I have a confession. I’m terrible at spending time. It could be that I’m not always wise in my spending decisions or, more likely, the universe is shorting me my 168 hour weekly due. Whatever the reason, I’m fearful that I may not have enough time left-over for retirement.
This is a scary thought. Instead of leisurely strolling Miami Beach looking for my car, I’m squatting on the curb in the watch district with a cardboard sign reading, “Buddy, can you spare a second?”
I’ve tried different approaches. I’ve tracked time, scheduled time, even considered buying a time-share (it must be more efficient to share time, right?). I’ve practiced Daylight Savings Time religiously but have come to the end of summer without any daylight or time left over.
Where does it all go? I don’t know, but I do have an idea. Here’s my theory:
Life is the Target store of time.
You know Target, right? It’s the store that sells milk and a DVDs at a decent price. So you go there to get both and you walk out with only a new Keurig Coffee Maker which you didn’t need because you already have one.
Target sucks your money; life sucks your time dry – especially virtual life. You know, the Internet, the web, the ADD capital of the world. I mean, unless somebody printed this up and mailed it to you, you’re most likely using it right now.
You log on to your email to get that one coupon you need and two hours later your viciously attacking some guy from Secaucus because he thinks Han shot first. Finally, in desperation, you brace yourself against the time-sucking winds of Internet and press Start so you can Stop and the computer shuts down. Phew!
But you forgot your coupon.
If the Internet was the only culprit, then the solution would be easy. But there are others. Television for one.
You click on local news to get today’s weather and instead you get a teaser forecast with an overly happy person telling you to stay tuned for the tornado forecast. Tornado? Damn, I have to sit here through the commercials which are dangerous themselves. Many of them offer you more Internet research possibilities. Is My Pillow really the best pillow? Did its creator indeed try every pillow on the market? Never mind, tornado! You have to stay focused.
The news comes back on and you wait through sixty seven other stories before you get to the tornado forecast, which, it turns out, there’s zero percent chance of a tornado today. But, stay tuned to find out how this Chihuahua saved its owner’s life from a grain thresher.
Time keeps on ticking, ticking, ticking — into the future. I want to fly like a seagull, to Wendy’s. Wait. That’s not right. Now I have to look up lyrics.
What’s more insidious is the rich time-happy fat cats have determined to separate us even more from our precious time. They’ve combined Internet and Television in a nefarious medium code-named Netflix. It’s supposed to be a time-saver because you can watch shows and movies whenever you want without waiting. And, to save you even more time, they’ll auto play the next episode so you don’t have to go looking for that wandering remote control.
You didn’t pick your child up from practice. You didn’t take the chicken out to thaw so now it’s dead. You forgot about that little thing you needed to do called work. But you did learn that Firefly ended in the most disappointing way. Good job. Make sure you put that in your journal for future generations.
Do you have time saved up for retirement? Time moves pretty fast. If you don’t start saving your precious seconds in a time-savings-account, you could miss it.
As for me, I’m going to Google why Firefly was canceled.
