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Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning.

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Speaker 1: This is Laura, Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's

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Speaker 1: tip is to play tetris with your schedule. Sometimes trying

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Speaker 1: to fit everything in can feel frustrating, but if you

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Speaker 1: recast it more as a game, you can maybe feel

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Speaker 1: a little more excited about it. So this episode is

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Speaker 1: first airing in September, which is always a time of

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Speaker 1: new schedules. In my family with five kids, somebody is

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Speaker 1: often starting a new school. Kids try different activities that

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Speaker 1: meet at various times. My sixteen year old will get

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Speaker 1: his driver's license soon, but he doesn't have it yet,

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Speaker 1: so our number of drivers is limit. I need to

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Speaker 1: try to preserve enough time to work. I like to

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Speaker 1: have open time on weekends for seasonal family adventures. Everyone

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Speaker 1: needs to get enough sleep, me included. This can sometimes

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Speaker 1: feel like a lot to fit into one hundred and

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Speaker 1: sixty eight hours. Sometimes I get frustrated as I am

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Speaker 1: waiting for one particular organization to post their activity schedule

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Speaker 1: so I can sign up for a class that a

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Speaker 1: kid really wants and that will affect what other activities

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Speaker 1: he can sign up for, and in the meantime, I

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Speaker 1: see those activities filling up, and well, there are a

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Speaker 1: lot of moving parts. But a few years ago I

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Speaker 1: decided to view this as something of a game. If

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Speaker 1: you are my age or so, you may have spent

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Speaker 1: a lot of time playing Tetris as a kid. Blocks

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Speaker 1: in various shapes drop from the sky and you try

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Speaker 1: to fit them into certain sides holes in the right way.

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Speaker 1: If you create a full line, it disappears and you

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Speaker 1: survive to keep playing. If too many pieces stack awkwardly

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Speaker 1: on top of each other, you hit the top of

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Speaker 1: the screen and it's game over. I think this is

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Speaker 1: a good metaphor for a schedule too. Stuff takes various

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Speaker 1: amounts of time to do. There are certain windows of

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Speaker 1: time that are open and some that are not. The

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Speaker 1: biggest and strangest shapes have to be accounted for first,

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Speaker 1: and then you can move other things around to fit.

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Speaker 1: I certainly try to think strategically about the Tetris of

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Speaker 1: my schedule. How can we schedule things in order to

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Speaker 1: leave the most open time for other things, given that

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Speaker 1: we are usually up on weekends. Anyway, the nine to

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Speaker 1: fifteen soccer session is better than the eleven forty five

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Speaker 1: soccer session. As the latter will chop up a weekend day.

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Speaker 1: We found a swim program that offers two different options

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Speaker 1: Monday and Wednesday or Tuesday and Thursday, and we could

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Speaker 1: select based on another activity that was only offered at

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Speaker 1: one time per week. Activities that happen right after school

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Speaker 1: and at school are preferable to others because there's only

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Speaker 1: one round of driving required, leaving at least one evening open.

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Speaker 1: Lets us have a low key family night, or at

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Speaker 1: least know we've got a spot for rescheduling lessons that

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Speaker 1: inevitably get canceled at some point. Things like my workouts

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Speaker 1: are flexible and so can be scheduled at any point,

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Speaker 1: but I know they are more likely to happen at

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Speaker 1: some points than others. That's one reason we are looking

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Speaker 1: into getting a treadmill for cold winter mornings. By thinking

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Speaker 1: of the schedule as a game, more excited about little wins,

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Speaker 1: It's not just phew, that's done. It's like, hey, I

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Speaker 1: just want another round of Tetris. Maybe no one cares

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Speaker 1: but me. Scratch that, I know no one cares but me,

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Speaker 1: But given how thankless family scheduling can feel, I will

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Speaker 1: take any positive reinforcement I can get in the meantime.

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Speaker 1: This is Laura. Thanks for listening and here's to making

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Speaker 1: the most of our time. Hey, everybody, I'd love to

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Speaker 1: hear from you. You can send me your tips, your questions,

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Speaker 1: or anything else. Just connect with me on Twitter, Facebook

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Speaker 1: and Instagram at Before Breakfast Pod. That's b E the

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Speaker 1: number four then Breakfast Pod. You can also shoot me

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Speaker 1: an email at Before Breakfast Podcasts at iHeartMedia that Before

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Speaker 1: Breakfast is spelled out with all the letters. Thanks so much.

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Speaker 1: Should I look forward to staying in touch. Before Breakfast

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Speaker 1: is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio,

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Speaker 1: visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen

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Speaker 1: to your favorite shows.