On Productivity and the Bottomless Cavern of the Infinite Commute

I've often been asked by a couple of folks how I continue to produce so much gaming output. And while I usually answer with a fairly stock answer (which I wholeheartedly believed was the reason), I got a great big confirmation on it this week. My stock answer is this... I have the HUGE benefit of working from home. First off, that means the same computer with my work-work is also the enabler of my gaming stuff, so I can bounce back and forth at will from work files to gaming files. More importantly, my commute is officially the 27 steps from my bedroom to the chair in my office (ironically, it is also 27 steps from my chair to the coffee maker in the kitchen; I counted).

My wife gets up early and usually leaves the house by 7 a.m. (she's a teacher and assistant principal). I try to fix her breakfast and pack her lunch every day. That means I'm usually ready to get my day started about 7 a.m. I don't really need to get cracking on work stuff most days until 8:30 or 9. That pretty much means while you're commuting, I'm working on game stuff. And if it's a slow work day, I don't have to look busy until I clock out at 5. I can hop over to one of about a dozen things that are currently occupying my time, and work on those. Now consider I only need about 6 hours a night of sleep (more than that, I'm sleepy during the day) and my wife is usually in bed by 8:30. That leaves me time from about 8:30 to midnight to do... whatever.

For the last couple of days, I've been on a photo shoot for a client. Today, the drive from my house to the photographer's studio was about 45 minutes, and the drive home was about the same. Yesterday, I missed a turn because of traffic and the drive to the studio was nearly an hour, and the drive home was almost as bad. In the days of the job I had just before I went back to work for myself (I have worked from home during 2 different distinct career periods), the office I shared with my 2 business partners was near the same part of town as the photographer's studio. It wasn't as far away as the studio, but, at the time, there were massive amounts of road construction near our office (they were installing a new rail line). So even though the office was technically closer, it still took at least 45 minutes each day... each day. Considering a 5-day week, that's 8 hours a week (or more) in traffic. That's a full day's work!!! Plus, take part in a Dallas-area commute any day and you will find yourself mentally drained. The last thing you'll want to do when you get home is to keep working... on anything! Because of this photo shoot, my sum gaming production total for the last two days has been 5 one-sentence-long descriptions for some magic items I intend for the next Dragon Horde zine. I'm just glad I only have one of these photo-shoots every year.

Tomorrow my schedule should get back normal.