Sunday, January 13, 2013

SAVING TIME, REALLY?

I'm just as fascinated as anyone with timesaving measures and doing things the quickest way possible, even though I sometimes do things the hard way for reasons of my own (building some extra walking into my day, for one).  However, I've recently been reminded of a time-saving strategy that makes absolutely no sense to me.

Reading an article in a women's magazine, I became reacquainted with this tip:  group your silverware together in the dishwasher for faster unloading.  I object to this four several reasons.

First of all, how long does it actually take to put the silverware away once it's clean?  It takes me less than a minute to put all my silverware away, and that's in a couple of steps:  first I take out all the big serving utensils and put them away, then I put away all the steak knives, then all the bread knives, then everything else.  Less than a minute, total. 

Secondly, when you group like silverware, they tend to nestle together.  When they're nested, they don't get cleaned properly, so you have to wash them again, thus using more time and resources than if you'd just mixed them up the way most of us do.

Finally, unless you're part of the Gilbreth clan (the family in the original Cheaper by the Dozen), does saving ten or fifteen seconds really make your life that much better?  It would take you weeks to accumulate a significant chunk of time. 

In my opinion, this is a timesaver that really isn't.

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