A great question, for sure. How to not lose time...

But here are some things you might want to try, based on my experience (and I had an incident like yours a couple of weeks ago).

Use a GPS with the volume on. I have a GPS unit for my car and a smart phone. It seems dumb to use my GPS to get to and from t office since I go there all the time, but the voice commands usually keep me on track.

Chew strong tasting gum or suck on sour candy

Drink ice water

Put hand lotion on when at stoplights. Especially if you have one with a nice scent

Do mental math. Like count backwards from 100 by threes. Or say the alphabet backward.

Talk on the phone