1. Having too much work
2. Having too little time
3. Doing work inefficiently

This is, of course, blindingly obvious, yet also something I tend to forget.

Most time management seems to focus on that third category - efficient working - yet there's an upper limit to how much improved efficiency can help squeeze into a day. Sure, you can reduce the amount of time you spend replying to the average email from, say, three minutes to thirty seconds. But if, like me, you receive about 300 emails a day which warrant some kind of response, that thirty-second average still adds up to a full two-and-a-half hours of email time, with little chance of further whittling down.

The next cause of trouble, then, is simply having too much work. Time management systems try to skirt this through prioritization, but, as Forster points out, the idea of priorities is a bit of a red herring. If you're going to get something done today, it doesn't really matter if it gets done first or last. The order only starts to matter once you've tacitly agreed not to complete all of your work. At that point, order becomes crucial, because it's the latter items that don't get completed at all. The 'C' task today is usually still a 'C' tomorrow, and the day after, and the day after that, and therefore never gets done. So, in short, the right place to prioritize isn't at the level of tasks, but at the level of commitments. You already fill 24 hours each day with something, so fitting in new obligations requires getting rid of an equal amount of time's worth of old.

But it's the third area - not enough time - that really gets short shrift in my own approach to managing time. I look at an open stretch of days on my calendar and think of them as 'empty'. But, of course, they aren't. The're full of all the work I have to do. Usually, that's fine; even with a few meetings and calls wedged in, I still have time to pack in the rest of my tasks. But, on weeks like this one, when my calendar spirals far out of control, and I'm left with only odd fifteen-minute chunks unbooked for days at a time, I find myself falling further and further behind on life, and feeling more and more stressed out as a result.

So, to combat that problem, a new policy, inspired by the trusty Roadie's Rule (no heavy drinking two nights in a row): no full days of meetings back to back. Or, in the simplest implementation of that I could figure out: no meetings, none, on Tuesdays and Thursdays. That way, no matter how bad my Monday, Wednesday, or Friday become, I'll always have at least one day in between to get back on top of life.

Which is to say, while updating MovableType, the software that runs this blog, I somehow managed to blow the brains out of both self-aggrandizement.com and CrossFit NYC's highly trafficked blog.

Fortunately, I back up the actual entry content for both. But not the design or code, which I've spent much of today rebuilding from scratch.

So, in short, if you see anything strange on either site, please let me know.

They were preparing to die, when one soldier found a map crushed down at the bottom of his pack. With the map in hand, they regained their courage, bivouacked for the night, and proceeded out of the mountains the next day to rescue.

Only when they were recuperating in the main camp did someone notice that the map they had been using wasn't a map of the Alps at all; it was a map of the Pyrenees.

When you are lost, any map will do.

Latest bit of CFNYC news: the CrossFit hype continues, with cover stories the past two weeks in Men's Journal and Muscle & Fitness.

Latest bit of Cyan news: looks like we just locked worldwide distribution rights to the film adaptation of Interpreter of Maladies.

No sleep till Brooklyn.

So, with consensus of the Cyan team, I've now re-instituted Anti-Casual Fridays, our old policy wherein we dress to the nines the one day each week that the rest of corporate New York (or, at least, the bankers with whom we've been dealing these days for our hedge fund) dresses down.

Of course, we're not a perfect converse of those bankers' schedule, as what qualifies as 'dressed down' in that world is something so Brooks Brothers catalog as to make even my CFO, a sailboat-owning WASP, cringe.

No, our casual still permits jeans and flip-flops. At least once the weather warms. But, even then, come the height of August, on Friday it should still be full-on Anti-Casual. Who doesn't love a khaki or seersucker suit?

"CrossFit is an internet-based cult of fitness for psychos, itinerant preachers, ex-killers, and crazy people of all stripes."

Sounds about right.

And, to be honest, I'd begun to have some doubts. Not because of any problems with the applications themselves, but because of how much they, in this first round, still leave to the imagination. A short synopsis, a couple of bios (director, writer, producer), and a few pages of screenplay isn't a lot to go on.

Of course, that was the point of the round: an attempt to initially separate the wheat from the chaff. Still, without any of the directors' work to screen until round two, I've had no real idea whether any of them can make movies that feel like real movies, rather than like student theses, and I'd started to fear the worst.

Today, however, I spent several hours screening graduate student shorts as one of the judges for NYU Film School's Wasserman Awards, their top honor for outstanding achievement in film*. And, in short, I was blown away. Sure, some of the stuff was exactly the sort of amateur-hour crap I'd feared. But at least two or three of the films were so astoundingly good that the judges actually clapped once they ended.

When the lights came up after one, another of the judges said, 'shit, somebody needs to give this guy a million bucks and tell him to just go make a feature.'

Which is good, considering that's basically what we're about to do.

*[Side story: as past Wasserman winners include Ang Lee and Spike Lee, I went in looking for any other Lee's who might have a leg up. There weren't any, though there was a Jennifer Li, and while I won't give away anything before NYU announces the awards, I will say her short was definitely in the top five.]

Perbacco (234 E 4th St @ B): Cash only, so stop at an ATM first. Then skip the forgettable entrees, and instead order as many of the Sardinian, tapas-style appetizers (and glasses of the excellently paired Italian wines) as you can afford. You'll literally crave more for days after.

Itzocan (438 E 9th St @ A): Cash only here, too, plus a wait to get in and sweltering heat once you do, given the closet-sized space and the adjacent, hard-firing oven. Suck it up. It's worth it.

Kanoyama (175 2nd Ave @ 11th): You knew there had to be a sushi place on the list, and this one's extraordinarily good. If you're feeling adventurous, ready for top-quality slices of fishes you've never even heard of, order omakase ('at the chef's discretion') and enjoy the best sushi bang for the buck in all of NYC.

As of today, it appears our third almost-home is falling through at the contract stage. This time, the landlord suddenly realized that a gym involves members coming and going - in other words, foot traffic - and decided he didn't really want such a populous use of the space.

So, though we've managed to extend by legal wrangling the lease in our current location to April 30th (no mean feat, given we previously knocked down our downstairs neighbors' ceiling), the countdown's on.

Add in Cyan and wedding planning, and the ulcer countdown is doubtless on, too.

Crap. Or, rather, not.

Apparently, a box of Duncan Hines yellow mix and a tub of Pillsbury Funfetti frosting is all it takes to make our week.