done than we think. AND do it well.
1. Clean While Cooking.
While you are preparing meals, it is possible to clean at the same time, believe it or not. Simply fill up your sink with hot soapy water before you start prepping food. As you finish with a dish or utensil, put it into the hot soapy water to soak while you cook. Then, while items are in the oven, you can quickly wipe with a sponge or dishcloth, rinse and air dry. Use the soapy water to soak cooking pots and dishes while you eat. Easy breezy cleanup.
2. Let The Cleaning Products Do The Work.
Have you ever watched the housekeeping staff in a hotel? They come in, spray cleaner in the tub and sink, clean the toilet bowl and spray the outside of the toilet. THEN they go change sheets on the bed BEFORE they wipe or rinse a thing in the bathroom! While they are taking care of the bed the cleaning products are cleaning the bathroom. After the bed is finished and the room is vacuumed, they collect the dirty linens and wipe down the bathroom. Once they hang up clean towels, the room is done, with half the work!
3. Wash And Work.
Start a load of wash to be washing while you are busy with something else. There is no need to babysit the washer so load it, start it, and go tackle another 35-40 minute chore. When you are finished, it should be time to toss the wet clothes into the dryer and start another load going. Then, off to tackle another chore or two.
4. Make Driving Time Productive.
We certainly aren't advocating trying to read a physical book while driving. However, you can get books on tape (or CD) to play in the car while driving. You can check out all kinds of books on tape at your local library.
Along the same line, if you use an MPD player at home, you can also listen to books while you are doing other things at home.
5. Waiting, Waiting, Waiting.
It seems like no matter where we have an appointment, it means waiting. Rather than thumb through magazines that are months out of date, why not do some of your home bookkeeping. You can reconcile your checkbook, read a bit of a book, tweak your budget and so on. There are many things we can do to redeem the time we spend waiting to get in to see the doctor or dentist or eye doctor.
6. Talking On The Phone.
Sometimes it can feel like we spend a huge amount of time on the telephone. While talking on the phone, we an wipe down counters, clean out a kitchen drawer, empty wastebaskets, or clear off a tabletop. I'm sure you can think of other things you can do while on the telephone that don't require a lot of concentration. You can talk on the phone and accomplish something at the same time.
7. Freshen Carpets While You Dust.
Before you start dusting, sprinkle a bit of baking soda on your carpets. Go ahead and get all of your dusting done, and then vacuum. The baking soda works while you dust to neutralize odors trapped in your carpets. After you vacuum, the odor and baking soda are gone.
8. Virus Scan While You Sleep.
While you are sleeping is a great time to let your anti- virus software scan your computer. This is also an excellent time to de-frag your hard drive. The de-frag works most efficiently when you aren't doing something else on the computer.
