Adult Swim: Celeb-Nerdy with Rob Corddry

Just in case you were bonked on the head by a stray pineapple, here's a newsflash for ya: It's the year 2011. It's time to wrap your mind around the reality that nerds no longer are restricted to wearing pocket protectors, glasses wrapped in Scotch tape, and acid-washed floods. That's right: Nerds can be cool now. This is especially true of celebrity (which are always cool) nerds (who we're also now telling you can be cool). In Celeb-Nerdy, we speak to such specimens, inviting them to geek out on their collections of gourmet dust bunnies and rare jumping edamames.

In this edition, Childrens Hospital (new episodes every Thursday night at midnight, E/P) creator Rob Corddry explained how and why he got addicted to GTD, or Getting Things Done. Or as they say south of the IHOP-Waffle House Line: Git 'R' Done. Or as they say in plain English: Shortcuts to making your day-to-day more efficient.

Rob on Accidental Penetration

I heard you're a big fan of this book, Getting Things Done. Is your love of GTD exclusive to that?

No, not really. I'm a computer nerd above all. But the thing I get really geeky about is how to use computers and their peripherals to shave seconds off my workflow. [Laughs.] I'm really into productivity tools and toys, really, because it's all masturbatory at the end of the day. That's how I spend my free time, tweaking my computer settings.

So when did this start? After you got famous or before? Can you pinpoint a specific moment?

Well, I've always been a list person.

“I'm really into productivity tools and toys, really, because it's all masturbatory at the end of the day. ”

Like "to-do" lists?

Yeah, yeah. You know when you get to that point when you feel really, really anxious and you feel really overwhelmed and that you're never going to get everything you have to get done, done? And then you make a list and you feel like you've gotten half of what you had to do done. Almost. It's so satisfying making the list, and then you're so motivated to do the stuff on the list. That's kind of a universal thing, right? That's the kind of person I was before I discovered GTD.

I actually discovered GTD at the same time I was writing Childrens Hospital. It was during the writers' strike. So I had nothing to do, so I spent eight hours a day being productive about productivity. I was putting a system in place and teaching myself how to be more productive when I was finally allowed to be again.

What was the biggest change you had to make mentally in that transition?

Oh, God it was all so gradual. It was months and months and months. First thing I had to change... I guess it was realizing that sort of phenomenon I described, that anxiety-reducing list-making thing? That can actually be systemized. Realizing when I read GTD, "Oh my God, this is it!" This whole system is built to give you that feeling that whole time.

So how did you hear of GTD in the first place, and were you of the mind that this stuff was BS at the time? Because I'm sure at least 90 percent of the country assumes that about this stuff unless they've tried it.

David Allen, the guy who created this system, says it takes about two years for you to learn how to do it. You just gotta keep doing it. If you're just playing with these things like they're gadgets, they're not gonna take. It's like putting yourself on a healthier diet: it's hard for a long time but it eventually becomes part of your lifestyle.

“It's like putting yourself on a healthier diet: it's hard for a long time but it eventually becomes part of your lifestyle.”

How David Allen Gets Things Done

Do you apply these techniques when you're on set?

Oh, see, now that's the problem: I don't. When I'm working on the set, I don't. Every other aspect of my work life is pretty systematical. But on set it's more about hoping that you've got your ducks in a row via the system so that when the inevitable barrage of questions from hundreds of people hit you, you will instinctively know the answers to them. The whole thing about GTD is creating a kung-fu-like, mind-like-water [mental state]. Meaning, you respond appropriately to the size and force of the pebble thrown in your pond, basically. It's gonna create a ripple. But in a pond, that ripple quickly goes away. That's what should happen in kung fu, as well as list-making. Same exact thing.

What is kung fu but a list of ways to punch people?

[Laughs.] Exactly, exactly. Or to defend yourself against people punching you. I have to tell you: "GTD here. GTD here. GTD no here."

Were there times when you tried to enact these philosophies on the set, or did it just never work from the start?

I do it to a certain extent but it kinda falls apart. I use the tools I already have in place and hopefully they work for me. Sometimes s*** breaks down because the very nature of being on set is it's completely unpredictable. I don't work at it when I'm on set. I just let it go and hopefully it works for me.

What's the biggest misconception about GTD?

There is no misconception. They're completely right that it's nerdy, cult-y, and really boring.

“They're completely right that it's nerdy, cult-y, and really boring.”

If it's nerdy, what's the nerdiest or weirdest thing you've done to indulge this interest?

I don't know if it's weird -- everyone who uses this will tell you it's the most normal thing ever. But there's this application called TextExpander. Basically, you enter codes for things you find yourself typing a lot: Your name, your phone number, your address, or the date. If I type "pp," my phone number comes up. It just pops up in whatever I'm typing.

