when procrastination catches up

sure enough this happens to me too frequently.

"sure, yeah, no problem i can do that"

then reality strikes...oh yeah, i have a job, wife, kids, no time, etc.

so i find myself in another predicament...a project due next week and only 30% complete.  so how do you finish 70% in a few days (and actually less in hours)?

jack daniels and water. oh wait, did i say that outloud?

okay seriously...here's what helped:

1-written out plan
i find that if i don't write a plan down, i'll continue to procrastinate and go all over the place.

2-realize you can't do everything
if you think you can do it all, you can't -- get over it and get help

3-find help
for me it was in the form of short-cuts in technology...these tools saved me:

• visual studio .net -- duh.
• aspNetEmail -- www.aspnetemail.com -- the EmailTemplate control rocks
• LLBLGen Pro -- www.llblgen.com -- one of my new favorite tools -- rapid generation of ORM-based DAL and great object model
• FreeTextBox -- www.freetextbox.com -- they should really name it [NotSo]FreeTextBox since you have to pay for the cool features ;-)
• Enterprise Library -- www.microsoft.com/practices -- with the new enterprise library, the configuration is so much easier to understand and quick to setup
• MasterPages -- i rolled my own implementation based on the Paul Wilson article -- not having to worry about the elements is awesome...concentrate on the functionality
• CodeRush -- www.devexpress.com -- only improves vs.net
• BaseClasses -- implement common functionality into base classes so that controls/master pages can be rapidly implemented
• WebUI 2.1 -- www.componentart.com -- for great menus, site maps, etc.

these are huge timesavers for me...check them out -- i highly endorse all of them!

4-quiet place with least distractions
probably the most difficult for me -- i'm usually easily distracted at home -- especially with a young one running around.  finding some type of peace is key to getting “in the groove” -- for me it is in my office, locked door, ipod in ears, and wife away [note: wife away usually means shopping, so this procrastination may ending up actually costing money ;-) ]