Wednesday, February 23, 2011

The Art of Procrastination

Procrastination is an art form. Not everyone can do it well. Somepeople over do it. Some people are too up tight to do it properly and think what they are doing is procrastination, but really they are just taking a break.

So how do you know you are procrastinatiing well?

Let's see....

You have a week off from work, and you think, hey, this will be a great oppertunity to get all that stuff I need to get done accomplished. You reach the end of the week and you are lucky if you even completed one of these tasks completely.

You may ask me, isn't that just being lazy?

Depends on what the tasks are and how much was accomplished.

For example. I am supposed to be editing a book I got for edits last week. I have had it for a week and only edited two chapters. Granted everytime I get started on themand really get my mojo going I get a headache, called into work, or got physically ill and had to go lay down. Those are not excuses because it is incredibly hard to work at the computer when your brain is escaping through the center or your forehead, you are at work with no track changes in which to do said editing or you are keeping the chance of having to clean up regurgitated pasta off of the monitor, keyboard, desk and probably your pet cat who likes to sleep in front of the monitor. Trust me, cleaning throw up off a cat who won't even let you keep your hand if you try to remove an eyebooger from her is not something one wants to do.

So what HAVE I accomplished this past week rather than my edits?

I have read two books.  I have watched all my TV shows (I have five that are currently on air and they come on 4 nights of the 7 days of the week). I have managed to do laundry and dust my bedroom, though I never got around to  vacuuming it so my task is incomplete. I do wash the dishes daily or every other day depending on how many I use, but the table is cluttered again. I sit down a the computer, facebook is my homepage on firefox. I can't help but get sucked into the distracting hell of liking everything I see!!! I must hit the like button. I must! Then I hop around to the locations that I visit daily. Post a bunch of random nonsense. Make a very deep, thought provocating post to prove I have some sort of brain. Then I open microsoft word. Open the file I need to work on. Get to the part where I left off.

Stare at the screen.

Facebook notifcations blink at the bottom of my page. I have a text from Jenn. That one text from Jenn becomes about 40 incoming and outcoming within 10 minutes. It continues. FB keeps blinking at me. I am told to look at the forum I frequent. I laugh. I respond.

I stare at the document I am supposed to be editing.

Phone rings. I talk for 20 min to an hour with my mom.

I make dinner. I throw things in the sink to soak and get back to several hours later when the water is then cold and only remember to do it because I catch Bagheera trying to drink the soapy water.

I stare at the word document.

I edit a paragraph.

Take random pictures of Bagheera being cute. Post them on FB. Wait for comments.

FB blinks at me again. I respond. I post something else. I see a youtube link. I watch it. I watch a link related then another. I laugh. I then browse IMDB and netflix looking for things I want to watch. I check the forum. I check FB. I look at my blog...but I don't post anything because I don't particually want to sign out of my gmail account and back in with my blog account then sign back into gmail because I am waiting on an email to come in. I get said email. I reply.

I stare at word document. Hit save to make it feel like I have done something to it.

I check the snailmail. I go to the store and buy something I don't need with money I can't afford to waste on something I don't need, all for the sake of buying something and using valuable time I could be working.

I rush home. Stare at word document. Edit another paragraph. I finish a page. I finish a chapter. It was four whole pages long. I close word document because it is now 8 at night and I know the rest of the night I won't work. Plan to do it in the morning. Sleep till noon. Go to work. Come home. Talk to friends, watch show go to bed. Plan to do it the NEXT morning.

Honestly I don't know how I get ANYTHING done.

4 comments:

Ricki Treleaven said...

*sighs* I think I am in touch with your emotion ;P

*dashes off to check emails and forum*

Anonymous said...

I've got the procrastination down to an art form too!

BTW ...YOU are the reason I had to increase my texting plan ...AGAIN! LOL

jenn

Victoria said...

Just get unlimited, Jenn! You know if you didn't deny being a dirty mind demonspawn that would cut our texts in half.

LOL Jill!

Anonymous said...

I am NOT a dirty minded demonspawn! If you would just accept my angelicness it would cut them in half!

and I upgraded to 5000 :)

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