The Joy of Procrastination, and other guilty pleasures

Raise your hand if you are one of those cool people who like to leave everything to the last minute.

Well guess what ladles and gentlespoons, you are not alone. I am a top player in this sport, and like all great talents I started it when I was very young.

I was very much a child of the new millenium, which meant my closest friends growing up were TV, Computer, and his cool younger brother Playstation. Not an uncommon thing in this day and age, but it did mean that my personal time was eaten away faster than a piece of cheese in a rat cage. Normally it was homework that was the first to suffer. I sang the anthem of the procrastinating pro, "I will get to it in just a minute", and then I learned the tactic of being able to do homework that should really take an hour or to, and do it in 20 mins flat and make the teacher thing I was a fine student so much that they looked over some of the more obvious mistakes.

Oh yes, I was a child prodigy at the age of 10, and moving my way through school only got easier.

But it wasnt just school that my masterful talent aided me in. The twin demons of housework and ironing were beat into submission fast, and I soon realised I had all the time in the world. Exams, Coursework, Christmas Shopping, Birthday Shopping, and doctors and dentist appointments, I was a pro.

Problem was that I learned that my guilty pleasure had one hell of a cost, and it only seemed to hit me when i was in was in my late teens. I had grown up under the assumption that I had all the time in the world, and now I realised that time was the only thing any one person really has, and mine was up. It hit me with the finality of a rock rolling down a steep hill, you want more than anything to pull it back, but momentum was already built up and now all you can do is watch it slip further and faster away.

I started doing things with my life, even if they were only the dull jobs that make up a life. I did my washing, before the laundry basket was overflowing, I cooked a meal for one, without using the microwave. The XBOX360 went off for a while, and so did the TV. I went out to lunch with friends, and indluged in a shopping trip or two. I did my chores without complaint and before I knew it my rush of getting away with it was replaced by some other emotion, getting the job done, a somewhat more hollow version of that old rush, but still good.

Now I cant get enough of doing the things I should be doing, even if they are rather dull to the outward observer. If I had to explain the unusual pleasure of doing my own washing and ironing I bet you would think i was insane, because seeing this written down, I already think I am.

Dont for a second think that I am a retired procrastinator though, I occassionaly dust of my old gear and the anthems of "Not right now, but by the end of the day" are still quick to cross the mind and the tongue. But I like to think I am now merely a semi-retired procrastinator, which seems to be ironic in more ways than one.

Still as I write I can hear that my current load of washing is done, and ready to be transferred to the dryer. And what kind of new leaf would I have turned over if I did not attend to it as soon as possible.