Watch full size video:

Multitasking is each the backbone of civilization as we know it, or the scourge of our very souls.

It is, after all, the reason that laundry gets folded, meals beget made, dogs get walked, friends get called, bosses get e-mailed, bodies get exercised and kids get carpooled, even if those activities — stacked end to end — would smear remoter longer than a person’session allotted waking hours in a age.

It is also why we have power to’t remember what our spouse told us five minutes ago and why we find ease to be such a, well, light task.

So is it really faster? Here’s an experiment. We found a multitasker extraordinaire, a woman in the place of whom “multi” isn’t really a strong enough descriptor.

(Gazilliontasker? Infinitytasker?) Anyway, she’s Jacqueline McBride, and she lives in Western Springs, Ill., with her husband, Jason, and five kids: Vivienne, Aidan and Georgia (7-year-old triplets), Finnian, 5, and Declan, 2. She describes her medial sum week as such: “Normal house work, cleaning, laundry, cooking three meals plus snacks, grocery shopping and the pattern. I am the kindergarten room mom with a view to Finn and just hosted the party in opposition to them including all the crafts and stores. I volunteer on Mondays for phonics. I also back coach soccer and get all of the four older kids to and from all social engagements and soccer and basketball, soon to be baseball and soccer.”

But there’s more. So, so much more.

She designs and sews baby blankets, children’s garments and T-shirts for moms, which she sells at limited boutiques.

She has a side function reupholstering embellishments and making window treatments. And she dabbles in the odd side job at home.

“My friends think I am crazy because I paint my possess house and put up my own crown molding in my kitchen,” she says.

She’s also a triathlete. “All of my training during the week has to happen before 7 a.m. so I can be home when my husband leaves for be in action,” she explains. “I help followers a group of women, about 14 on a expert day, onward Thursday mornings at 5:20 a.m. at the Lyons Township (Ill.) footprint. On Saturdays I moil at a running store (Run Chicago in Forest Park, Ill.) from 6:45 a.m. until noon.”

We challenged McBride to stop multitasking for 48 hours. For two full days, she was to pursue no other than one activity at a time — no chatting on the phone while driving to soccer, not any checking e-mail while cooking dinner, not any plait laundry while checking the kids’ homework.

McBride took our challenge.