Focused - 30: Tito Needs to Pay the Rent

Episode Date: September 19, 2017

So you're working in a house full of kids. Or a partner who is there all the time. It can make working from home difficult to say the least. We discuss the good and bad of working around kids (and others) who are in your house with you.

David Sparks and Jason Snell spent their careers working for the establishment. Then one day, they'd had enough. Now, they are independent workers learning what it takes to succeed in the 21st century. They are free agents. Welcome back to Free Agents, a podcast about being an independent worker in a digital age. I'm Jason Snell, and I'm joined as always by my fellow host, Mr. David Sparks. Hi, David. Hi, Jason. It's good to be back.

Another fortnight, another Free Agents. It's good. Yes. Now, as we're recording this, I have entered a very, very special phase in my life as a free agent. Oh, really? really what's that the kids went back to school amen and and that's actually our topic this time is um one of the things that happens if you work at home is you may have other people in your home with you and how do you deal with that how do you deal with the distractions in general but especially of other human beings in your house? Because for me, every summer, I have

two kids with sometimes nothing to do. We try to keep them busy, but that doesn't always work. And it completely changes the dynamic of my house. You may also have a spouse who works at home. That's also something that happens from time to time. But I felt like this is worth a conversation about how we deal with distractions in our house when we're working. Yeah. Who is it that said hell is other people? I don't know. Somebody with a family. I think this is a good show to cover because this is a real challenge for a lot of free agents. I think especially if you work from home, part of the idea is, hey, I'll get to work from home and spend more time with my family.

And it doesn't always work out that way. But let's just talk about that for a little bit. So I worked at an office for a long time, you know, for 22 years. And my kids, who are now teenagers and even post-teenagers, when they were young, daddy went to work, put on a tie, and disappeared for hours at a time. And I was doing a lot of litigation at the time, so I had a lot of long hours. I was doing a lot of litigation at the time, so I had a lot of long hours. And I really have regrets looking back for those years that I feel like I wasn't at home as much as I would like to be. I think that as much as we talk about it and make jokes about it, being able to be around your spouse or your significant other and your kids more often is a real advantage of being a free agent and working at home. I agree. I think it's a huge advantage. I definitely felt one of my calculations in

going out on my own was I saw how quickly my kids were growing up and how they were going to be out of the house before too long. And I'd already missed a lot of time. And when I worked at home, I would get some of that time from my office. But most of the time I was going into San Francisco and I was not getting back until late. There was a period in there where there were basically, there were two dinners in my house. There was a kid dinner and then there was an adult dinner because the kids couldn't wait for me to get home because I got home so late. So Lauren would make them food and then we would have dinner when I got home. And that was, that was definitely a factor. Um, and I regret not, you know, I did as much as I think I could, but I regret not having that time, that fleeting time when they were younger.

At the same time, though, I think about the way that I interact with them now while I work at home, especially when they're out of school in the afternoon or when they're out of school for the summer. And I wonder, actually, if I would have felt capable of doing this job at home in my garage if my kids were in, you know, second and fifth grade. Because the neediness scale ramps way up and you know the way that worked was that when they were that little my wife wasn't working she wasn't a librarian she was taking some classes and maybe working a few hours but um they she was taking care of them but you know if i had little kids and my wife in the house while I was working, that would be a totally different dynamic. And my gut feeling is from the distractions that I get in the summertime when the kids are here, and they're basically self-sufficient,

that it would have been, it would have required a whole lot more discipline. And I do wonder sometimes if it would have driven me to get a separate office space somewhere if they were younger. Yeah. We talked about it being an advantage. You could just spend more time with your kids, though. But it is not an advantage in the sense that you get to replace daycare for young kids with yourself. Yeah. Yeah. That's an important, I think, I don't know, some people probably have that illusion that they're going to be able to work from home and they're going to be the childcare, especially if you end up in a situation where you're like, well, what if you have, we talked last time about the spreadsheet. What if one of the calculations you decide to make in the spreadsheet is I'm going to be able to save some money on childcare because I'll be able to take the kids because I'll be at home. because I'll be able to take the kids because I'll be at home.

So I'm going to take them to school and then I'm going to pick them up and bring them home instead of having them go to an after school care or something like that. And everybody's different, but I will just say that I don't think that's realistic because child care requires attention. You can't, you know, it's very difficult to have a child, especially if they're younger, and just go back to focusing on your work. I don't think that actually works. And also, it's a distraction. Like, once you're driving, you know, or walking or whatever, the kids to school and from school, that's more limitation in your schedule. Suddenly now at 2.45 or whatever, you've got to get up every day.

