I too have had trouble with IM being very distracting, and I often turn it off when working on time sensitive projects.

Funny you should mention South Park. I used to think those little foulmouthed kids were nothing more than just another form of in-your-face shock humor. But, when I actually sat down to watch a bunch of episodes in a row, I discovered that the overall message of the series is really quite positive (be decent to one another) – except for poor Kenny getting killed almost every episode. It’s peppered with a lot of tongue-in-cheek socio-political commentary/satire but made palatable to even the Jackass TV show crowd with buckets of blood, vomit, and excrement (a little something for everyone). It pushes us way past our comfort zone to question everything, which can be a very good thing (is there anyone who doesn’t find Mr. Hankey irresistibly adorable yet gut-instinct repulsive at the same time?).

Never got into instant messaging but when I worked in various law offices, I had fifty to a hundred emails a day. So, it just worked better for me to deal with them quickly while they were fresh in my mind and put that ball into someone else’s court as soon as possible. I even stopped whatever I was doing to get this done. Otherwise the little snowballs would turn into an avalanche by the end of the day and people would hunt me down for an in-person response, always taking ten times as long to get the issue resolved than a mere quick email.

Cool topics, as usual!