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The jobs like painting will probably be completed sooner if you do them in parallel; paint a layer in one room, paint a layer in another room while the first room dries, etc. You're idle for less time, and the work is a fixed amount, so the math works in your favor.
I have no quibble with Brian's conclusion, but we should no confuse it as an example of appropriate multi-tasking, or what he calls doing them...
in parallel (do a little of A, put it down, do a little of B, repeat).
The room painting is not really an example of "parallel" multi-tasking.
Painting a room is a project (or sub-project), not a task. The tasks involved are 1) painter paints first coat, 2) room dries, and 3) painter paints second coat, 4) room dries.
Doing something else (painting room #2) while room #1 dries is NOT multitasking. Going off to paint a coat on another room while room #1 dries is not multi-tasking; it is, as you say, simply productive use of the painter's time while the room "resource" is otherwise occupied drying.
That said, if it takes longer to paint a coat in room #2 than for room #1 to dry, an interesting operational decision is whether to shift back to the second coat of #1 before completing the first coat of #2. If the carpet guys are (or will shortly be) ready to get started on room #1, it may be worth the shift back to the first room before completing the second. Doing so may be multi-tasking, but it may be appropriate multi-tasking.
Bad multi-tasking is the interruption of one task, started, but not completed, to perform another unrelated task for no reason other than to get the second task started. If taken to the (usual) "extreme", bouncing back and forth between uncompleted tasks results in no benefit for either; indeed, it results in delay of completion of both.
Progress is not acheived in just getting something started, or even paritally done. It only really occurs at the completion of the task when some other resource (the carpet guys) can make use of your output - a dried, painted room.
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