And if you can schedule that, and I used to pick up my son from school, from elementary school sometimes, and it was great. But it's another thing on your calendar that you have to do. And you've got to factor that in too. So there's a lot to do. And, and you've got to factor that into, so there's a lot of, there's a lot of downside. And, you know, I just, I'm not a believer that you can be a, an actual childcare provider and work simultaneously. I don't think it can be done. Yeah. I feel like it's like a trade. It gives you some flexibility to help out, but you've got to pay for that. Um, we had a, my older daughter had a car issue and she had to deal with the car and she was intimidated by it. And I said, okay, I will help you deal with the car. And so I spent two and a half hours

dealing with the car. That didn't mean that I, you know, could just, you know, knock off the usual time that night and be done. I had to make up that two and a half hours somewhere. And so it gives you a little bit of flexibility, but it's just long-term. It is not a solution, especially with younger kids. I think younger kids are really hard. Yep. Yeah. We had a, um, over the summer we had due to some family things, we ended up being daycare for a four-year-old in my house and this four-year-old, he, I'm his favorite uncle.

I mean, I like star Wars. I have, I have a lightsaber. I'll do fights with him. Um, you know, so I have, I have a lightsaber. I'll do fights with him. Um, you know, so I'm, we have a great time together and he's used to coming over here for family events where I, I give him almost exclusive attention. And suddenly he was here two or three days a week all day. And, and it was a shock for him that, you know, uh, in the, my wife's Filipino in the Philippines, uncle's Tito, it was, it was shocking to him that that, you know, and my wife's Filipino and the Philippines uncle's Tito. It was shocking to him that Tito could not just spend the whole day doing lightsaber battles with

him. You know, he just did not understand. Tito would have loved to do lightsaber battles all day. Let's be clear. Yeah, I would have, but Tito also needs to pay the rent, you know? So, and I really gave, that's one of the reasons this show started percolating for me is that experience with that younger kid because my heart goes out to anybody who's a free agent at home with a young kid who they they are so sincere they want they want nothing more than to spend time with you and trust me when they get older they don't feel that way um and so why wouldn't you want to spend all the time with them, but you can't. And, and you got to figure out how to, how to make that work. You know, how do you set limits and,

and deal with that? I can tell you with, with, with Oliver, what I did was I would just close the door and say, when Tito shuts the door, it means he has to work. And kids will really accept that. I mean, small kids, especially. And the other thing that we did is I would play with him, but I would set the oven timer. And this is a trick I learned. I mean, so we're going to go on a sidetrack with kids here, but for some reason,

when my kids were little, if I told them, if I'd look at my watch and say, okay, time's up or like, if you guys have to trade now or whatever, to be fair, they never believed me.

But if the oven timer goes off to them, that's like the law. They just accept that as the law. So I'll go down, I'll set the oven timer for 20 minutes. We'll have a great battle and then I'll go back to work. And so we were able to find some balance, but I was not his daycare. My wife was his daycare. And she's the one that made him hot dogs and dealt with all the issues of his day. And I just really believe that it's almost impossible to take care of a small kid and be a free agent working from home.

Yeah, and if there is another caregiver in the house, then you can do it. But there are still lots of issues, as you just described. I think that's one of the important things about this is you, like, doors are a good way to do it. Signs can be a good way to do it. I had, obviously, my kids are older now. So, the door, just as it does with my wife, actually, the door plays an important role in message setting. Sometimes I leave the door open. And the implication there is not that I'm asking people to come in and talk to me. But if I leave the door open, there, it's like, it's okay.

It's like, come in and do some laundry, come in and talk to me the door is open it's fine if i close the door i'm asking for isolation and then i have a third step as a podcast person which is i have a do not disturb sign that i put on the door yeah and i do that when i'm recording podcasts for the most part but i do have a do not disturb sign like you have in a hotel that i hang on the doorknob that basically says do not open this door so there's levels there and that works pretty well because my kids know that they can come in and ask me but they also i think know and if they don't they maybe have internalized when they open that door and i glare at them a little bit that they need to um you know they need to have a good reason to do that at that point

which they they do and it's fine but the the door helps now you got to have a good reason to do that at that point, which they do and it's fine. But the door helps. Now, you got to have a door, right? If you don't have a door to shut, then this makes it harder. I'd say that that's when you're considering your space planning, this is one of those issues. Like if you've got a child and a caregiver at home and you're trying to work and your workspace is the couch or something, it's going to be a problem. It's right because you can't block out the space. You may need to go somewhere else, whether it's into a bedroom or out of the house in order to

