I’m a stickler for timing. Few things irritate me in quite the same way as meetings starting late, or people turning up late. Punctuality is important, and the busier I find myself the more a lack of punctuality irritates me. So here, I’m presenting two articles on being late.

The first is from National Review, and is a little New York centric. Kevin D. Williamson posits that “wasting somebody else’s time is a great sin”. I tend to agree. I particularly liked his description of the commuter holding open the train doors as someone “who is not in such a hurry that he can be bothered to precede the train to its stop but in such a hurry that he cannot wait three minutes for the next train”.

The second is from Medium. It is Max Strom’s advice from life experience on how to cure oneself of being perpetually late. It starts from the position that riunning late is an problem of “life span management and commitment integrity”.

Strom makes some points that I thought were common to everyone – probably because they are things that I always do. Does anyone really plan to arrive on time for an appointment, rather than a few minutes early? Does anyone really fail to plan to fill up their petrol tank? But, on the other hand, some of the advice is stuff I disagree with: my watch always runs a couple of minutes fast, and my brain falls for the con every time… which is a kind of self-sabotage in itself, as it makes me disproportionately annoyed when people arrive late.

Both of these are great reads, and come highly recommended.

2D posts appear on alternate Wednesdays. For 2D, I pick two interesting articles that look at an issue from two different – though not necessarily opposing – perspectives. I hope you enjoy them!