A kettle sits in my front garden, inside a wedge of polystyrene in a cardboard box. I know for sure it is a kettle, because I justbought a new one. On Taobao.
一个水壶放在我的前花园里，在一个纸板箱里的聚苯乙烯楔子里。 我确定这是一个水壶，因为我刚买了一个新的。 在淘宝上。
The piercing whistle of the old one has ushered in a new dawn of tinnitus that makes it even more difficult than usual to hold a coherent thought in my head. So that’s why there is a kettle in the garden. But that’s not the only item sitting amid the straggly weeds that herald springtime.
旧哨声的刺耳哨声迎来了耳鸣的新曙光，这让我比平时更难在脑海中保持一个连贯的想法。 所以这就是花园里有一个水壶的原因。 但这并不是唯一坐在预示着春天的草叢中的物品。
Each afternoon, a man in a little square box on wheels screeches into our driveway, like an F1 pilot over the finish-line.
每天下午，一个装在车轮上的方形小盒子里的人尖叫着进入我们的车道，就像一个F1飞行员越过终点线。
He then either turfs packages onto the path, or yeets them over the hedge. If it has a “fragile” label on the front, he throws it at the front porch.
然后，他要么把包裹放在小路上，要么把它们扔到树篱上。 如果前面有一个“脆弱”的标签，他就把它扔到前廊。
Mostly, this is fine. Ever since Fresh Hippo (盒马) launched its 24-hour delivery service from Taobao, the most mundane of items arrive daily. Gone are the days of exotic parcels. Today, apart from the kettle, my kuaidi friend hurled tins of tomato pulp, five kilos of wholewheat flour and two bags of cat litter at the front door. Other exciting purchases include toilet cleaner, tins of tuna, and toothpaste.
大部分，这很好。 自从Fresh Hippo（盒马）从淘宝推出24小时送货服务以来，每天都有最平凡的物品到达。 异国情调包裹的日子已经一去不复返了。 今天，除了水壶，我的kuaidi朋友在前门扔了一罐西红柿果肉、五公斤全麦面粉和两袋猫砂。 其他令人兴奋的购买包括马桶清洁剂、金枪鱼罐头和牙膏。
The commonplace elements of the weekly grocery shop of bygone days now arrive near my doorstep at the click of a keypad.
过去的每周杂货店的常见元素现在只需点击键盘就会到达我家门口。
Think of all the time I save! Gone are the sensory assaults that were supermarket trips. No more choice paralysis over which brand of washing powder to choose from the endless aisle of options.
想想我省下的所有时间！ 超市之旅的感官攻击消失了。 不再为从无尽的选择过道中选择哪个品牌的洗衣粉而陷入选择的麻痹。
But where exactly does all this extra time manifest in my life? I feel just as busy as ever. Certainly, over the last few years, the importance of self-care and downtime has come to the forefront of public consciousness, while the mere thought of having an extra chunk of time for rest and relaxation is delightful.
但所有这些额外的时间到底在我的生活中表现在哪里？ 我感觉和以前一样忙。 当然，在过去的几年里，自我护理和休息时间的重要性已经排在了公众意识的首位，而一想到有额外的休息和放松时间就令人愉悦。
And yet, this time gained by not traveling to, or parking at, or whizzing around grocery stores every day has not translated into a more manicured garden. I have not used it to revamp my moribund exercise routine. The novel that lives somewhere in my subconscious mind is no closer to existence in the physical realm than it was before the kuai di delivery man took over my shopping duties.
然而，通过不每天去、停车或在杂货店里转来转去而获得的这段时间并没有转化为更修剪整齐的花园。 我没有用它来改造我垂死的锻炼习惯。 生活在我潛意識的某個地方的小說並不比在kuai di送貨員接管我的購物職責之前更接近於物理領域的存在。
I am suffering from the modern-day affliction of “time poverty”. This term, coined by Cassie Holmes, PhD, author of Happier Hour: How to Beat Distraction, Expand Your Time, and Focus on What Matters Most, refers to the modern phenomenon of having too much to do, and not enough time to do it.
我正在遭受现代“时间贫困”的折磨。 这个术语是由Cassie Holmes博士创造的，她是《更快乐的时刻：如何克服分心，扩大你的时间，并专注于最重要的事情》的作者，指的是现代现象，即有太多事情要做，而没有足够的时间去做。
Now, to be fair, I am my own worst enemy in this respect. In order to stay motivated and operational, I need to have my plate piled high with quests and sub quests. Otherwise, I will watch “Come Dine With Me” ‘til the cows come home and do absolutely nothing. Having too much free time, paradoxically, can be stressful and lead to lower productivity.
现在，公平地说，在这方面，我是自己最大的敌人。 为了保持动力和操作，我需要把任务和子任务堆得满满的。 否则，我会看《Come Dine With Me》，直到奶牛回家，什么都不做。 矛盾的是，有太多的空闲时间可能会带来压力，并导致生产力下降。
But still, I must have saved a good 30 minutes by ordering my kettle online, and this week I discovered that my kuai di friend will even lob a bottle of contact-lens solution out of his three-wheeler; another 30 minutes a month to add to my discretionary time allowance. So where is it all?