do your work. But I'm fortunate to have a door that I can close and send a message that, you know, when the door is closed, don't casually interrupt me. I'm reminded of that viral video two or three months ago where I think it was CNN or some news network. They were interviewing a guy from his home office and suddenly you see the kid walk in the background as they're on the news and the kid's wandering in and then the mom flies in the door. Did you ever see that video? Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. And she's trying to get the kids out meanwhile he's just trying to pretend there's nothing going on he's doing that bbc interview and she's yeah she's

like crawling across the floor trying to pull the child away and yeah exactly right i i feel for that guy right because i think i think we've all we've all been there to a certain degree and the wife is trying to you know she's she's the she's the caregiver there while the husband's doing the TV interview, and the kids are on the loose. And, you know, they outnumber her. Yes. And that's tough. So, yeah. That's great. Now, the flip side is as they get older, like, suddenly, they are not as interested in you spending time with them.

And so I'm living now with no longer preteens, but teens and actually one in college. And there's still an element to it, though. When you are working from home with these older kids, they still need support and they still need help. They don't necessarily want to ask you for it. But when you're around and it's convenient, they will ask you for it. And it's as simple as like problems saying my iPhone charging cord is broken. Yeah. And I had to kind of have a conversation with my kids saying, I know you have issues in your life and if it's a big deal, interrupt me. But if it's

not a big deal, you know, keep them. And then when I'm done working, we can address those problems, you know, and, and, and kind of setting an expectation with them that just because I'm here doesn't mean, you know, you can interrupt me at any moment for whatever, you know, itching and scratching. And, and that took a little work as well, but they're older and, you know, itch you need scratching. And that took a little work as well. But they're older and, you know, you can kind of get through to them after a little bit. You don't want to be a jerk about it, but at the same time, you know, it's like,

dad's got to work. Don't let me do my thing. And they're more capable. And what I found is that if I'm a little less accessible, they will learn to do those things on their own, which is great because they should. They do need at some point to learn how to do it on their own. is great because they should they do need at some point to learn how to do it on their own and i'm not asking my kids to like you know get out a

frying pan and put some olive oil in it and cook some meat or something like that you know i'm not but it's it's like you know yeah you can probably get your own popsicle you can get your own you know make your own piece of toast things like that that i don't need to be involved with, or that could be delayed until later when I'm not working. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I do think that an advantage of working with teens and later at home is that it does give you, as a parent, a window into their lives to kind of see what they're doing, which you wouldn't get if you're away. And it'll also, I think it gives you kind of a toehold to get more involved with what they're doing. Like one of the things I do with my kids is like my older one, she really likes going to Starbucks with me and doing homework. And it's a silly

thing. You know, we go to, we do at least once a week and, and we don't even talk much there, but it just kind of gives us time to be together, which wouldn't be possible if I was putting on the suit and going into the office. So, you know, I think, you know, there's advantages to this and you should look for some of those

opportunities to, to become a little bit more of a part of their life when you are working at home. Well, we've got a lot more to talk about on this topic, but I think it's time for our first sponsor, which is FreshBooks, David.

FreshBooks. Yeah. FreshBooks. So all our freelancers out there, you know how important it is to make smart decisions for your business and our friends at FreshBooks can save you up to 192 hours with their cloud accounting software for freelancers. That's ridiculously easy to use. So you need to get paid and that's what FreshBooks solves for you. By simplifying tasks like invoicing, tracking expenses, and getting paid online, FreshBooks has drastically reduced the time it takes for over 10 million people to deal with their paperwork. I mean, these guys have a lot of experience.

email reminders. So I'm really bad about this. If someone doesn't pay me and I don't keep track of it, I don't give them notices. And if you let enough time go by, like if somebody is a month or two behind, then that's their problem. But if you let it go six months, it's your problem. So FreshBooks solves this for you. They do it automatically and you spend less time chasing payments and FreshBooks, you know, the robots in the FreshBooks system do it for you. And tied to that is when you email a client an invoice, FreshBooks can show you whether they've seen it. So if you're following up, you can see that they've actually seen the invoice. Sometimes I'll look and it shows that they haven't seen the invoice yet. I'm like, okay, something went wrong. So then I can make sure they get the invoice. So

it puts the end of the guessing games as to whether they've actually seen the invoice. So it puts the end of the guessing games as to whether they've actually seen the invoice. FreshBooks may now have over 10 million users, but they've managed to stay a pretty small company, landing them the title of small giant on Forbes' list of small companies this year. Now, if you're listening to this and not using FreshBooks yet, now is the time to try. They are offering an unrestricted 30-day free trial to listeners of the show. No credit card required. All you have to do is go to freshbooks.com slash free agents, and that's one word, and enter free agents in the how did you hear about us section.

