Sidetracked

[mrissa]

I'm in that mode where I can hardly ever do anything on the first try, because other things keep intervening and demanding to be done. In a particularly pathetic example, I got sidetracked on my way to brush my teeth by the fact that the hall closet door was open and displaying a box the right size for lydy's birthday present. So then I got out the present and removed the tags and found the tissue paper, and I realized that I had gotten sidetracked when I started to go get wrapping paper and tape. Which is important, don't get me wrong: Lydy's present does need to get wrapped one of these first years, before she declares it her birthday. It is on the list. It is not to be neglected. But really, brushing my teeth is something I should be able to do on the first go, without fetching tape, without sorting the laundry, without calling my grandmother, without putting away the book I finished last night, without transferring allochthon's cell number to my address book, without bagging the recycling. Walk to bathroom. Brush teeth. Those are the necessary steps. They are the only necessary steps.

I am now a little frightened to think of what steps will seem like natural and necessary progress towards putting my contacts in.

Some weeks.

Comments

[jackiejj.livejournal.com]

I am smiling with sympathy and recognition!

[wilfulcait.livejournal.com]

You don't take Allegra, do you? Because this sounds like me on Allegra. I came to work once without brushing my teeth or putting on socks, and I had to have a to-do list that not only said "wash laundry" but "move laundry to dryer before it mildews." Completely trashed my short-term memory.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Nope, the only drugs I take are birth control and iron supplement. I'm not like this most weeks. It's just when I have an incredibly busy week that all the tasks come in on me at once.

[wilfulcait.livejournal.com]

K calls that "head explody."

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yep. That.

[supergee.livejournal.com]

The world is all too rich in distractions.

[dsgood.livejournal.com]

I wonder if it's a problem with making choices.

[diatryma.livejournal.com]

I do that sometimes; I'll lose track of what I went in a certain direction for, do something else on the way, then not have any idea where I was going or what I was doing. I seem to put my initiative in my movement, so I'll walk to a room and either automatically do the thing I meant to do before the other thing distracted me, it'll occur to me as I walk, or I'll have to leave, walk in again, and hope that the action inspires me.
Eventually, things get done.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Sometimes when I'm in this "do everything right now" mode, I repeat my intentions aloud to myself: "laundry, laundry, laundry" or the like.

Crud, laundry! *zoom*

[pariyal.livejournal.com]

Ooh, that sounds like my Lenten-resolution problem. I resolved at one time to do anything that needed doing immediately; that made me get distracted by everything, quite the opposite of what I wanted it to do. Having had a holiday in the meantime, I realise that the feeling that I never got round to anything (which prompted the resolution) was mostly stress. Now I'm free of the stress, I know that lots of things need doing but it's all right to do them when they come up.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I am not free of the stress.

Alas.

[carbonel]

When I was packing to move in 2003, I pretty much gave up on doing any other procedure. I called the ADHD method of packing. I bounced from room to room, putting something in a box, realizing that this object belonged in the box in another room, and going there and dealing with that box until something moved me to another room, and so on.

It actually worked surprisingly well, though I doubt it would have if I had been sharing the work with anyone else, except for a couple of structured occasions.

Now if only I could get everything unpacked. It's been over a year; this is ridiculous.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yah, unpacking is much harder than packing. Cannot be delgated.