I love music. Music seems to make work go by faster. Someone please explain this phenomenon to me.

Another similar shrinky/stretchy-time thing for me is when I go to the beach and time seems to drag on in the most delightful way, while eight hours seem to collapse into one seriously intense 30 minutes when I'm having a mad day of colliding deadlines.

Hm. For me, it engages enough of my attention that I'm not dwelling on whatever task is in front of me at that particular moment. Consequently, you're not watching the clock, or "feeling" said moment pass you by. Next thing you know, hey, quitting time!

That could be involved, too. the right song stimulates you, maybe gets you to work a little faster, etc.?

Oliver Sacks wrote about this in great depth.

In short, I think that the mind gets tantalized by the presence of symmetry and beats and measures and just stops feeling so bored, which makes the day go a lot faster.

The book is called "Musicophilia". There is also a book called "This Is Your Brain on Music" by Daniel J. Levintin, which was published a little before "Musicophilia", but personally I think Sacks' book is a far more interesting.

@soulcamp: Thanks for the recs!

@Geoduck: I concur with that and what LadyO said earlier.