Just a Few More Hours

For a while now I’ve been trying to think of a logical way to add some time to the day. All I really want is two more hours each day. I feel that will allow me to stay up until I’m sufficiently tired and get the sleep I need. Still, with a little extra time, I don’t think I’ll be able to squeeze everything I want into a day.

Besides sleep, the #2 use of my time is work. 40+ hours and 5 hours of driving to and from each week. Not much I can do about that since I enjoy paychecks. It could be worse, I’ve had a job that was 7 days a week and anywhere from 50-70 hours a week.

TV takes a large chunk out of each day. There are all the shows I watch, which thankfully are coming to their season’s end. A few are getting cancelled which will free up some time in the fall. Of course its the ones that I don’t want to get cancelled. Then you have the shows that are on every day. I keep up with The Daily Show and The Colbert Report. Eventually I get to watching every Letterman (skipping the guests I could care less about). Still there are some that don’t make the cut just because of time. These include Conan, PTI, and Countdown. Can’t the late night shows put out some sort of best of the week shows? I’d pay to see the clips of Letterman and Conan that are worth my time. Even if I hear about a good Conan clip NBC has it yanked from YouTube. I’m not sure what NBC is thinking by doing that. Now I’m less likely to watch Conan.

There is also a lot of TV that I’ve missed. Shows that I didn’t jump on board from the beginning require me to catch up, and there are some that I missed altogether. Currently the show I’m catching up on is The Wire. I’m getting the discs slowly through Netflix. While this is a pain to have to wait when I want to get to the next disc, its the safest approach. If I had them all in front of me I might as well just call off a week of work to watch the entire thing.

For some reason at work I don’t have a TV at my desk with cable and a DVR. I also don’t have internet so I have to search for other forms of entertainment. Its a good thing that we have an amazing morning show in Philadelphia: Preston & Steve. Its also a good thing that they post the whole show every afternoon for download. Otherwise I might have to ignore people all morning because I don’t want to miss anything. When I did have internet I would just listen after they posted the show in the afternoon, then I could pause when needed. I’m not allowed to have Sirius so I haven’t been able to get hooked on Stern. Possibly a good thing. I enjoy Stern’s show, its just that these radio shows are so long.

Let’s not forget about sports. I don’t watch nearly enough of Phillies’ games. I wish I had the time to watch every pitch. At least every pitch until they drive me crazy enough to change the channel. Then there are all the other games on and events throughout the year. I wish I could watch more NHL Playoff action, I’d even consider the NBA. Soon the College World Series will be starting and last year ESPN was nice enough to carry some of the Regional and Super Regional action, because they want as much of my time as they can get.

I also have a mountain of sites that I visit on a daily basis. I have to keep up with the many areas that interest me: sports, TV, movies, video games, social networking. Oh, did I mention tech sites? On top of that I try to keep on top of my sites. Writing the occasional blog post and adding some features to Ice Cream Helmet.

Have I mentioned I miss my Xbox 360? We barely get to spent any time together. I know its jealous of the Wii.

I do my best to combine some activities. When I do my web surfing I will catch up on Preston & Steve or watch something on my DVR that does not require my full attention.

What’s missing? Doing any sort of physical activity. For now, let’s just pretend its because Summer is just getting started. The pool is open and the weather is warming up, eventually allowing people into the pool sans wet suit. Playing softball and maybe a little effort on my part will take care of all that. But as you can see, where am I going to fit that into my day?