但是，我在网上订购水壶一定节省了30分钟，这周我发现我的kuai di朋友甚至会从他的三轮车里拿出一瓶隐形镜头溶液；每月再增加30分钟来增加我的自由裁量时间。 那么，这一切都在哪里？
Dr. Holmes suggests that the secret to increasing satisfaction with the downtime I (apparently) have begins with cataloguing it, and then “hunting for waste”. By conducting a discretionary time audit, we can become more conscious of where, when and how we spend the free time that we currently enjoy, and then tweak it to maximise its potency.
Holmes博士认为，提高我（显然）对停机时间满意度的秘诀始于对它进行编目，然后“寻找浪费”。 通过进行可自由裁量的时间审计，我们可以更清楚地意识到我们在哪里、何时以及如何度过我们目前享受的空闲时间，然后对其进行调整以最大限度地发挥其效力。
So, I gave this a try. And sure enough, the evening meals, revenge procrastination deep-dives, and “Come Dine With Me” marathons add up. All told, there is a good two hours of downtime that I do not adequately account for nor appreciate in my day, which is quite frankly, tragic.
所以，我试了一下这个。 果然，晚餐、復仇、拖延深度潛水和「和我一起用餐」馬拉松加起來。 总而言之，有两个小时的停机时间，我一天中没有充分解释，也没有欣赏，坦率地说，这是悲剧。
The good news is that awareness is the first step towards resolution. The Doctor has a plethora of suggestions for maximising downtime, one of which includes outsourcing as many time-consuming tasks as possible, but since that is what led me to her in the first place, I will share another nugget of wisdom to launch you into a downtime revolution. Apply a “happiness filter” to your commitments, prioritising that which brings you joy and pencilling in “do nothing” as well, to prevent the risk of over committing.
好消息是，意识是解决问题的第一步。 医生有很多关于最大限度地利用停机时间的建议，其中之一包括尽可能多地外包耗时的任务，但由于这是我首先找到她的原因，我将分享另一个智慧，让你进入停机革命。 在你的承诺中应用“幸福过滤器”，优先考虑给你带来快乐的事情，并用铅笔画“什么都不做”，以防止过度承诺的风险。
One side of my brain decries this as ludicrous and yet it possesses a certain seductive allure. Scheduling time for rest and reflection finally locks down the missing hours now the purview of my kuaidi-lobbing delivery man.
我大脑的一方谴责这很荒谬，但它具有某种诱人的魅力。 安排休息和反思的時間，终于锁定了缺失的時間，現在是我kuaidi-lobbing的送貨員的管轄範圍。
It’s not that the time saved by this and other outsourcing tactics vanishes into the ether, it is more a mindset issue. Becoming conscious of how and when we spend our time allows us to better use it to find fleeting moments of happiness.
这并不是说这个和其他外包策略节省的时间消失在以太中，这更像是一个心态问题。 意識到我們如何以及何時度過時間，使我們能夠更好地利用它找到轉瞬即逝的幸福時刻。
The thud of a package slamming into the front door, or bouncing across the garden is music to my ears. It is the sound of free time pinging into my day. Modern life is changing at an unprecedented rate.
包裹砰的一声砰地撞上前门，或者在花园里蹦蹦跳跳，在我耳边是音乐。 这是空闲时间进入我的一天的声音。 现代生活正在以前所未有的速度变化。
Just like the kuaidi van burns rubber down the driveway, it can feel like life is speeding towards some invisible finish line. Constant change and a frenetic pace can make us forget the boon that comes with living in an ever-accelerating world.
就像kuaidi面包车在车道上燃烧橡胶一样，感觉生活正在加速走向一些看不见的终点线。 不断的变化和疯狂的步伐会让我们忘记生活在一个不断加速的世界里所带来的福音。
So get your cheese delivered, buy your veggies online, eat, drink and be merry without setting a foot outside the door.
因此，让你的奶酪送货上门，在线购买蔬菜，吃喝玩，不用出门就快乐。
But don’t let those minutes spared vanish into the doom-scrolling vortex. Try a time audit. Take stock of where and when you spend your precious moments and then tweak to the max.
但不要让那些幸免于难的分钟消失在厄运的漩涡中。 尝试时间审核。 盘点你在哪里以及什么时候度过你宝贵的时刻，然后调整到最大。
I am so grateful for any extra minutes to any day, and my delivery friend, upon reflection, has provided me with far more of these than any other innovation of our time.
我非常感谢任何一天的任何额外分钟，经过反思，我的送货朋友为我提供的这些比我们时代的任何其他创新都多得多。
It is with gratitude in my heart, that I retrieve the kettle, the milk, and the teabags from the garden, and brew a cuppa to the health of the bringer of time wealth, the kuaidi delivery guy.
我怀着感激之情，从花园里取回水壶、牛奶和茶包，为带来时间财富的人，kuaidi送货员的健康煮了一杯茶。