The Student Pocket Guide | Procrastination: A Guide
Written by Stuart Robinson
Let’s face it, no matter how big that stack of books gets or how many deadlines there are on your calendar, you’re always going to find some way of avoiding work. But even so, there’s no point just sitting around being bored. In aid of this, we’ve come up with our ultimate guide to procrastination, just to help you put off that essay for another day or two…
- Log on to Facebook. Search for people that you barely know, haven’t spoken to in years and hardly even like. Spend hours looking at all their details, photos and friends. Repeat.
- Cook an overly ambitious meal. This also gives multiple opportunities for procrastination, as a lack of ingredients is the perfect excuse for a long visit to the shops. Choose something you’ve never cooked before, as this will probably take you longer anyway, and you may have to start again several times. Meals such as roasts are ideal, but make sure you have plenty of vegetables to prepare while you’re waiting for the meat to cook.
- Most student houses will include desk chairs with wheels. Challenge your housemates to a race down the corridor on your chairs, or construct some sort of catapult and see who can get the furthest.
- If you live in university accommodation with an intercom, wait by the window until someone walks past the door, and shout as loudly as you can down the intercom. If said passer-by doesn’t react, continue shouting at them, complaining how rude they are.
- Collect up old beer bottles from around the house (most student houses will have a lot). Place these in a triangle formation at the end of a corridor, creating a makeshift bowling set. Find a ball (any round fruit will do, or balled-up paper torn from your uni books) to throw at your glass skittles. The first person to break a bottle does all the cleaning for a week.
- Many university halls will come with a phone. Make a friend by dialling a random number from your accommodation and chatting extensively to whoever picks up.
- Redecorate. It only makes sense that you should rearrange every single piece of furniture in the house from day to day. Your housemates will probably also appreciate it if you turn everything in their room upside down while they’re out.
- Find a pack of cards – if you don’t own one, perfect! You’ve got another excuse to go to the shops. Using the internet, teach yourself ever single variation of Poker you can find. If you feel that you need to validate this exercise, just think of it as something to fall back on if you fail university.
- Find an old airbed that no one cares about, take it to the top of your stairs, and instantly you have your own bobsleigh course! If you don’t have an airbed, sleeping bags can work too, although this tends to be more painful. In either case, cushions at the bottom are recommended.
- Take a bath. This can be tried at any hour of the day. Stay there for as long as you possibly can before you really have to do some work/your housemates start to smash the door down.
- Try something new! Since the internet gives you access to pretty much everything, why not give experimental jazz a go? Expand your interests in modern art? Learn a few phrases in Chinese (just in case you’re ever in the region)?
- Watch Jeremy Kyle.
