If You Give a Blogger a Cup of Coffee

(This is purely a parody of a beloved book and not associated with it in any way.)

If you give a blogger a cup of coffee, she’s going to ask for a cookie to go with it. Smelling the aroma of the coffee, she’ll ask for a five-minute break to enjoy it. When she sits down with her cookie and coffee, she’ll decide to check her Facebook. She’ll see 27 new notifications.

When she clicks on her notifications, she’ll “like” ten posts, comment on five photos, and respond to seven comments on her page, two messages, and two group posts inviting her to drop the link to her latest blog post. When she posts her link, she’ll look at five other bloggers’ sites and subscribe to two. When she subscribes, she’ll be directed to her email to confirm. When she checks her email, she’ll find 17 new messages and want to respond to five of them.

When she begins her responses, she’ll decide that she should send the emails from her website address and she’ll log into her webmail. She’ll realize that she hates her webmail and remembers a trick she read about setting up an alias to link it to Gmail. She’ll then google the directions and configure her webmail. While she’s in the settings, she’ll update her automatic signature and upload a more current photo to all of her Google accounts. When she returns to her inbox, she’ll see a request for her info for a sponsored post. When she reads the email, she’ll decide to quickly write a cover letter and update her media kit.

When she updates her media kit, she’ll find some new photos to highlight her popular recipe posts. Seeing the photos, she realizes that… she’s hungry. She’ll probably ask you for another cookie. And, chances are, if you give her another cookie, she’ll want a cup of coffee and five more minutes to go with it.

If that rhythm sounds familiar, it is because this little story owes everything to If You Give a Mouse a Cookie by Laura Numeroff. The mouse and the blogger have the same problem. One small request leads to the next, and suddenly the whole day has wandered off.

How to Keep a Five Minute Break to Five Minutes

The coffee is innocent here. The real trouble is that the break has no edges. A few small habits can give it some:

• Set a timer. Five minutes feels generous until you open an app, and then it feels like nothing. Let the timer be the bad guy.
• Leave your phone in another room. If checking it means getting up and walking, the cookie suddenly looks like the better deal.
• Silence what is not urgent. Those 27 notifications will still be there later, and very few of them were ever on fire.
• Take the break away from your desk. A chair by the window does not have a Facebook tab open.

A Simple Way Out of the Email Rabbit Hole

Notice how the blogger never actually answers the emails? She fixes the webmail, the signature, the photo and the media kit instead. Those are all real jobs, which is what makes them so sneaky. Try these the next time your inbox starts handing out side quests:

• Pick one job before you sit down. Write it on a sticky note by the keyboard, so there is something to come back to when you drift.
• Check email at set times. Twice a day is plenty for most of us, and it beats jumping at every little red number.
• Keep a later list. When you think of a brilliant fix, write it down and keep going. If it takes under two minutes, go ahead and do it. If it does not, it waits its turn.
• Stay out of the settings. Nothing good has ever happened in there on a deadline.

Coffee and Cookies Worth Stopping For

If the break is going to be short, it should at least be good. Keep coffee beans in an airtight container somewhere cool and dark, away from the stove, and grind them right before you brew if you can. For the cookie half of this arrangement, baked cookies keep for a few days in an airtight container at room temperature and for a couple of months in the freezer. Better yet, freeze scoops of dough on a tray, move them to a freezer bag, and bake just one or two at a time, adding a minute or two to the baking time. One cookie, on demand, with no whole batch tempting you from the counter.

Need something to read during those five minutes? Try my favorite coffee quotes or plan a field trip to a Harry Potter themed coffee shop. Just set the timer first.

If You Give a Blogger a Cup of Coffee… she’s going to want a cookie to go with it.