Also I give a lot of notes on scripts. I'm constantly giving notes. When I give notes, I'm blue, David Wain is red, and Jon Stern is purple. I hit "aa" and immediately a blue "agree?" pops up, if I agree with a note. David Wain is very fond of saying, when giving notes, "We have to cut a little air out here." So he just types whatever, "cc," and that whole frame pops up. That is probably the most minute, micro way I shave time.

Text Expander

There's actually a function, a window pane, in the application where you can see how much time you have saved in your life. I'm up to seven or eight days. It measures it.

What are you going to do with those extra days?

[Laughs.] Exactly. That's the catch, right? Really, though, you want to create flow. I think a lot of this s*** is bulls***, and a lot of this s*** can get really preachy, and Dr. Phil-y and self help-y. But I find people like Merlin Mann, Seth Godin are people who are really practical about it. If you're a "knowledge worker," meaning you don't go to an office and [having] a set of tasks what you do, it's basically amorphous what you do. You have to create your own way to achieve flow. By "flow" I mean that feeling that when you look up at the clock and you've been working for four hours and you had no idea. And you're just going, you're passionate, and you're just going. Everyone's had that feeling, even people who put f***ing switches on widgets. It becomes a lifestyle and it's about creating that ideal environment within which to work.

Are there websites or message boards you lurk on to stay posted on this stuff? I'm sure you've aware of Lifehacker, but what about any others?

I like Lifehacker, but it really has become counterintuitive in a way. There's only so many articles I can read about the best way to open a can. I'm all about the concept of hacking your life to be more efficient and productive, but that just becomes white noise to me. I do like Lifehacker, I like Gizmodo, Merlin Mann has a bunch of different sites, 43 Folders, Kung Fu Grippe, and he has taken this GTD thing into a more technological realm. He became famous for Inbox Zero. His whole thing is that email is an unsolvable problem. Too many of us let email dictate our day. We go through our email, we all have 40 or 50 emails a day, and we let our email tell us what we're gonna do next? It makes no sense and it's unmanageable.

“There's only so many articles I can read about the best way to open a can.”

He has this system much like GTD where you do it on your own terms and you keep your inbox absolutely empty at all times. I have zero unread emails in my inbox. Unread emails are kernels of anxiety, and that's the whole thing with GTD: knocking out those tiny kernels.

What's the strangest or most expensive purchase you've made to pursue this? Has there been anything you've had to justify yourself, "It's ridiculous, I know, but I really need it."

[Laughs.] Just the opposite, to tell the truth. I'm one of those guys who for some reason needs a new computer every year or two and can justify it in really bulls*** ways. When this new iPad 2 came out I'm like, "Of course I'm gonna start justifying that purchase." But then I realized I'm at a point where I can't lie to myself anymore and buy that, because I do not need it. The improvements are just negligible enough to make me feel like a liar if I buy it. [Laughs.]

What's your take on cloud computing? Is it going to help save time, you think?

I don't know if it saves time. It's definitely more efficient. We're in the Wild West of it right now. I run my whole show on Google Docs. We're all in the cloud, basically. And we're all on DropBox, as well. We're for the most part, paperless and all in the cloud.

Has there ever been a point where you maybe started to lose interest in GTD since you started? Or have you only gotten more enthused about it as time has gone on?

I go through phases. Right now I'm in a phase where it's just working for me so I'm not really concerning myself with the nuts and bolts of it. However, last week I was feeling very anxious. I had a lot to do and I was really overwhelmed by it. It doesn't really happen to me anymore, so I just looked at my system and tried to look where the hole was. I hadn't collected my thoughts in a long time. I hadn't reviewed my projects and I hadn't gotten everything I felt I had to do out of my head and onto paper. That's the whole idea behind GTD: Getting everything you think you have to do out of your head, and then organizing it by small, doable physical actions.

"Send out Christmas cards" is impossible. That's impossible to do. That's why people hate sending out f***ing Christmas cards. But if you look at "send out Christmas cards" and "organize addresses for Christmas cards" and then "print out labels for Christmas cards" and "go buy Christmas cards." Boy, that seems really manageable, and then when you organize those addresses? You're a quarter of the way through that task. And it feels really good.

“‘Send out Christmas cards’ is impossible. That's impossible to do. That's why people hate sending out f***ing Christmas cards.”

That's the thing. I don't think it's as crazy, really, as people assume it is. There are macros in Word, for instance, but no one really knows how to use them or that they exist.

Look, look, don't get me started on Microsoft Word. That program is useless because there are so many bells and whistles that nobody uses. That's why I don't use any f***ing word processor. I use text files. F***ing TextEdit. What do I need anything else for? I might need to bold something or italicize. That's all. What do you need all that s*** for? A lot of this stuff is about the right tool for the right job. I don't want a tool that does 20 things. I want one tool that does one thing really well.