Monday Manners: Multi-Tasking

Multi-Tasking: the concurrent or interleaved execution of two or more jobs by a single CPU [or person]
How many of y’all multi-task?  I think it’s in my DNA.  According to an article the hubs sent me a couple of months ago, 40% of moms are mad that Dad can’t multi-task.  And the more kids they have, the madder they are: 46 percent of moms with three-plus kids are irked by this.  Would you agree?  I realized a long time ago that the hubs wasn’t the best multi-tasker, and I’m actually okay with it, now that I’ve come to the realization.  If he brings home the bacon, I can multi-task with the best of them.  Balances out, right?
The hubs prefaced the article he found, with this, “I thought this was funny for two reasons…1) It describes my inability to multi-task and your frustration with that inability to a T, and 2) The example of the woman multitasking involves her actually cooking dinner! ONLY ONE THING AT A TIME.”
Alright, without further ado, here’s the article…
“As mothers, we think nothing of stirring a pot of noodles while setting up a refrigerator-repair appointment, sorting mail, and helping a child with his weekly spelling words. And it annoys us when our husbands act put-upon or overwhelmed when we want them to handle a couple of things at once. The dinner hour tends to be especially trying. Randi Maerz, a stay-at-home mom who lives in Keokuk, Iowa, says she’s repeatedly asked her husband to watch their daughters, 4 and 2, while she’s cooking, if only to keep them safe.
Instead, he comes home with a list of things he plans to do around the house. He gets to focus on one thing at a time, whether it’s changing his clothes or doing touch-up painting on the house. Meanwhile, she’s trying to cook with human leg warmers clinging to her shins.
“His priorities always come first,” Maerz says. “He’s got to accomplish them before he can focus on helping me with the kids.” She likes how he takes on house projects, but his inability to acknowledge her needs and his unwillingness to multitask irritate her every day.
Lisa, a mom of two who lives in the suburbs of New York, knows the feeling.
After a full day at work, she can be cooking dinner, helping with homework, and taking notes for a PTA meeting while her husband is in the family room with their preschooler. She’ll ask him to sort through magazines to be recycled while he’s there, and he’ll claim he can’t because he’s watching their kid.”
How many of y’all have experienced this with your significant others?
How do you multi-task?
Multi-Tasking My Way:
– Folding laundry while watching television.
– Bathing three children at once. 🙂
– Prepping girls’ lunch for the next day, while prepping dinner.
– Walking on the treadmill, while reading my Kindle.
– Doing the elliptical, while responding to emails.
– Watching television, while checking emails on my phone, and surfing the iPad. (My husband says this one has got to go, and I agree!)
Photo Credit: 1, 2, 3, 4

4 thoughts on “Monday Manners: Multi-Tasking

  1. Hah! I watch two different shows while checking emails, cleaning the kitchen and making dinner.

    My husband can barely find his pants.

    I'm beyond being irked by it…I just write him a list and send him on his way.

    Of course many could say multitasking is simply doing 4 things poorly.

  2. Yes ma'am! This is what goes on in my house too.
    Although I must say the hubs is good at working, watching, TV and playing on his ipad. Its amazing when its for him all that he can do at a time. He can watch TV and the girls at the same time too…

  3. These comments are hilarious! I am constantly multi-tasking and I wish I could stop. I bathe 2 at once, love that you have 3 in the tub. I fold laundry on the kitchen island sometimes while watchinf my toddler eat. I too check email and surf the net during tv watching and always have to ask questions which drives my husband nuts.

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