Once there was a man named Mr. Artesian and his activity was tremendous,
And he grudged every minute away from his desk because the importance of his work was so stupendous;
And he had one object all sublime,
Which was to save simply oodles of time.
He figured that sleeping eight hours a night meant that if he lived to be seventy-five he would have spent twenty-five years not at his desk but in bed,
So he cut his slumber to six hours which meant he only lost
eighteen years and nine months instead,
And he figured that taking ten minutes for breakfast and twenty minutes for luncheon and half an hour for dinner meant that he spent three years, two months and fifteen days at the table,
So that by subsisting solely on bouillon cubes which he swallowed at his desk to save this entire period he was able,
And he figured that at ten minutes a day he spent a little over six months and ten days shaving,
So he grew a beard, which gave him a considerable saving,
And you might think that now he might have been satisfied, but no, he wore a thoughtful frown,
Because he figured that at two minutes a day he would spend thirty-eight days and a few minutes in elevators just travelling up and down,
So as a final time saving device he stepped out the window of his office, which happened to be on the fiftieth floor,
And one of his partners asked "Has he vertigo?"
and the other glanced out and down and said "Oh no, only about ten feet more."
That reminds me of a short science fiction story, (I think by Isaac Asimov?) but I can't for the life of me remember what the title was. The protagonist was a writer, who began begrudge the time he would wait for his bus and time waiting for red lights and time waiting in general. By virtue of some machine, he was able to get everything in his life in sync, so that he never had to wait for other people or other things anymore. By the end however, he was unable to write anymore because he found that those times of randomness were when he was able to find his inspiration.
The following is a vignette from a series of vignettes on improv by Billy Merritt:
[THUMP, THUMP, CRASH]
The closet door explodes outward and inside the closet there is a 6 foot worm standing upright. It is green with bits of moist hair all over the body. The head of the worm has two giant eyes that always seems to be crying, and pinchers for a mouth. It makes a noise that is a cross between a hiss and a donkey bray.
Creature: What the fuck is that?!?!
MASTER: That is my worm.
Creature: Your what?
MASTER: My worm. We all have them.
Creature: I'm pretty sure I don't have a worm. I think I would know if I had something like that.
MASTER: Yours may not be as big, but you definitely have one, I can tell.
Crerature: How can you tell I have something like that? Is it inside me? Will it kill me? Jesus, get it out of me!
MASTER: EASY. Once you become an improviser, once you feel you have it down enough that you can improvise with anyone at any time. A worm develops inside you.
Creature: You mean once I finally get it, I get this, this worm inside me. I don't want that, it's disgusting.
[the worm weeps a little louder]
MASTER: The worm is all your bad habits. All the rules you break in order to make a scene work. It feeds off of your bad habits it lives off of denials and bad object work.
Creature: Well then don't you want to kill the worm. Your worm is so big.
MASTER: Thank you. You can't kill the worm, just like you can't eliminate all bad habits. Sometimes you have to break the rules in order to further the scene and go where you never thought you could. You must except your worm, you have a symbiotic relationship with it.
Creature: How do you know when you have a worm?
MASTER: You will know. It will speak to you. You will find yourself doing a scene and you will realize that what you are doing is wrong, then a little voice will say "do it, see what happens" , that is the worm.
Creature: Should I always listen to my worm?
MASTER: No, if you feed it too much it will consume you. You need to develop a relationship with your worm, know your worm, know when to let your worm out to play, and also know when to keep your worm inside.
Creature: Why is your worm so big?
MASTER: I'm a level 37 improviser, a shaft of light, My worm has grown along with me. But I still have to control it, make sure it doesn't get out of hand, or out of the closet.
Creature: What happens if you lose your worm, or if it dies.
MASTER: Then you become a improrobot, making automatic responses, and doing automatic scenes. You run a risk of losing your creativity, your life force. You lose the truth.
Once there was a man named Mr. Artesian and his activity was tremendous, And he grudged every minute away from his desk because the importance of his work was so stupendous;
And he had one object all sublime, Which was to save simply oodles of time.
He figured that sleeping eight hours a night meant that if he lived to be seventy-five he would have spent twenty-five years not at his desk but in bed, So he cut his slumber to six hours which meant he only lost eighteen years and nine months instead,
And he figured that taking ten minutes for breakfast and twenty minutes for luncheon and half an hour for dinner meant that he spent three years, two months and fifteen days at the table, So that by subsisting solely on bouillon cubes which he swallowed at his desk to save this entire period he was able,
And he figured that at ten minutes a day he spent a little over six months and ten days shaving, So he grew a beard, which gave him a considerable saving,
And you might think that now he might have been satisfied, but no, he wore a thoughtful frown, Because he figured that at two minutes a day he would spend thirty-eight days and a few minutes in elevators just travelling up and down,
So as a final time saving device he stepped out the window of his office, which happened to be on the fiftieth floor, And one of his partners asked "Has he vertigo?" and the other glanced out and down and said "Oh no, only about ten feet more."