holliday

From “One True Sentence A Blog Devoted to Ernest Hemingway”:

With the economy likely in a recession, gas and food prices skyrocketing, and home values falling, consumers are curbing their spending at expensive restaurants especially abroad. In the midst of all of this financial despair, there is one very special restaurant in Italy that is making its meal ticket more affordable for Americans.

Ernest Hemingway was a frequent patron of Harry’s Bar in Venice, Italy and mentions the restaurant in his 1950 novel, Across the River and Into the Trees. If you were to visit Harry’s Bar today, you would see this sign on display outside of the restaurant.

“Harry’s Bar of Venice, in an effort to make the American victims of subprime loans happier, has decided to give them a special 20 percent discount on all items of the menu during the short term of their recovery.”

It is true that Ernest Hemingway believed “the very rich are different from you and me.” Arrigo Cipriani, the owner of Harry’s Bar, however, has found the opposite to be true: “You would be surprised how people like to have a discount on their bill whether they are rich or poor.” Hemingway aficionados, looking to take advantage of this offer, should be advised: alcoholic drinks are not included.

While I’m still not perfect on this, I’ve greatly improved and don’t procrastinate nearly as much. One thing that has helped me the most is making do to lists at least twice a week. I usually have one for the weekend and then a new one on Monday or Tuesday. When I’m overwhelmed with tasks it makes it less stressful to have all of them written down, so I can see what needs to be down instead of trying to remember it all. It’s a good feeling of accomplishment when I get things done and see the list getting smaller and smaller.

I may still finish things the night before they need to be done, but I’m no longer starting them the night before.

Trying to keep an empty inbox for my email helps too, it pushes me to answer emails at least the same day that I receive them (in most cases).

The firefox plugin “Morning Coffee” (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/2677), is very helpful with productivity as well. I can push one button and every site I visit regularly opens in tabs, so I get all of my regular reading out of the way first thing.

“Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that Our Lord finds our desires, not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea.”
-C.S. Lewis, as quoted in The Jesus I Never Knew by Philip Yancey, p. 111