Though we still have miles to go before we sleep, I'm proud to report that in five years' time we have made slight, but definite, improvements in our batcher-ness. Originally posted January 24, 2006:
The other night, Brendon and I were chatting and ended up back on the same old subjects of, you know, what do we want to be when we grow up and how we can get our acts together. Nothing new there. But then, we rebelled. Why do we care so much, we asked ourselves? Why can't we just make peace with slackerness? Wouldn't that be such a lovely, messy, lazy peace? Ahhh, just imagine...
But, nooooooo, dang it, we couldn't just leave it there. It was just a brilliant few minutes before the caring came back and we were right back where we started. I gave up for the night and went to get ready for bed.
When I got to the bedroom, I was greeted by Brendon with, "You know what our problem is? I've figured it out...we're batchers."
Then is his most father-like, Steven Covey moment ev-er, he proceeded to explain our batcherness.
We ARE batch people. He is right. We do things in batches. Rather than being effective daily disciplinarians, we batch our life work. Everything we do, we save up until it HAS to be done, and then devote all our energy to doing it in one fell swoop. Need to clean up the house? Spend the day and get the sucker done top to bottom. After a few days, let the pile up begin...repeat. Need to get some work done? Do one task only, putting off other items of business until your batch task is completed. (Brendon does this with design work, me, grading.) Heck, my thesis could have been alternately titled: "How to batch six months worth of writing into six weeks." And on, and on, and on.
We were up until the wee hours of the morning, laughing about just how many things in our life have fallen prey to the batch theory. Just when one of us would be ready to drift off to sleep the other would start laughing and shout out, "I batch ________ too!" We even realized we are "sons" of batchers. LOL. It's a genetic condition!! We finally stopped when we decided that we were batching our batch conversation by staying up so late.
So, that's the story of The Batchers. Are you one too? Maybe we should start a support group, because we are now on a quest to relinquish our batcherhoods. If you are a daily disciplinarian and have any tips for us, pass them on...we're gonna need them.
2 comments:
I remember this post well. I am batcher, too. Maybe it really is genetic. I batch putting laundry away more than anything else. It can get so bad, all the clean clothes are neatly folded on the guest bed and everyone just comes in there to get what they need to wear out of their pile.
I'm glad I'm not the only Batcher. Thanks for the reminder I need to get my pile of paperwork done.
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