If you've got some clients that you need to get some billings out to, just try this. Go do the free 30-day trial and see how easy it is. I'm sure you're going to love it. We want to thank FreshBooks for their support of the show and making it easier for all those free agents out there to get paid. Let's talk about some other issues here. We mentioned having a significant other, having a partner working in the house. That can be an issue. My wife is now mostly working a regular schedule, but for a while there, she was working in the house a couple of

days a week. And we had similar issues, right? That she's not going to come in and ask me to toast bread for her or anything like that. But it was the same kind of issues of what does the door closed and open mean? And what's the conversation like? And how do we do that? And there are some challenges there. And I said, yeah. He says, oh, that is never going to work. He was insistent. He says, mark my words, in a year, you are either going to have an office or you are going to be divorced. He says, you guys will drive each other crazy. And I kind of took it as a challenge, to tell you the truth. Because, I don't know, my wife and I have, I'd like to think, a really good relationship.

We get along great. But working at home with her here as well uh is a challenge um you know she does like social media for scrapbook companies she's got like a little independent business she runs and she's also a chauffeur because my my youngest daughter goes to school at an art school that's far from our home and she's always in plays and she's you know i i feel so bad for the amount of driving my wife does although she does listen to a lot more podcasts than i do these days um but anyway so uh when we started this whole thing of both of us being at

home uh you know we i i did wonder if it would work or not and uh now i've been doing it over two years and it seems like it's working fine for me. Yeah, that's good. That's good. Sometimes it's... But we... Go ahead. We did have to like kind of grow into it.

Yeah. Yeah, I think that's it, right? You're both adults and it's like there are boundaries that you set and Lauren and I have had several conversations about like what does this mean and what does that mean when one of us has gotten frustrated with the other one

because, you know, why are you looking at me that way i just came in to ask this question it's like but i was working on this thing and it took some you know effort to codify like how this how this works so that you know we're um we're able to do it but you know we did we learned and grew and it was fine for us i think one of the things that we had to kind of get used to was the idea that just because we're both home doesn't mean we need to spend a lot of time together every day. We don't eat lunch together. I mean, we're both in the same house and, and once in a while we will eat lunch together, but it's just kind of happenstance. Some days I don't eat lunch or she doesn't. And I don't feel like I'm obliged to schedule the lunch around her because I may have a bunch of phone calls I need to make early or late in the afternoon. So we kind of got through that.

We take walks where I live, and it's fun to take walks together. But if one of us isn't feeling it that day, we're like, I'm not going to do it today. And the other one goes without them. And, and I think just kind of giving each other permission to, to live our lives and do our jobs, uh, without needing to like coordinate everything is, is what really was the kind of the magic sauce for us to get this figured out. Yeah. Makes sense. Okay. Um, so, so Jason, how do you know when this this isn't working well that's that's a real good question i think um i think the challenge is i mean frustration lack of uh productivity feeling that you're missing your deadlines you're uh getting distracted

um i think if you've got kids in the house and you love your children but now they're starting to be you feel like an impediment like they're they're frustrating you i mean some of the emotional signs may may become noticeable to you before anything else it's like i feel like this is uh these are all signs like Like if you, if you feel your productivity is being impaired in some way, or you're getting really frustrated by what's going on, um, that means it's not working. Yeah. It could even be just like the way the space is being used. I mean, when you're working from home and there's other people, they're going to do things in your home that may, may annoy you. And, um, and you've got to pay attention to all those little things,

because what you don't want to do is let it build up to like my client's threat that we'd be in divorce court. You know, it's like, get so angry at each other. You can't stand each other anymore. I wasn't going to say that, but it is a sign that if the people who are around you, It is a sign that if the people who are around you, adult or child, are not showing any signs of being able to get with the program, of doing what you need to do in order to make your space workable, that is also a sign, right? You could be doing your best. You feel like you're doing everything you can. And the fact is, if the other people just aren't doing it to your satisfaction and i'm not saying that that makes them bad but like if it doesn't if it's not working it's not working and if they can't adjust their behavior for whatever reason uh if and it could be that your needs are are not

realistic for them to follow like you you might have specific needs doesn't mean either of you is bad i guess is what i'm saying but you may have judgment you may have some very specific needs doesn't mean either of you is bad i guess is what i'm saying but you may have you may have some very specific needs in order to have a good workplace work environment and for them to behave in a way that fulfills those needs is unrealistic for them at which point again the answer is nobody's at fault here really it doesn't work that's the that's the bottom line it doesn't work and and you know you try to adapt but at some point, if it's not working, then you need to start being realistic about it. I mean, I haven't got to that point. You know, I've had days of frustration, but I've never felt like, oh, this isn't working. I need to get an office.

