I have really been assessing my time management in the past few weeks and have come to realize that I spend way to much time on the computer. Half the time, I don’t even know what I am doing. I will check one website and then go to another, go back to the first to see if anything has changed and then go to another. After about an hour, I want to slap myself and I give myself a little talkin’ to.
What are you doing?
It’s not like I have tons of stuff that I have to do online. I check a couple forums, all my blogs that I follow and a couple other sites aside from my emails. So I basically frequent about 5 sites a day. Yet I seem to waste about 4 hours a night on the computer after the boy’s go to bed.
So in an effort to cut down on my computer time, I started using a software that I bought a few months ago.
Ultra Hall Text to Speech Reader will read any document out loud in one of its many high quality voices. You can also convert it to a .wav file and upload it to your MP3 player.
So each night before I go to bed, I will convert all the blog posts and articles that I wanted to read for the day to a .wav file and upload them to my iPod. Then, during the next day’s housework or errands, I will catch up on all my reading. This frees me up from a lot of computer time so I can attempt to do the things I am suppose to do. Now I just have to find the motivation in the evenings to do those things.
For now, this is my magic solution.
Feel free to visit Rocks in my Dryer for more Works for me Wednesdays.
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This seems like a good idea. Do you find it difficult to remember what blogs you wanted to comment on? That is the thing that would worry me.
I have been only really using this for blog posts for about a week or so. So I am still working out a system that works for me.
I will usually do one file for each blog. So if Rocks in my Dryer has 3 posts, I will copy and paste the first post and then I will type next blog post (I like the verbal warning that I am about to begin the next post as I am usually don’t stuff while listening). And I will continue to post each following blog post for Rocks in my Dryer.
Then for the next blog that I read, I will do the same thing. When it comes time to saving and naming the file, I will save as w-rocks in my dryer, that way I know what day it is from and what blog.
I have started starting the posts that I convert in my google reader so that I can easily find them when I want to come back and comment on them. But I am still fine tuning my method.
But this program has worked wonderful for articles that I have wanted to read on Carm.org or Worldnet Daily but I just don’t have the time to sit down and read.
Thanks for your comment.
Amen! This sounds like a great idea. Unfortunately I have a Man and no iPod (I know gasp!). It sounds like something to look into though. Thanks for the tip!
Wow, this could be just the thing I’m looking for to break out that MP3 player and give it a try. Thanks for the tip!
that’s brilliant! I love listening to things on my ipod such as podcasts so this is a great idea! But, you don’t get to “listen” to all the cool pics and graphics
Wow, interesting!
Good for you for trying to get your priorities back in line! Keep up the great work!!
I never knew something like this existed. Sounds like a fantastic way to multi-task.
I also spend WAY too much time on the computer and am trying to figure out a way to fix that.