I wrote a few paragraphs of this column between school drop-off and an appointment. I sent a bunch of emails between making dinner and taekwondo. Bedtime reading with the kids, then more writing at 1 a.m., after a few hours of sleep. Then back up at 4 a.m. to write and sign up for summer camp.

There's a name for this. It's called "time confetti."

What are the most frequent contributors to your time confetti? If you could convert all of your confetti into leisure time, would you feel guilty?

Fairly quickly, I discovered that my anxiety is fueled by the fact that I do very little in chunks of concentrated time. Instead, my days are chopped up like little bits of time confetti.