And part of it for me is I just don't want to go to an office. I mean, all of the time investment, putting aside the money, but just commuting and dealing with other people. You go to an office, you're going to have other people there, too. So I have a very high threshold for it, I think. But also my family's been very cooperative, and we've been very open about it. But having those open conversations is really good. and we've been very open about it. But having those open conversations is really good. But if the conversations aren't getting you anywhere,

you need to start thinking about what to do next. And I don't think you necessarily start with, say, okay, I'm going to go get an office. Maybe it is like, no, we need to put the kids in daycare. If this is going to work for me. If you've got young kids and it's just not working, we need to get daycare. And just like if I had a jobby job where I was going to work for me. If you've got young kids and it's just not working, we need to get daycare. And just like if I had a jobby job where I was going to work, we need to take them somewhere so I can have the house empty to get my work done. That may be the solution.

Depending on what it costs, it may be more cost effective to do that. It may be more cost effective to get an office and to pay for daycare. It sort of depends on what the daycare is, what the timing is, and where you live, all of those things. Also, there's some intervening steps, right? Like, it may be that there's only certain times of the day that it's a problem, at which point you could go somewhere, right? Maybe you need to explore the cafe life, right? Where at the height, like, I think school is a good example of this if you've got kids especially little kids in school and they get out of school in the afternoon and that's when your house goes from being a good work environment to being a disaster area and you

may have a caregiver at home but it's still spillover maybe you decide that in the afternoons you're going to go work somewhere else you know know, and just at Starbucks or something. And that can be part of your routine. And that might be all you need to do. There are lots of different options before you say, oh, this isn't working. I literally, I need to get an office or we need to move to a bigger place where I've got a room that I can, where I can lock the door or something like that. There are some interim steps there. Yeah, I still have. where I can lock the door or something like that. There are some interim steps there.

Yeah, I still have. It's not necessarily related to the people so much as sometimes I just need a change of environment where I will go to Starbucks and work and works all the time. Yeah, absolutely. Sometimes I'm straining to write an article and it's just not coming. And change of scenery makes all the difference. And in the summer, I'm more likely to try change of scenery in the house to a different location or into the backyard. But especially in the winter when the house is kind of cold and the backyard is wet, I will more often go to a Starbucks or something. It gets me out of the house.

I can walk to Starbucks, so it gives me a little bit of activity. And then I can sit there with my headphones in and drink my hot chocolate and it works like that change of scenery really works so that that's an option is just to retreat basically during the tough times if the tough times are all the times it's a harder thing although i do know people who spend a lot of time working out of cafes and you can do that and that that um and i, like, libraries is another place. The library is a place where lots of people go as a public space. And they've got internet, and they've got tables, and they've got quiet. And you can do your work at some place like a library. It doesn't even have to be a cafe. So there are lots of different options if you need to get out before you necessarily have to rent a space. If you need to get out before you necessarily have to rent a space. Jason, I know that when your kids, we made jokes about the beginning of the show, but when your kids are in school versus when they're on summer break, you have very different kind of like procedures in your house to allow you to work at home. Yeah.

Can you kind of share some of that with us? Yeah. Well, I mean, some of it is, like I said before about the door. I think the big differences are, um, first off, they don't wake up to go to school. And so I have to be more aggressive about getting myself up because my wife doesn't work until like nine 30. So with the kids, the kids go out the door during school year at between seven 45 and eight 10. That's my daughter is out at 7 45 my son's out at 8 10 and so we're up like we're up at 7 i mean maybe one of us stays in bed a little bit there but it's very different where everybody's kind of dozing we could really we could literally

doze everybody but my wife could sleep as long as they wanted and she would need to get up maybe by nine in order to get in at 930 or 845 or something very late. Right. So in the summer, paradoxically, I have to be the one who gets up like I have to be the one who is the pioneer in the morning. Who's like, I'm up. I'm making the tea. I'm going to make breakfast. I'm going to read a little bit. I'm going to get about my day and I have to exercise some discipline in getting out into the office here and doing my job because everybody else is just asleep and it's

hard it's so hard when everybody's asleep to be the one who is stirring and doing the work but i have to do that so that you can't you can't even really blame that on your kids no no it's i mean someday they're going to go off to college you're going to the same challenge yeah exactly right it's just it's just the natural rhythm changes. So that's some of it. And I would say another thing is in the summer, because the weather tends to be better, I can do some backyard work, which is great, where I can just sit in a chair in the backyard and do work. And then the other summer issue, I guess I would say, is also my garage often on a hot day will get really hot in the late afternoon. The sun shines in in the afternoon.

