The time you stop counting carefully may be the time you are enjoying most freely.

Measuring an experience puts you slightly outside it. The hours you cannot account for afterwards are usually the ones you were fully inside, because your attention was on the thing rather than on its length. Losing track is evidence rather than carelessness. What gets counted is often what is being endured.

When you plan something you want to enjoy, leave the finishing time vaguer than usual. Put the phone elsewhere and let the afternoon report its own length. And if you catch yourself checking the clock a lot, treat that as information about the activity rather than about the hour.