...Procrastination

Unless you absolutely love writing essays, which I’m sure most of you do (along with attending 9am lectures, revising for ten exams in the space of one panic-filled evening, and eating shit) there were most likely occasions when you’d do anything to avoid actually getting down to writing one (Or in the case of my poor flatmate, one a week).This list is a rundown of the tried-and-tested activities that I have used for procrastination purposes, which I’m certain will ring a few bells, unless you’re fairly studious, or more likely, an essay writing robot. Why not procrastinate some more by reading this list?

1.      
            1. Washing Up (also Tidying your room, Laundry)

If you’re like me, your kitchen most likely resembles the hell-pit from Withnail & I. Never mind something living among the dirty crockery; the beings in my old dorm kitchen were feral (and that’s just my flatmates, boom boom). But then essay time comes around, and suddenly those fifty plates piled precariously in the sink become priority number one.

I never understood why Withnail & I wasn't remade as a B-movie horror starring a tentacled, washing-up pile inhabiting monster

It’s like, I know that I’m only doing housework to avoid writing my essay, and I understand that subsequently, I’ll be writing said essay at 3am, with the help of five cans of red bull and a piece of sugary cereal to reward every five words written (yes, you’re right; this is far too specific to be anything other than personal experience). However, as I fail to do anything that takes effort and willpower (diets, studying, basic hygiene…), writing essays with time to spare seems like an impossible task. So cleaning is a perfect way to waste an hour or two - or five, depending on the state of the kitchen - without having to leave the apartment. Also, and most importantly, any cleaning activity is an accomplishment. So you can still feel that you’re doing something even though you’re not. YOU’RE REALLY NOT. WRITE THAT ESSAY! Actually don’t; stay to read the rest of this article.

2.  Long Shower (also Long bath, Manicures)

Not to have a wank or wash your hair, I’m talking about standing under the warm water for thirty minutes or longer purely to avoid doing any work. The basic washing routine was completed over twenty minutes ago; now you’re just raping the environment. You’re turning into a prune, your eyes are sore from the various assortment of chemicals that are hitting you from every angle and your flatmate’s banging on the door because she needs a piss and don’t you ever think of anyone but yourself you selfish bastard?!

The problem is what awaits you outside the shower. Once you’ve gotten past your frustrated and hysterical flatmate, you have to contend with the eerie glow of your computer monitor that seems to pierce through the darkness of your empty bedroom, the screen devoid of any content save for a single, unfinished sentence. It’s already 9pm and the deadline’s tomorrow, but you can’t let personal grooming go out of the window just for an essay, can you?

                   3. Snacking (also Late night vending machine dash, Buying redbull in bulk, Raiding kitchen cupboards at three in the morning)

Student version of Ready Steady Cook

At this point you still haven’t written much more than the (somewhat long-winded and pompous) essay title, and your computer clock is telling you that yes, it really is 21:39, despite you thinking it was only five minutes ago that you got out of the shower. However, for some inexplicable reason, and with a sudden intensity, you reason with yourself that you cannot possibly write the essay without any sort of snack, so you pop out to the local 24 hour corner shop in your pyjamas to buy red bull and Maryland cookies, as well as some fizzy Haribo. Starving kids in Africa walk miles for water, and they don’t even consume enough food to live on, let alone snack on two mars bars and a 2 litre bottle of diet coke. Still, I guess the threat of losing 2% of your essay mark a day for late submission isn’t as powerful as the threat of dehydration.

4.  YouTube videos (also Watching television, Watching a movie (or three))

Question: How many of these do you recognise? [click]

Question: When I say ‘autotune’ do you automatically think of this? [click]

Question: Do you know more about bad parenting than your local child services? [click]

….

You are your own worst enemy.


5. Facebook

3.15 am. Finally, you’ve cracked open the first book on your reading list. And of course, some student’s turned each page into the paper equivalent of a five year old girl’s bedroom, thanks to an extreme overuse of pink highlighter. After reading a paragraph, you get tired. You swig some more red bull. You have a cookie. You have another cookie. You read some more. Unbeknownst to you, in your tired state, you’re actually just reading the foreword about the scholar who wrote the damn book. You think to yourself, I’ll just check the internet for five seconds; I’ll just have a quick perusal of my social media websites (Maybe not in those words, but it equates to the same thing). Alas, that was your biggest mistake of the evening, which to be honest, was fairly unproductive from the second you woke up and said to yourself, I’m gonna finish that essay by ten tonight so I can watch a movie to reward myself after. Ha ha ha! Even your alarm clock seems to mockingly flash its neon numbers at you. Now it’s half three and you’re on your Facebook homepage, and what’s that? Some ugly chavvy girl from your old Secondary School is in a relationship? How? She always smelt of piss, and one time she even made out with a cocker spaniel (allegedly). How is she in a relationship with a human male? Click. Ah, that’s why. She’s dating the love child of a sumo wrestler and Worzel Gummidge.

After violating several privacy barriers (well, they choose to upload this stuff), and scrolling down your home page until it can’t load any more television/essay related statuses, drunken photos taken in gloomy nightclubs, and YouTube videos of men in their underwear dancing to Lady Gaga, you get caught in a vicious circle of checking friend’s profiles and looking at their photos. In particular, holiday albums, which could be anything from thirty-odd pictures of sunburnt torsos in Marbella to a month’s worth of snaps of the Australian bush (NOT leaked pictures of Dannii Minogue, I hasten to add).

Facebook is the enemy of the essay, as it brings down productivity levels to zero. Even furtive glances now and then add up to a huge lack of concentration. It’s 5:30 am by the time you actually start your essay, and the regret of procrastination that has slowly been seeping in all night has finally crashed the floodgates. However, you know that this essay ritual has gotten you passable marks up to now and it will continue to get you through the rest of your university career, right until some unlucky sap employs you in an actual job. No matter how you try to fight it, if you procrastinate once, you’re a procrastinator for life.

Now excuse me while I go off and finish my essay.

Oh my god, that girl who dropped out of first year is pregnant?