It's shining on the side of the house. The house is radiating heat into there. I don't have any air conditioning or anything like that. And on a hot day, an open window won't help. And so sometimes I have to escape my workspace in the late afternoon and go in the backyard because I have no other, it's too hot to work. So that's some of it. And then, you know, I don't know. I think that's most of it.

The door being open and closed, occasionally reminding them to quiet down if I'm doing a podcast or something, you know, and it works. But what it does do is it does cut off some of my options. Like the summer, the door stays closed a lot. The winter or when, when it's not school, when it's school time, the door stays open a lot. The dog comes in, the cat comes in. I can, I can, I can see into the kitchen.

I can just walk out into the kitchen and, um, I can work at the bar top in the kitchen, which I did yesterday i wrote a couple of stories and that's one of my great changes of scenery that i like to do that is taken away from me if there are people in the house so you know it's just uh it's just different and uh i've got to force myself awake more and i've got uh some sort of some of my old recourses are not available to me and uh you know but it works it's fine it's just a little different yeah i think really a lot of it is just having a very frank conversation with the with the spouse and the children saying look if we're gonna make this this uh this machine run

you know i gotta do my work so you guys gotta give me time and it was that's even when i talked to the four-year-old it was kind of that simple yeah when i shut the door it means i can't play exactly and he got it exactly i want to talk about some of the good parts about working home with kids but i know we have another sponsor today too yeah this episode of free agents also brought to you by timing the automatic time tracking app for the Mac. Now time tracking, that sounds like a really boring topic. But the fact is, it's important because you need to track the time you spend doing your job. You may have that to build clients, you may have that to try and analyze what you're doing to become more efficient. But what you don't want to do is like

click start and stop on a bunch of timers every time you do something. It's not natural. It interrupts your workflow. You forget to do it. But timing solves all of that. It automatically tracks how much time you spend on each app, document, and website. Not just like, oh, you were in Safari, but like what websites you were using, what document you were editing in that particular app. And you can apply those to different use types so that you get a better idea of productivity and lack of productivity and what

stuff you're working on and how long you're working on them. You don't have to start and stop timers ever again. Timing is collecting data behind the scenes. It's showing you exactly what you're using, what app, what website, when you slacked off. There's a whole spectrum for the day. And you can say, yep, that was when I was reading that dumb story about Star Trek or Star Wars on the internet and not working. And you can point that out. And then you can see when you jump back in and got in the flow and were working for a couple of hours. And of course, your work doesn't just happen on your Mac. That's why Timeline automatically will make suggestions for filling gaps in your Timeline. And they can ask what you did offline every time you return to your Mac. So you can go back from somewhere and it'll say, okay, what were you doing? And put that into the Timing database as well. So you'll never forget

entering in, say, a meeting that you were doing. I've been using Timing a little bit. It has given me a really interesting perspective on my use case. One of the things I love about it is being able to apply apps and websites and folders in the finder and things like that to specific jobs so that I would never be able to classify like Safari as a podcasting task. But specific websites, like right now, Safari is the front most window for me, because I've got all of our show notes and our ad reads in Safari. I can set timing to say, when you're loading relay.fm, which is where I am right now, or Google Docs, you're doing work. In Relay.fm, I'm doing podcast work. Google Docs, I might be doing podcast work or writing work, but I'm definitely doing work. And that's a level of granularity that really helps. It's very different than if I'm reading the Hollywood Reporter about the latest TV news, because that's, unless I'm working on the TV Talk Machine podcast anyway, that's not work. It's probably for entertainment. So, lots of things that timing

does to make me, in hindsight, be able to see how I'm spending my time and maybe cajole me a little bit about when I'm wasting time. And every time it warns me and says, you were 58% effective yesterday, I get a little irate. I'm like, come on, I must've been more effective than that. But that's all part of understanding a little bit more about how you're working because it's very easy to waste time and then forget that you did it and timing will not let you forget. So download a 14-day free trial. You can measure 14 of your own days and see what you're doing. And you can do that by going to timingapp.com slash free agents. You'll save 10% when you buy it. Timingapp.com slash free agents.

Timing. Stop worrying about time and focus on doing your best work instead. Thanks, timing. Yeah, I got a lot more productive using that app. I did find holes. Yep. The things I didn't know I was doing. Yeah, and it's also showing me the balance between,

I've got like podcasting and writing and stuff broken out and they're all productivity, they're all productive time, but they're different. And that gives me a sense of like, how much time am I spending on podcasting versus writing as well as the stuff that is wasting time one other thing i wanted to mention about um about a challenge is actually about rides it's about being the taxi for your kids yeah yeah and i i want to mention this because this has become actually a serious

i don't know if it is so much anymore although school's back in session so it may become that again like a serious point of friction between me and my daughter is uh because she's a teenager and she's got a lot of stuff going on after school and she's got to get around and get here and there and she started just calling me and saying, can you get me? Like I'm sitting here working and it's three o'clock and she says, can you come pick me up right now? And it got really frustrating for me because, uh, sometimes in my town, there's really bad traffic at certain times of day. Generally the schools are getting out the traffic gets really bad and so i at several points i've actually timed it that the amount of time it takes for me to drive the mile to the high school to pick up my daughter and bring her home

is not any more time than it would have taken for her to drive yeah or for i mean sorry for her to walk yeah and so what that means is that she could have just walked and i could have spent no time and instead it wastes both of our time for that amount of time it's wasting my time unnecessarily to save her any time and another thing on top of it was a lot of times what she was doing is like she would come home and then need to go back to school 40 minutes later or or an hour later for an activity and that got really frustrating for me because i would say why don't you just stay there and she's going no no i don't want to stay there she doesn't want to like study in the library after school or go to starbucks or

and hang out with her friends no no i gotta come home or she didn't want to carry her cheerleading outfit with her all day so she leaves it at home which means she has to come home and then put and then put on her stuff and then go back which needs now she needs multiple rides right yeah huge point of friction for us and i don't have a big solution here other than to say um one of the things that i made clear was i um i i was gonna say no and i had a couple instances where i was like on a podcast and she texted me saying, can you come? And I was like, I can't. Nope.

And learning to say no. And she just has to deal with it. And she knows now the price of wanting to come home is that she's got to actually walk home. It's not that far, but she doesn't want to do it. She's a lazy teenager. The other thing that we did that I think has improved things a lot we'll see how it goes this fall is scheduled rides versus surprise rides so what i started to tell her is like

if you need me to give you a ride somewhere the night before or the morning before you go to school, you got to check in with me, say that you need a ride and see if I will agree. But I am not going to say most of the time, I am not going to say yes to a text saying, can you come get me right now? If obviously look, if she's got a big problem or something, but then, then it it's different but it's literally like i just don't want to hang out here or walk home and i'm being lazy and i'm gonna waste a half an hour of your time like i mean and that's what it really is it's like 30 minutes of my work time not only is it broken up and i'm interrupted but it's 30 minutes that's just gone me sitting in the car so that my 15 year old canold can't walk for 20 minutes.

And so scheduling has helped because I, and then also limitations on that because she's got like cheer or dance or things like that. And so sometimes it's, she needs to go to and from places a few times in a day. And I'll say, I'll give you one, right? Yeah. Like, which one do you want it to be? Do you want me to take you to dance? Do you want me to pick you up from school? But what I'm not going to do is pick you up from school and then 30 minutes later, take you to dance. It's not going to happen. You should just walk to dance. And that has helped. And occasionally it'll happen where

she'll get a ride home and then I'll take her to dance, but it's got to be scheduled. So, that has been a huge point of friction for me. And I want to be helpful because sometimes it's not a big deal. Sometimes I'm at a break. Sometimes all I needed to do in the afternoon was write something and I already wrote it. And then she calls and says, can you come pick me up? And I say, you know what? Sure. This perfect time I can do it. But the challenge is you become a taxi service, you become a public utility, and they assume that you're going to be there whenever they call to take their where they need to go. And for me, that became a huge frustration in time sync. So I don't know, it's a work in

progress, but trying to make her schedule these things and have it not be on demand and limit how many times she can do it, it has become part of the agenda because she's not driving and her friends aren't driving yet. Just starting to now, so this will change. But right now, it's like, I want to be helpful when I can, but I literally can't. That's some of my most productive time in the mid-afternoon and to have to just set everything aside so that I can sit in a car for half an hour so that my 15-year-old can't walk a mile is just ridiculous well i

think there's an underlying issue there that i deal with occasionally too and that's just respect for your time yeah you know and just you know you need to show some respect for my time as well i want to help i want to be there when i can but uh you have to show some respect for my time yeah and that's a challenge with teenagers because teenagers, what I've found being one and now having one is they're in their own little world and they're not really thinking about other people and how their behavior affects other people. Yeah. Well, and it's just like I mentioned earlier in a show where like they'll come in the room

and say, oh, I need you to buy a book for this class for me. And I, you know, I need to go get some cookies for something I'm doing at school. I need to bring cookies. I'm like, okay, but you just can't come to me with no warning and ask me to do all this Now it's not the time for that. Yeah. Pull it together. And later we'll, we'll deal with whatever problems you have.

I want to be there for an emergency. But I, but you have to understand that my time is valuable, too. And I try to say it in a way that doesn't make me sound like a jerk, but it is kind of true. I've got to work. If we're going to pay for the book, you need to buy it for school. Yeah. It is tough. I think that is a challenge with teenagers, honestly, more than with little kids.

that is a challenge with teenagers, honestly, more than with little kids is they just don't understand why anything you do is more important than anything they need. It just doesn't occur to them. So, you know, we've been, we spent most of the show talking about the challenges of working with children or your spouse at home, or, you know, reasons why you need to punch out, you know, but the I think I want to kind of close this episode talking about why it's so great being able to work at home with your kids and significant other around. I mean, for me, uh, I talked about at the top of the show, I feel like I did miss out on some, some special days as my kids were little and that's not happening now. I mean, I'm there for, I'm there for them, you know, um, a lot of it's just the now. I mean, I'm there for them.

A lot of it's just the little things. Our kids just went back to school. And it's fun when they come home fresh off the bus or whatever, and they're talking about their new teachers and seeing their friends again. And you get to kind of share those little things with them that I never really was a part of before. Yeah, I get to greet my son when he comes from school. And, you know, he's tired and he's got homework and all of that. But I get to do that. I get him, like you said, sort of fresh off of that school experience instead of having it be hours and hours later. And that's good. That can make for some special moments sometimes it's a distraction right because suddenly i'm writing a story and i hear him sort of shout from outside the garage that i need to open the garage door so that he can roll his bike in but

but there's a lot of positive stuff about that too and i will say again in the category of distraction but also helpful it's not quite child care but i do have the ability to drop in and say uh are you doing your homework and things like that little little things i'm not going to be able to sit with my son as he does his math homework for an hour and a half at three in the afternoon like it's not going to happen because i've got my job to do right um but a couple of things one is if it's a real desperate problem and I can help him, I can opt to do that and take a little time out from work. But, um, at the very least I can do a thing where I check in and say, what's your homework today

when he gets home and okay, you've got 20 minutes to have a snack and then I want you doing your homework and then see, you know, come out half an hour later or an hour later and see how he's doing with his homework. So that's kind of a good thing where it's a very light touch. I'm not going to be remote controlling him doing his tasks. He needs to be responsible, but I can help him get on task a little bit. And I've really appreciated that. Less so for my daughter. She's older. She's in high school and she's got a lot of after school activities. So she's often not home until basically the same time my wife comes home. But with my son, I've been able to do that and that's been great. And I'd also say that being home for the big things is pretty great too. I mean, sometimes your kids will have a distressful

day, like a genuinely crappy day and being uh, and being there to kind of help prop them up. I mean, I will interrupt my work for that. I mean, if they're in distress, I want to help them out or, or the flip side of that is like, if my daughter got a big part in a play she wanted one day and she came home and I said, okay, that's it. Everybody were going out to eat and celebrate, you know, and being able to just stop everything and do that is special. And I hope that's something that, you know, is a memory that she'll have.

So, you know, as big as hell is other people, but it's also joy. You know, I mean, especially when it's your family being there for them. I think to me, that's one of the biggest advantages of doing this thing that I'm doing is being able to be there on those big days. Yeah, it's a, I was going to throw in there too. It gives you the freedom to do some stuff like schools need help from parents, right? And so one of the things that's been a positive aspect to me is not, it's not a requirement and it doesn't happen that often,

but like if the school needs a parent to drive, I did this a few years ago with my daughter. If the school needs a parent to like drive on a field trip or something like I can volunteer to do that. If I've got time in my schedule, I can block it off. Right. I might not be able to do it,

but I have way more flexibility than i do otherwise for things like driving uh driving or picking up or even going on a field trip with kids from my uh from my kids classes and that's uh that's something that is a luxury that i didn't have it's all good uh just uh just get it sorted out so you can stay home and you'll be surprised what happens. So I bet we've got a few free agents listeners out there that are also dealing with kids and significant others. Maybe you've got something you can share with us for the feedback show on this. Yeah. You can go to relay.fm slash free agents and click the email link to contact us. You can also visit our free agents group and talk to other free agents.

That's at facebook.com slash groups slash free agents group. And you can also tweet at us at freeagentsfm. All right, Jason. I guess we'll see you in a fortnight. All right. We'll be back later. Thanks, everybody. Thank you.